Boat Project

Post by **Eric D** » Wed Jun 24, 2009 6:58 pm

This winter our boat was destroyed. We had a huge snowfall and the car port (bad idea) caved in on it and crushed everything above the deck. Below are some pictures.

The insurance company totaled the boat, so we bought it back and hired a local marina (where we bought the boat actually) to repair it. They had new rails made and bought a new control console for it.

Well, when we got the boat back I was pissed. Here is a rundown of what was wrong...

No navigation lights installed on the front
No docking cleats installed on the front
Front door off 3in in relation to the front deck (one side in more than the other)
Rear door did not open easily
few braces installed on the rails
Small piece of trim in the back not pop riveted back on (it took me all of 15 seconds to fix it, why could they not do it?)

This is what I found wrong upon further inspection when it was in my yard...

Only a few loose rivets in most doors
Door latches installed wrong
Canvas top installed backwards (the mooring light actually pointed forward!)
My Xenon 100.4 amp was all gouged up on the top
Tim gauge not connected to the right wire
Voltage gauge not connected to the right wire
Oil pressure gauge not connected
Water temp gauge not connected
Ignition wired to feed everything in the boat with an 18ga wire (fire hazard)
All grounds under the console daisy chained from one to the next instead of separate grounds (another fire hazard)
Our depth gauge system was no longer installed (we need it on our shallow lake)
Frayed wires on the main control panel
Frayed wires under the throttle control
Patch of missing carpet on the deck
Rear trim panel above the outdrive all busted up (it was not when we brought them the boat)

There was probably other stuff as well, but I don't have enough memory to remember it all.

So far I have over 20 hours alone into rewiring the console. In the past few days I have learned a ton about marine wiring.

dwnrodeo · Post by **dwnrodeo** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 4:18 am

Wow, that sucks! If there is one thing I've learned it's that not very many places do repair work to the same level I would. That's why whenever possible within my abilities, I will repair something myself. (That way if it goes bad all I can do is blame myself, or the parts.) Good luck fixing it.

Post by **Francious70** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 5:35 am

Oh man that sucks ass. I love being on the lake on our pontoon boat so I can imagine how you feel. Especially since you probably paid good money to have it "repaired".

Is there any way you could politely bring these issues up with the marina and have them do the job right?

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 6:02 am

So far my Dad and I have fixed every problem listed, other than...

Xenon 100.4 gouged up (sort of fixed, as I put a 200.4 in instead)
Patch of carpet missing on the deck (we are going to try and piece in something)
Busted pieces of trim above the outdrive (we put some screws in it, so it is not going anywhere, but it sucks that is it broken when it was not before)

All the other problems just took time and some thinking. To fix the front door we pulled some screws out holding the rails, pushed one side in an inch and a half, bolted it, pulled the other side out an inch and a half, bolted it, and now it looks great.

I installed the NAV lights, wired them, we put more braces on the sides, fixed the door mountings, spun the roof around correctly and wired it, and I have redone all the gauge wiring under the console.

Here is what the boat looks like currently...

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 6:14 am

I have a lot of time into the depth gauge, and I really would not expect the marina to do the same.

I took the old unit out of the old dash panel. Our old console had a one piece dash panel will all the gauges integrated. I took the LCD out for the depth gauge, and the main brain for it, plus the button assembly for the shallow warning adjustment.

The LCD had no trim so I had to cut the blank in our new dash with my scroll saw and file it right in where I needed it, then mount it with some small brackets and epoxy. I then also epoxied in the buttons. Apparently if you buy a boat which comes with this console it included a fish finder in the middle. The depth gauge now works and I think it looks great as well, especially considering we did not have to go buy a new one.

At this point the remaining work is to pop rivet all the skin on the bottom of the boat, build and install new speaker boxes for the front of the boat, install the old rear speaker boxes, and my Dad wants to build something to cover up the gas tanks. We tore out our old big gas tank and are replacing it with two small portable tanks. It is always a pain in the ass to fill up the old tank since that side of the boat is not against our dock, plus we just did not need that much fuel on board.

Post by **stipud** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 6:39 am

Cool boat dude! Sucks about your car port and repair issues though...

Yeah on the whole I don't trust anyone to fix things right. If you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. I have never brought my cars to a mechanic for that reason

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:02 am

I blame all of this on Canadians for sending us all that snow...

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:13 am

Here is the carpet mistake and the broken trim. I think I will leave the trim, as there is not much I can do to it, but I am trying to figure out what to do about the carpet.

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:19 am

I moved our dock lights below the deck so people will no longer trip over them.

I installed a horn off our our old boat back in the 80's. I sandblasted and painted the horn and got it working again. It draws a lot of current so I put an 8ga power wire to it just for the hell of it.

We also have red white and blue rope lights all around the underside of the boat (yes, we truly are rednecks!)

And I bought a new Clarion head unit, which is really impressive if you ask me. It looks nice, and it supports FAT32 file format so I can plug in a big ass hard drive with all our MP3s on it and never run out of music.

Post by **stipud** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:30 am

Looks like that 8ga is terminated well (though it could use some loom to tidy it up), but I can't help but feel a bit squeamish knowing that much current is that close to the water

And Eric, I am disappointed... you should at least have a bald eagle airbrushed on it. And where's your gun rack? Some redneck you are. And a French headunit? Come on man

ProperID · Post by **ProperID** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 7:35 am

Eric D wrote:Here is the carpet mistake and the broken trim. I think I will leave the trim, as there is not much I can do to it, but I am trying to figure out what to do about the carpet.

How about cutting out a metal plate and installing it over the carpet (under the dock cleat)? It could look like it's supposed to be a mounting point for the cleat I suppose...

Forgive the butchered pic below...I'm using MS Paint (no Photoshop at work), but it could give you an idea...

Post by **Francious70** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 8:14 am

Damn Eric, you truly are a craftsman.

Post by **Eric D** » Thu Jun 25, 2009 9:01 am

Wow, that metal plate idea is a good one.

French head unit? I thought they were from Japan. Well, time to go get my axe and fix that head unit...

Post by **Eric D** » Wed Jul 01, 2009 2:59 pm

New speaker boxes covered in carpet, and a cover for the new gas tanks...

Post by **Francious70** » Thu Jul 02, 2009 6:42 am

Damn, those look good.