Springsong

At last some wood actually going back in instead of adding to the great pile of junk that we have taken out of her. These planks are as you can see sapele, we already had this timber, when that is finished we will go over to the Russian red wood, purely on a cost basis. When we pulled the formica off the s/board bulkhead we of course found, what ? You guessed it ROT. So the bulkhead we were leaving in is now on that ever growing heap, and yet more 20mm ply is on order. The second and third photos show the rot, although the shower was on that side we think the damage was done by water coming through the deck, she will be rectified when we put new ply on the decks and seal the whole with epoxy.The final picture shows the all too familiar open plan look of the saloon and galley.

Hi Howard You are certainly closer than Trevor but still no prize

Sorry Trevor. Cold.

Forgive the posseur in the picture but I was once young. Notice the wasp trap a jam jar with a little marmalade and beer in it a paper top with hole in it, once in they could not get out, got drunk and drowned, no life jackets see. So where is this scene of torture ?

Hi All I have been thinking about this. In the picture are my mother and her father, they, and my other grandparents were on Golden Eagle from Oulton Broad so it could be south, or north

Not too much to report this week. We went down Monday and Will fitted the new bulkhead you see in the photos , the hanging cupboard still to be made with a new door to be made as well. A little worrying we have found a small amount of woodworm in the saloon/cockpit door, we have of course treated for this and it is the first evidence we have found, they apparently like oak and the doors are veneered one side oak the other mahogany, as you can see they only touched the oak. Fussy eaters? So new doors there as well, good job Will has veneering skills as well !!!

The first photo is the coaming running at deck level inside the aft cockpit, a finishing piece if you like, not to bad, a good sand and a little scrapeing and away we go. No you forgot didn't you it's a wooden boat, next picture the other side of same piece of wood, rotten as a pea, which takes us to the next picture behind the coaming. Now this has had a little more of a dire effect, but we have managed to save the day by pooring a smidge of epoxy into the top of the rudder post to stop the progress of rot and to give it strength, it really is not that bad,but some of the timber around it is a little iffy. Next, the edges of the transom are now trimmed and faired ready to take the new planks, which hopefully will now be on order ready for the start of fitting next week Finally the ply will have a coat of epoxy binding a layer of finely woven glass cloth, the strip of wood you can just see in the picture is for this cloth to be epoxied to to give a good watertight finish, the tongue & groove will then butt up to it to give a nice finish. A solid wood handrail will run from side to side on the roof to take water away from the aft cockpit and also as somewhere for the cover to be fastened to.

Hello All I shall try to catch up in some kind of order I have as usual been so busy, I really don't know how I ever had time to have a job/work. First picture is Ivor removing planks from the bottom of the boat. I had thought they were rotten, but no apparently some bright or not so bright spark had put three short planks about a foot long, side by side and all finishing in a straight line across, a complete no no what's more to hide it, it had had a piece of ply wood nailed over it. The next photo is looking up through the bottom of the boat to the cabin roof. The next photo is the 6mm ply cut and trimmed to fit the roof, although it is screwed down it will have to be removed to prime the inner roof before the bonding coat is applied and the whole is fitted and screwed down through predrilled holes. The portside bulk head that we thought we might get away with replacing the bottom half, don't be silly the whole thing was banjackzed so the photo you see is looking forward to where the bulk head used to be, also making one side of a hanging cupboard, which naturally was also useless, so what you see is the side of the boat and the end of the sideboard in the saloon. The final photo is the new saloon roof looking forward with the bulkhead missing. Good or wot ! More to follow time.

Hello All We had a good day on Monday the saloon tongue & groove is now finished but no photo I am afraid as Will had to rush of for boiler duty on Falcon the MOB steam launch. Ivor and I remained and the result is the last board is now on the transom bar the fillet at the top that is. We had hoped to start getting the ply epoxied onto the tongue& groove on Thursday, England in July put paid to that with heavy rain showers and this is a job that needs dry weather with a bit of warmth for at least a morning. Oh the joys of working outside in an English summer. The other bit of good news is personal, but I had my first walk on Tuesday, and to day I have had a date for a fitting for my new apendage leg/foot to you.

I too was told, in my youth that it was an old WW1 motor gun boat, and that she was built of teak which probably explains her longevity. I remember as a kid climbing over her, the foredeck was still complete in those days, but I never had the courage to go inside far to many spooks for me.

Thanks Howard you are so right but I think next year, maybe even the year after. Thanks Jill Jonny I concur with Jill I guess to epoxy a boat of this size with West System would have to be in the region of £ 400 / £ 500 but that is pure guess. Once we have her up to scratch, slip her every other year or even every year there will be bareley anymore maintenance than on a plastic boat. The original planking has been there for fifty years some of the repairs have lasted less time than the origional, and as far as costs maybe £ 500 to £ 700 to do all the repairs ossmosis treatment on a boat this size £ 2000 to £ 5000. I know which I would rather have. When she is beyond economical repair left to moulder into the ground or a funeral pire how are these thousands of plastic boats goin to end their days, they can't be burnt they wont moulder, there will just be huge fridge mountains of cast of boats. Sorry about that just one of my recurring thought for today.

We have taken this rotten plank out to let the air circulate around the forepeak, a good job really the smell in there was a little old and damp, but there doesn't appear to be any growths of fungus or any rotten timbers that we can see. The transom is coming along a treat although Ivor would probably have something to say on that as he struggles with the boards on his own and sweats behind a flat scraper. So the fourth board is on but no varnish as yet we ran out of time but it is well covered from the weather. I am still removing antifouling and tar varnish, it seems never ending but the end is now in sight at least as far as I can reach, but some poor soul has to spend rather a long time on his back in the not to distant future to get the bottom cleaned off, then at least we will no what we have to deal with, let the dog see the rabbit so to speak.

I really having no luck with this. It's the forth atempt to post this cyber space must be getting near full of my atempts. Fianally some real progress, the fact that it is something I have had a hand in might just have a bearing on the matter. Iam so pleased with the result with some varnish on the beams and another coat / touch up of the cream I think it will look something else. The varnish will darken the ash slightly which will contrast nicely with cream. The beams were faired in and the tongue & groove was nailed and screwed to the beams. On Monday the remaining half dozen pieces will be fitted the outside surface will be sanded ready for sealing skim of epoxy to seal it. Thursday another layer of epoxy to bond the ply to the tongue & groove, we were going to use 4mm ply but in the interest of strength we have decided to go with 6mm, this should be strong enough for us to boogie late into the night at various venues including of course Ranworth staithe The ply then has a fine woven fibre glass mat epoxied on to it which will either have colour in the epoxy on we will paint it with deck paint. I am torn at the moment, the coluor in the epoxy is definitely the hardest wearing but there is a very limited choice of colours whereas with paint the choice is much larger. This process we intend to use on the decks which may well be the next bit of the project on the topsides, for this we have bought a sheet of 12mm ply, we are hopeing that one sheet will be suficient but on previous guesstimates probably not.

As an ex landlord amd an ex smoker I have this to say. Who the hell does this government think it is. My pub was MY home therefor in my home I decide who smokes and who does not. If I should wish to make it non smoking so beit my desision not a bunch of free loading nere do wells in London, and incidently I still have to find anyone who will admit to voting for that ex freeloader in chief (I still cannot use his name without a profanity attached to it). I DECIDE WHO DECIDE WHAT HAPPENS IN MY CASTLE. Rant over.

That's better a lie down and now a small libation to calm the whatever needs calming and away I go. First picture is the new bulkhead looking aft not a very good photo but you get the idea, better are the next two showing the finishing detail around the edge which the tongue & groove will but up to. The next one shows the third board being offered up, just look at that grain, that is going to look something with a few coats of yacht varnish on. The last shows the kind of colour we should get, this being it's first coat of very thinned down varnish. So all the progress this week has been outside as Will has taken a well earned break on his boat on the river, lucky so and so, still all things come to he who waits.

Yes Jonny we will be having a nice new one probably chrome, but maybe S/S polished we shall have to see. I have been a bit remiss not having posted for a while but apoor excuse I know but with all this painting and we seem to be down at Wayford twice a week I am getting quite tired. So here we go. This first section is all about the transom firstly the bottom board which will be below the water line, This has been epoxied on the back so that any future ingress of water will not affect the board from the , as well as being screwed it is also being clamped and wedged to help it take it's shape. Next a bit of a jump but the second board being fastened by screws and copper nails which in the picture are being roved. Will in the picture is putting pressure on the head of the nail whilst inside the boat Ivor is hammering the other end flat, much like riveting. The ends of the planks showing in the next picture are the ones that have to be replaced, although of course not through their full length, at least I sincerely hope not. The screw and nail holes have now been plugged with plugs cut with a special tool from offcuts of the board used in the transom so that the colour and grain will match so looking good when varnished. Finally the boards are being scraped with a flat scraper, not used so much in these days of fibre glass, but a superb way of getting a glass like flat surface for varnishing, but bloody hard work, which is why you wont see me doing too much of it, until we get to the cabin sides. I'm going for a lie down now, back later.

Whilst all that has been going on Ivor has been beavering away at the transom. New wood going in everywhere, you can see the new section behind the middle tansom also the new grey primer is hiding new wood covering the corner. Finally a new piece of Sapele being fettled fo the outer transom. This is really going to look the dogs whatsits when it has several layers of varnish on it. Finally I don't know wether you can see the colour but this is the first top coat of cream for the inside of the new cabin roof. The stripping of tarvarnish goes on and on and on etc. but it's a labour of

Thank you all for your kind words, they certainly make the job easier and more fun. Dave we will be there Thursday weather permiting. Things are begining to hot up at the SP berth ashore ( hot up is a Norfolk term for ever so slightly faster.) The new aft bulkhead is in bar final fettling. Whilst this was going on an idea kind of morphed out of thin air, the result being that we are going to go back to the origional plan of the boat and have a full width galley between the saloon and the aft cockpit. We are only a four berth boat so really a heads is enough so we are going to update the existing one to port forward which has a washbasin already in it. To starboard where there was origionaly a wah basin some one latterly made this into a tiny quarter berth with legs sticking into the cockpit in a ghastly kind of raised seat, which was no use to man nor beast and made accessing and egressing very difficult, and we had already ripped out anyway. So we are going to make this ex quarter bert into a wet/shower room/cabin.

Hi Jonny The origional cabin roof was totally shot at so was burnt. Origionally it had a kind of faux suede headlining which we have also binned. We decided to use tonge & groove because whilst not origional we felt it to be reasonably period, and at the end of the day it came from B&Q at a favourable price, and when it's painted with a nice cream enamel with two undercoats I think, read that as hope, it will look like the dogs b******s. In fact I think the undercoat was more expensive than the wood.

Thanks Jonny Just a quicky here I have at last got started on the tongue and groove for the inside of the saloon galley and heads roof. The top side is just having a single undercoat the side on show will have two undercoats rubbed down betwee each coat and then a final coat of Blakes cream enamel, the whole having had a good soaking in cuprinol whilst still bare wood. As you can see the problem is not necessarily space but surfaces to lay the wood whilst painting it,and an overcoating time of 8--12 hours it's a once a day paint. But we shall overcome as the song goes.

The first photo shows the floor and beare in place and all cleaned up, a very good job well done The second is taken with ones back to the transom looking forward through where the aft bulhead used to be, and showing the next bulkhead between the galley to port and the heads to starboard,and Wills' beautifully crafted beams all in place.I now have about twoo weeks to finish painting all the tongue and groove which will be the inside of the saloon cabin roof. More later have to go and paint.

Morning All I have lost the plot a little this week, a combination of fumes tarvarnish, enamel paint, white sprit and wine, vodka doesn't smell. So forgive me if I repeat myself. I haven't quite got used to getting the photos in the right order so we'll start with a tea/ coffee break, and what's wrong with that I ask? The next one shows very graphically how bad Mahogany is as a wood on the waterline. It really does not like the continual wetting and drying, although I am told this is not as big a problem on sea going boats as the salt tends to pickle the wood.Looking towards the bottom left of the photo you can see a short plank still with tavarnish on it and ending in a vertical black line. This is more evidence of a bad repair. The plank runs through two planes coming from the stem and should run much further aft, the result is that the short plank has lifted at the end dispelling the caulking and putty/filler. Looking at all the rot and poor repairs around and under the waterline the Gods of Breydon Water must have been smiling that December day last year. The next photo gladdened me greatly. I found what I think is called the boot top line, you can just make it out. It is the faint white line that is running parallel to the blue paint at the top of the picture. This line is scribed into the wood at the birth of the boat, but is often lost over the years with burning off of paint and sanding repairs etc. I was very glad to find this as I had always thought the waterline to be incorect.

Hi Jonny We have as yet found no damaged or rotten ribs maybe when we get up near the bow there maybe some ex hire fleet damage, although I hope not.

The first picture shows in the top left the remains of the shower tray/box a wierd construction which is proving rather stuborn to remove, I can feel a large Birmingham screw driver coming on. The next one shows the detail of the beam and the capping between the beams, the strange blue is not artistry but it was begining to spit with rain, so covers on Next another veiw of the floor during fitting, and finally a boatbuilders lot Ivor not in his favourite position, but I suspect we may see him in it a good many times yet. I have all the tongue and groove in my daughters' and son in laws new extention. The roof is on so I have this lovely big space to work in but I can't got in. Four weeks ago they asked the scaffolder to come and remove it,we have come to the conclusion he is using there house as a kind of storage depot, another week lost. I am begining to really worry for the day fast approaches when Will must need it for the cabin roof,here's hoping for this week. Regards Barry

Tell you what Jonny I haven't worked the grey cell (my last one) so hard for many a while. Now to work. This week although some things actually went back in some more had to come out. Needless to say we found some more rot but there you go. A couple of weeks ago at the yard a fellow came up for a chat and said he remembered Star having some serious money spent on her, I forget where, probably a good job, a good amount of this rot has been going on for many years and some of the repairs have been penny pinching to say the least as the photo shows. The piece hanging down is I think a piece of copper although someone else thinks it's lead, anyway it was nailed on to cover a rotten piece of plank!! Delaying not curing. Whilst doing my paint removal I have constantly found small pieces of erroneous wood let in where a plank should have been put in thus allowing the rot to progress. In no particular order the new floor fettled and ready for it's final fitting,the rotten wood being chopped out.New and old some of the old bulkhead leaning against the new awaiting it's final cut to fit.The new floor in it's final place, with just the old to be chopped out.