August 2009

I did very little to Sabrina during 2009, I met a new Partner and we had a damn good time instead, plus we didn't have a mooring for the boat.  However that all changed in August 2009 when a friend of hers saw a sign for a new marina that was being built just outside Audlem. Karen and I arranged to meet the owners at the site one Sunday, we stood on top of a large pile of clay in a recently dug out field, the Marina wasn't even a hole in the ground.

We both stood there and listened to total silence and we were sold, we signed up there and then, planning to have the boat ready for when the marina opened in March 2010.

We have since visited the Marina on each and every open day watching the progress, ever concious that the Sabrina is not getting worked on, but the weather has been horrendous, with Snow and rain preventing any real progress.

If you are looking for a mooring then I cannot recommend it highly enough, its Overwater Marina, the owners are a wonderful couple that make you feel welcome.

The marina is being built more like a large lake, with soft edges than your traditional box shape for parking boats.

10th April 2009

I've been very remiss lately on spending time on Sabrina, mainly due to my longterm relationship breaking up in 2008. Not the best year of my life, still I have a new partner and she is 100% behind me getting Sabrina repaired on back on the water.

We have spent the weekend pumping her out, she had over 1' of water inside her, it took 3 hours and she didn't look in too bad a shape (little did I know how bad things were).

To stop her filling up again I decided to build a canopy for her out of 8' lengths of 3" x 5" timber and securing a large tarpaulin over it using shock cord, this was to prove invaluble and a lot more sturdy than I was to realise.

Below is a photo of the canopy a year later, its still standing to quote Elton John.

9th March 2008

I managed to spend most of the afternoon on the boat as the weather wasn't too bad. As you can see from the photos the front deck is back down, on my next visit I need to grind off the screws that were holding the rubbing strip so I can trim and sand the deck. Once I'm happy with the deck I'll put two coats of epoxy on it and then use epoxy filler and glass tape to cover the joins which should mean the deck can last another 43 years.

Hopefully I can spend some time on her next week, finishing the side panel off, which will be used as the template to cut the right hand side. Before I start to put her back together I will strip off the paint on the inside of the hull and remove the water tank.

I ended up relaying the deck a further two times due to the new one getting damaged due to my infrequent visits to her, the same with the new side panel, although that was more to do with it not fitting right, which I only found out when I started putting her back together and the support timbers went in.

I did plan to use paper to make templates of the panels before I demolished them, but it was a bad idea, maybe I'm just need practise, but in the end it was easier to use the structural timbers assembled on a piece of ply and then draw round them, I've since found that its sometimes easier to use some cheap hardboard or scrap ply to make the template, seems to work a treat.

17th February 2008

I spent the afternoon on the boat stripping half the front deck off and cutting out a new panel to install in place of the rotten piece. I drilled some holes either side of the deck support so I could align the cut, it was just a simple case then of running the circular saw down the line.

Removing the old panel on the other hand took a lot more effort than I expected, like most things on the Sabrina, where she is rotten she disintegrates, where she is solid she is very solid. While stripping off I noticed two other patches of rot on the side decks, where they joined the front section.

The plan is to cut all the new pieces to size, dry fit them and then seal them with epoxy, infact seal all the pieces of wood before refitting. Once refitted I'll put another two coats of epoxy, which will hopefully stop her rotting again in the future,

25th January 2008

There are no photos for this update, I visited the boat after having not seen her since last year and spent a couple of hours pumping her out. Not having a roof on her, but having a tarp in place stops most of the rain, but some still seeps in and its been a couple of months since she was last pumped out.

I spent the day making a paper template of the front side panel, when I pulled the boat apart I deliberatly left the starboard side intack, knowing full well I would have to dismantle it at somestage, but not having any way of make a new panel as the existing one disintergrated when dismantling it.

It took four attempts to get the template right, a lesson learned is not to attempt to do this when stood on the side of a boat, four feet in the air, with a high wind and a 25 metre roll of paper.

One thing that I didn't realise is that the panel, because of the curved shape of the boat is actually at a slight angle. Once I had realised that and split the template in two things were a lot easier.

I then spent Saturday using the template to cut up a sheet of marine ply, I decided to leave a 1 inch border around the paper so that it would allow me to adjust it onsite at the boat, without having to man handle a 8x4 sheet of ply next to the boat.
I also spent the day striping the paint off the root supports, two will need to be remade, plus all the supports for the sliding roof so I will be taking them to Rotherham next week to get remade.

I went back to the boat on Sunday and dry fit the panel, I needed to trim it off in various areas and it fits pretty well, I need to make an adjustment to the front slope of it so that it fits a bit snugger, once I'm happy with the panel I can cut the other one out and remove the rest of the front.

12th September 2007

You can see from the pictures that it was another long day of removing the rotton wood, a couple of times I did think to myself that maybe I had bitten off more than I could chew.

As most of the panels literraly disintegrated when removed I have no patterns to make the new panels from, so I have left one side intact so I can use brown paper to make patterns for the new panels, rebuilding the port side (left) first then the starboard side.

A lot of the boat is made of hardwood with marine plywood. I have managed to find a local carpenter who has said he will remake any of the support pieces that I need, if I give him the old ones. For example one of the roof supports is completely rotton though, but has come apart cleanly in two parts.

I need to get a larger tarpaulin or maybe a marque so I can work on her in the winter months.

25th August 2007

spent a day starting to strip of the vinyl roof so I could assess the damage to to front cabin, but was hoping that at worse it would only be the window frames at the front that would need to be replaced.

The more I stripped off the more it became apparent that the whole of the front was going to have to go.

The main problem I had was striping the vinyl off as it had been overpainted at somestage with roofing paint. I tried a paint scraper, but that didn't work so I ended up using a blow torch to heat it, then using the striper to remove it.

If you are going to try this then my advice is to wear gloves as I managed to burn my hand a couple of times.