I'm getting old so have patience with me as I learn to use this Blog thingy. I'll try to edit and list thing chronologically on rain or cold days when I can't be outside. In the mean time I am just trying to get things loaded onto it so I don't lose or forget them.

    

I built the bulk of the boat on a jet ski trailer using it as a building cart. I only have 18 feet inside the fenced carport and a longer tongue wouldn't have allowed the gates to close. Before moving the boat to it's road trailer I had to do a bottom job on the boat. I had decided to coat the bottom with epoxy and graphite instead of paint. It would be a lot more scuff resistant and add another layer of epoxy to the several coats and fiberglass already there. Graphite added to epoxy results in an opaque shiny black finish which would go with my paint color scheme. So I blocked up the back of the boat and used a come-a-long attached to the big oak tree to lift the bow.   simply rolled the jet ski trailer out and put a big block of Styrofoam under the bow for safety while I added the epoxy to the bottom. simply rolled the jet ski trailer out and put a big block of Styrofoam under the bow for safety while I added the epoxy to the bottom.

I had a stripped down Aluminum trailer that I had bought a few years earlier. I had gotten a great deal at $500 but it had no bunks. I had lusted after both the Aluminum construction and also the Torsion Bar suspension system. The Aluminum doesn't corrode and the Torsion Bar suspension is a much easier ride over the bumps for the boat. I built a wooden support system out of 4X4s and 2X4s so I could test the theoretical float on/off bunk system I had designed before spending the money to do a more permanent system of Aluminum. I also wanted to get the boat in the water and make sure my self designing didn't end up too heavy fore or aft or too tender from the too-tall top. Using the same procedure for lifting the boat that I had used when removing the jet ski trailer, I rolled the new trailer under the hull and lowered the boat onto it.

So..... off to the boat ramp and the initial splashing. I had to back the van up til the wheels were at the water's edge before it floated off, but it did indeed float off. Not only did the trailer seem to work but the boat floated level like she was supposed to. I had loaded 35 gallons of water in containers and placed it in the stern to simulate the 240 pounds the engine would weigh. I took the picture and then got aboard to see what my weight and moving around would do. It seemed to make little difference if I was fore or aft with regard to the boat being level. However, as I had guessed the top did lean way over when I boarded from the side. Not dangerously so, and the hull itself probably didn't lean much more than other boats, but the roof leaned over nearly a foot. I knew that the 6ft+ head-room was gonna cause that and had hoped it wouldn't be too dramatic. Like a fishing tower, the top will appear to sway heavily even though the hull is not. The exaggerated appearance was due to the height but I had been determined to have standing headroom and was willing to accept it as long as it wasn't to the point of being  dangerous. I guess I'll just have to be careful when tying up where there are tall posts like at the boat ramp in the picture. The thing I hadn't counted on with my "Bubba" rigged wooden support system was that when the boat floated off, the trailer floated up! When I recovered the boat I had to tie lines to the trailer and tie them off on both sides of the ramp to hold the floating trailer while I pulled the boat up onto it.

So now that I knew the basics regarding the trailer system and that the boat seemed to float on her lines I was ready to get serious about adding the expensive parts. First I bought 13 inch tires to replace the dry rotted 10 inch tires. Larger diameter tires are easier on the bearings and span the cracks better meaning a smother ride. It added 1.5 inches to the height on the trailer frame. Then I bought the Aluminum square tubing to bolt to the bottom of the trailer.so I could lower the entire bunk system to and get rid of the wooden supports. Lowering the bunks would more than offset the additional height gained by the larger tires. The net effect would be that the boat would ride nearly 7 inches lower to the ground. That would mean it would float on & off with the van tires well up the ramp and no more wading to the winch. I bolted the new Aluminum to the bottom of the trailer with the temporary bunk system and boat still on the trailer. I took the temporary goal posts off and installed the new galvanized ones. Next step is to take her to the water and launch the boat and remove the wooden parts. Then I'll bolt the 4X4 bunks to the Aluminum cross members and recover the boat. I designed the 2 aft cross members to be long enough to fasten fenders to and to allow tie downs to be attached. Eliminating the wood should eliminate the trailer flotation issue too;-) I'm estimating a couple hours to accomplish the boat ramp modifications.

I'm new to this blog and haven't figured out all the editing stuff so bear with me. You can also tell I am not good at doing daily or even weekly updates so some of the stuff is out of sequence with regard to when it actually was built in the construction timeline. The boat is near completion with regard to the actual construction and needs to be moved to it's road trailer and have the bottom coated with Epoxy and Graphite. So I used the tree out front, a come-a-long and some wood to block up the transom. I lowered the tongue of the building-cart/trailer to make the transom as high as possible. Then using the wood I blocked up the transom and used the come-a-long attached to the bow eye to hoist the bow off the trailer. My bow eye is 6 inches long and goes through 5 inches of solid wood to be able to take the entire weight of the boat.

Love Bugs are an natural part of boat building in Florida at certain times of the year. They can be ignored but sometimes become an integral part of the boat when you do. Epoxy has virtually no smell to me but it is a super attractive smell to Love Bugs and they flock to the area where fresh epoxy has been applied.  I tend to ignore them in the preliminary coats of epoxy (they sand smooth) but wait till their short season is over before doing a final epoxy coat or paint

I decided to "not" include a closed storage area under the seats. I wasn't sure if that space might be usable as part of the sleeping arrangements or not and figured I'd leave it open from the front. I can store the Porta-Polti under one and slide a milk crate storage box under the other if needed. I built a Bolger Microtrawler a few years ago and got spoiled with the standing headroom in the Pilot House and the open doors right beside the seats. I like the open jeep feeling of having the seats and doors like this.