tophatyachts.com

Well I got it back together- I will post a clip of the bench test soon

Boat is here in Kettering bobbing around on the echoes of the Southern Ocean swell.

Gotta put the engine back in

The advice i got from this board spell it out so easily
Is the reverse what is required for re-installation??



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqfKhcQsbWA

After you have dropped the nuts and washers and half your tools down in the bilge, removed some skin from your fingers and bang your head on the underside of the cockpit sole and have somebody ask if you are ok .Well yes! that's basically it ? It could pay to have some shims of different sizes to pack under the engine mounts .The rest is just fiddly trying to line the coupling up ,because if your tail shaft is as short as mine it is nearly impossible to get it perfect. All I did was to put all the nuts and bolts on the coupling and use a feeler gauge and hand turn the shaft and see if the gap is the same all the way round.If not just add or remove a shim. Mine is about a" bee's dick " out at the moment ,but once I get my Beintrouble ( BMW) started and running properly things might change .

Cheers Bear

Hey Bear
Thanks for that

Speaking of bilge I thought I would give it a Deep Clean before refitting the engine.

I noticed water leaking in...

Put my foot down and pressed-thinking 'I would rather know now if i have a fatal flaw than one dark night with the family on board.

The 'floor' flexed and dark stinking oily bilge water concentrate oozed out...


Then I got stuck in to it and removed a bilge floor in ugly finger stabbing sections.

Below this was sand-oil soaked and pungent; so I scooped away. Removing several bucket loads and discovering the lead ingots deep in the bowels of the boat.

This has created a much bigger bilge than one needs-so I intend to concrete it back in to the original level with a large magnet set in at the point I can just reach my arm down to.(assuming that I will shower tools and other bits into this cavity shortly)

Why concrete?- similar ballast as the sand and much easier to form to limit the washer and nut stealing capacity of the the bilge monster.

Has anyone else looked below their bilge floor?

tom