My Chronicle of fiddling to date

[CRF999]

Thanks for the feed back Tyger. Its all finished now. I just decided to post it all on here when I realized some of it may be of use to others.. There are another 6 bits to come.

The pot will probably only be used in Scotland and as a recreational fisher I can take up to 5 crustaceans a day with a maximum of 2 being lobster and no license needed.

I know your pain in waiting for the engine what brand of 20 are you getting.

C

[Tyger]

Must be different in Wales you have to have a license, although it is free.
I have a Tohatsu on order for my 380 lx Takacat ....first sib and engine.
Looking foward to the next updates.

[CRF999]

Epistle 6
The engine. A Honda 6hp with charge coil and lead , for reasons already explained.
Having had a new Suzi 6hp in Norway 2 years before I knew keeping track of the running in hours stretched my brain cells. So plagiarism being a favourite pastime of mine the forum had made me aware of add on hours meters that work via an induction pulse off the HT lead. A few hours on you tube and EBAY had one of those winging its way to me from the far east. You may have gathered by now that I like my solutions to be neat and just so ( well to my eye anyway ) so how was I going to fit this ? certainly NOT by clagging it on with double sided tape. By this time I had come across a certain MR Gurnard ( not sure if he still frequents here but if he does, great man Donny keep up the good work ) and he looked to have a neat attachment on the front of the engine hood.
How to make that work, NOT drilling holes that’s for sure, but there are the pop rivets for the engine cowl hold down clip. Off to the small CRAP (SEE #1 ) bits boxes, yes of course there is MORE than one! Eventually I turned up a slide on toilet roll holder bracket and as Robert is my Aunts husband the hole pitch was an exact match for the pop rivet centre’s. So I drove out the rivet shanks tapped the holes M4 and thread locked the screws and bracket to the hood. A quick rummage in the plastic offcuts box revealed a nice shelf like backing piece and some U shaped channel. Epoxy channel to backing piece, screw meter to backing piece, and slide onto bracket, voila easily readable removable meter mount. I just take it off and let it dangle if I want to be under the hood, otherwise it stays in place and is well out of the way for all normal boat use. Result!

All of this was achieved whilst the engine was mounted on a lump of wood firmly held in the large bench vice. Yes but that was getting to be a problem in all sorts of ways, space, access to rear echelons of CRAP (SEE #1 ) and I needed to be able to use the vice!
Yes that oft talked about subject of an engine trolly dolly mover had reached the top of the list and the forum search button and some sittin n thinkin got the ball rolling.
I already had a cheap collapsible sack barrow courtesy of Aldi many years ago. It was going to do the job come hell or high water. This had originally been for moving my RC aircraft gear and starter / charger battery around hence the large wooden base plate for stability, which was a great start for placing the skeg on without everything tipping over.

In offering the engine up to the trolley and the finger guard was in the way so was taken off moved up one hole and a new second hole drilled in the handle and reattached with self tappers. Next up the last remaining piece of my cheap Chinese ply was just the right size to make the backing piece to hang the engine on. It just need a few holes drilling through the trolley cross members and some packing pieces to fill the gap between them and the ply, easy! Until you add the engine and find 12mm cheap Chinese ply is way to flexible to last more than a few minutes swishing an engine around. So look at the photo again now the thick stiffening pieces and a further plywood plate make sense and rigidity of it all. Bonus is only a fraction of the engine clamp twiddeling is needed and I added clamp pads to the ply for protection.

Also in the first photo you can see a stainless steel “S” hook. That was used at the front of the boat to take the weight and give me wheels front and back for maneuverability, it sort of worked but not very well as others have found and commented on previously.
So guess what there is a version 2 later.

[Tyger]

Good work..... tacho nice and neat....ive got my bit no engine lol.

[CRF999]

Epistle 7
The Transducer. All of this later activity had been at fever pitch to get the outfit ready for a 12 day trip up to my sons in Cruden bay where I was praying for good weather so that I could have a good play out , do some fishing and hopefully catch some turbot and or Plaice. There was however a big BUT in the ointment. I had not fitted the transducer!
I had been doing lots of U tube research and had ideas but they did not feel right. I did not want more holes in the transom and it needed to be removable! I knew if I strapped it under a tube it would get forgotten in smashed on a run ashore. Then my beachmaster style wheels drew my attention, Could it? Would it? Did it? Probably, maybe, yes.
I blew the boat up for a few days , I had by now found a way to slide it in and out of the garage and keep it away from any residual sharp swarf on the floor to save blowing it up and letting it down all the time. With the back end propped up at waist height I could get a good look at it all ( PS I don’t bend well either these days)
By judicious use of CRAP (See #1 ) wood and my modeling clamps I mocked up a mount and decided it would work. All I needed was a strip of stainless bent to 90 degrees with a few holes drilled, two of them tapped and then holes drilled in the side of the beachmaster removable mounting plates.
The photos maybe in order, probably not, will make sense of it.

Stuff pulled from CRAP (See #1 ) included. Two nylon headed thumb screws for basic fixing. They are only BZP threads and so saltwater corrosion will need actively managing, silicone grease for now. Thick polypropylene sheet for spacers to fine tune the depth of the transducer in relation to the bottom of the hull. Butyl rubber washer to act as a locking spring to the thumb screws. Two stainless wing nuts for extra security.
Plain slightly oblong holes were drilled in the horizontal of the L bracket for mounting the transducer with the Lowrance supplied transom hardware.
Two M6 threaded holes were put in the L bracket vertical to receive the thumb nuts with clearance holes in the wheel brackets. Assembly is thumb nuts into wheel brackets from the inside. Place butyl gasket over thumb nut threads on outside of wheel bracket. Offer up L bracket with transducer and screw up thumb nuts very firmly. Once in place add the wing nuts tight for added security. The transducer can now come on and off with the wheel on a daily basis when away for a holiday or removed from the wheel totally when packing away for a while.

Added bonus hint. Do you suffer from added Ethanol concerns , worried about getting your E10 treatments correct , stale fuel getting you and your engine down. Well go and steal the little plastic cap off your Liquid Tommorite bottle it is a handy little 0 – 50 ml measuring cup Ideal for dosing those magic potions into your politically correct unleaded.

[CRF999]

Epistle 8
Yes there’s more!
FF / GPS mount yes that was still to do. Also needed to be removable as if I am not fishing I will often not have it aboard, particularly if on the lake ( Ullswater ) in the end I opted for the simplest solution possible. A simple plate of plywood , no not cheap Chinese, in this case its good quality 9 ply birch. Why ? because it was there and did the job. Sealed , primed and purpled as is all other wood. Plastic FF head is screwed down with SS self tapers, with Sikaflex 291i as sealer adhesive , on SS penny washers to aide drainage and drying.
Underneath with waterproof rubber based glue I stuck on a lump of the non slip matting you get for caravans and boats.

But how to fix it in place and the same goes for the lingering problem from many posts earlier the battery and tool box. Ahaaaa ! enter stage right CRAP (SEE #1 ) nylon webbing from my time in automotive related work and some plastic quick release buckles courtesy of my wife’s sewing hobby shop. A bit of sewing on her old machine, that I am allowed to touch, and 4 off 25 mm wide straps appeared. 2 for round the seat top to hold on the FF mount. 1 for round the seat side to hold the battery, 1 for round the seat side to hold the tool box.
At the same time I knocked up some 40mm wide ones to hold the boat onto the roof bars for short trips without having to deflate the boat. FYI I had a very neat system of bars and props for helping my bad back get the kayak up onto the car roof rack. If any one is interested let me know and I can post details. With very minor mods I have already proved that it works very successfully with the SIB.

Now I return to the subject of the battery. Having found the FF would put the supply voltage on screen I saw an opportunity for simplification and less clutter on board.
So I have taken the plastic box with the volt meter and power supply plug out of the system and put it back into CRAP (SEE #1 ).
Instead I have sealed any FF / GPS wire end with waterproof glue and stuck them and the splash proof fuse holder to the top of the battery with double sided tape. Spare wire has been coiled up and is strapped to the side of the battery with a , god knows where from, white incontinence pad suspender belt thing. I 3d printed a little bobble to allow the hook ends to lock together. I have also made a folded over and stapled together thin Poly prop sheet spray cover to go over the top of the battery, it too is conveniently held in place by the white strap. The outboard charging lead coils up out of the way on top of that when not needed.

Bonus hint Number 2 3D printers come in useful in many ways and I made some emergency spares for the kill cord safety switch for my Honda BF6, pence instead of pounds. If any one wants the file let me know.

[CRF999]

Epistle 9
I got my trips out at Cruden Bay in the July heatwave, yes even in Aberdeenshire. Lots of miles covered so running in is now fully complete with 10.7 hours on the clock. I saw Hundreds of seals, Puffins, Razorbill, Gulls, Guillemots, and Cormorants. I caught plenty of Mackerel and a few Dabs but the Turbot and Plaice proved very elusive. What was noticeable was the rods lying around with nowhere ideal to place them. I missed the rocket launcher tubes that I had on the Yak.
So thinking hat on and the transom seems to be the best place but yet again I do not want to drill holes or prevent folding up. My eyes fell upon the, ah yes the Eyerony of it, lifting eyes that are already fitted. How to make use of them.
Another visit to the CRAP (SEE #1 ) stores yielded black 40mm UPC piping , just over 600mm long, some 25 mm thick nylon pieces and some 4mm stainless plate. I figured if I could machine them to spread the load suitably I could mount them vertically to the eyes. The photos below give you the idea.

The block was machined to give a good smooth mounting surface for one side of the eye. The other side of the block is a semicircle to receive the pipe, which has holes drilled though to take countersunk screws. The screws are into drilled and tapped holes in the nylon block, the main screw is long enough to also go through the ring. Next up thick SS washers, I really do not like working with SS. All topped of with wing nuts. This should give sufficient strength and purchase to hold the rods which may also reach the floor for stability. It may be the hole in the ring is too big for good support if so I will make or print suitable spacers to fill the gap. That is pending the next inflation at the end of August. No it isn't I got the boat out in a dry spell to test it and had to make some clearance cuts in the grey block and the stainless washer. It fits now!

And finally remember I mentioned the “S” hook to the engine trolley supporting the front of the boat. Well it sort of works but the boat can slip around on it and trying to turn corners it tries to rip it off the front of the boat or everything falls over. So Bow trolleys were back on the agenda but my trip to Cruden Bay had shown I already had a lot of gear so I did not want another trolley. So now to concoct Mk2. Research showed that lots had tried and failed but that Fenlander had come across a pivoted bow trolley from TREM that gave a fair pass at doing the job. So how to make a DIY substitute.
I examined the trolley and looked long and hard at the gap where I had hung the “S” hook. That would do it I guestimated the angle the trolley had been at when using the hook , 60 degrees, back into my nylon block and SS stock to machine a flat top block about 70mm square and two pieces the same width as the gap /slot in the trolley with their top edges machined at said 60 degrees. The top block was drilled through and 4 SS screws used to screw into drilled and tapped holes in the sloping face of the other two pieces that were spaced just far enough apart to slide over the ply front plate. Drill countersink and bend a piece of 4mm SS plate to form the combined hook and bearing surface. Drill a hole in the top block and fit a nyloc nut in the recess below screw together with a smear of marine grease. Hey presto one compact swivel hook for the existing trolley. Looks good but has yet to be tested.

So that’s it I think I have finished, or should I add that little something else.

[harrison]

Lots of miles covered so running in is now fully complete with 10.7 hours on the clock.

Great read and hundreds of hours shed fettling.

10.7hrs! Reckon you need to get out more there matey.

[CRF999]

End of the month will get more hours.
That's only engine running time.
In the 4 trips out I probably did 20 hours of drifting after the Turbot etc.
Shed hours who counts, its better than me sitting around doing nothing.

Only one more epistle to go though. I just can not find anything else to do on it, YET!

[Tyger]

Love the neat job on the rod holders....... engine now run ....... no more excuses get out there lol.