The Engine Bay

Wild Goose used to have an inboard motor but the last owner had it replaced with an outboard. The inboard was removed but the dirty engine bay remained. The plywood hatch covering the bay on the outside was rotten and falling apart (if you stood on it you would probably fall through).

I set about removing all the rotten plywood, cleaning up the mess and removing the cover inside the boat to free up some extra space. This was quite easy to do with a chisel and a mallet, the fibreglassed areas came free with some leverage.

Next I moved on to creating a plywood sheet with supports that would go over the large hole where the hatch was. When fibreglassing it is important to round any sharp edges so the fibreglass lays on the surface without causing any airpockets (something I failed to do adquately on the replacement beam for the mast base).

You can see in the attached photos I used some bog (talc and resin) to fill any voids and help smooth the edges. I then fibreglassed the bottom of the cover with some overhang. The overhang would join with the top layer of fibreglass and the boat when I installed it over the hole, with some bog around the edges.

The result is not very pretty as it still needs to be sanded and a layer of colour matched gelcoat added to make it fit in with the rest of the boat.

Pulley Block

There are a number of wooden blocks on the deck of the boat used to secure pulleys and other bits and pieces, a lot of these are rotten or well on their way and I have been remaking them. Attached are photos of a new pulley block I created, this goes next to the mast and through the new beam I installed.

Mast Base

Not much progress has been made on this as I have been waiting for some nuts, bolts and cable glads to arrive. It seems Australia Post are having trouble keeping up, but I am hopeful that everything I need will arrive this week.