July 22/25

Big weekend of work this time. First was I finally decided on a new tank fabricator. I wanted the tanks redone locally so I could talk to the welders about construction, materials and most important take them a tank so the fitting would be guaranteed to fit the existing plumbing. Each tank has seven fittings, fill, drain, return, top/bottom sight gauge and two vents.  These are different sizes and I want to be sure the existing plumbing will fit the new tank. Some of the placements are critical as the plumbing goes through the floor and the tank covers. So I took off Friday afternoon to deliver the two tanks I have out of the boat to the fabricator.

This is the hole that caused all the problems (e.g. leak). It was in the bottom on the port forward tank and right where the tank sits on the support. So water probably got on to the support and ran under that tank and rusted this out from the outside. It did not leak too fast as the support was under the hole which closed it up somewhat. (I also stuck a key into the hole to see how strong the metal was. Pretty rusted out. With the tanks delivered, it was off to the boat for most painting, etc.

First up was cleaning, sanding, and painting the port side exhaust manifold on the port engine. One of the cooling hosed had leaked several years ago and dripped on the hot exhaust manifold and caused some rust. So the manifold had to be stripped of the rust down to bare metal as well as the engine mount below. I never could get to this area before with the fuel tank in the way so this was my one opportunity to clean up this whole mess. The exhaust was repainted with high temperature paint.

Next was to re-fiberglass the tank support. This is ½ plywood and was fiberglassed previously so I just had to clean it up and put another coat of glass on. After talking to the tank fabricator, we decided that the tank should not rest directly on the support platform but on some strips of very hard rubber. The rubber will be placed directly above the ribs. So the tank platform is not actually needed but I kept it to spread the load out a little over the ribs. The tanks will be ¼ so they will have a very strong bottom. However, we did not want any water to get under the tanks, so I cut holes in the platform to allow air circulation as well as to drain any water away.

Next was to deal with all the screws sticking thru the hull behind the tanks. This may have been the source of the water under the tanks. I did not want to disturb the screws as they hold on the outside exhaust tube. So I made some 1 ½ inch blocks of wood with a ¾ hole on the back side. The hole was filled with silicon around the screws and the blocks were fiberglassed onto the side of the hull. This will allow the screws to be undone at some point and still seal out any water intrusion. I thought of glassing the inside of the screws but then they could not be removed in the future. I really hate things that cannot be maintained in the future.

The final job for the weekend was to clean up around the aft tank so the area could be painted. This area had the latest diesel spill as the diesel ran out of the fuel lines as I was working on the forward tank. So more scrubbing, sanding and wiping down of the area. Then a first coat of Bilge Kote paint. All in all, a good weekend of work.

July 16/17

This weekend is continuing cleaning and painting the bilge. There is a lot of dirt accumulation and spilled diesel in the bilge. All this takes hours to clean up before the new paint can be applied. First is vacuuming up the loose dirt. Then washing out what is left. This takes using bilge cleaner and then fiberglass wash and a good scrub brush. It takes a lot to get the diesel up. This really smells a lot so good ventilation is a requirement.

This is the first coat of paint in the area between the port side fuel tanks around the exhaust exit thru the hull. It may take about three coats of paint to do a good job covering up the old gray paint.

July 2/3

The task this weekend is to remove the second tank, clear out the area where it was and start repainting the bilge. Removing the second tank is a repeat of the first tank. Slide the tank from beside the engine aft to where the first tank was. Then tilt it over on it back and slide it to the center of the engine room. Stand it back up again and slide it up between the engines. Hook up the lifting harness. Attach everything to the lift frame over the hatches. Crank up the come-alongs. Put 2x4s under the tank. Remove the harness. Slide the tank out salon doors. Hook up the dingy crane. Pick up the tank and swing it over the side of the cockpit on to the dock. Put the furniture dolly under the tank. Roll the tank to the parking lot and load into the van. Takes about an hour of work.

Here is the empty space where the forward tank came from. Behind the tank is just the raw fiberglass. The cribbing is the support for the tank under the support platform. All this area needed to be sanded to prep it for some Interlux Bilge Kote paint. This paint is designed to resist oil, diesel, etc. in the bilge. Obviously this will be my one and only time available to clean and paint this area.

This is the same location with the first coat of paint. I was debating using white fiberglass to cover this area but after a lot of research decided on the Bilge Kote instead.

Also, as long as I have access to the outside of the engine, there is some rust on the engine mounts and exhaust manifold. So all that will get cleared up and painted at the same time.

Saturday 6/18

Today’s work is to remove the final bolts holding the forward tank in place, Of course, it is not just the bolts, more fuel lines need to be disconnected. To get the bolts out, the ceiling needs to be lowered to get at the end of the bolt. To lower the ceiling, the yellow fuel lines need to be removed. So the whole day went into this operation. Because there are several tank supports, there are several ceiling paneling that have to come down.

Once the top bolts are out, the process with the fuel lines is repeated at the bottom. There are two fuel feeds from the tanks to the Racor filters.

Saturday 6/4/2011

This weekend’s project is to build the lift frame that fits over the center engine hatches and if time, lift out the first tank. The tank is 18” wide, 27” high and 60” long. There are six engine hatches with the center ones open to the area between the engines. There is about 20” between the engines most of time. Less where some of the cooling lines run. But my fingers are crossed that the tank will fit out the opening. The tank weights somewhere around 200 lbs so the lift frame will be made of 2x4s. I figure I can sit on 2x4s so it will tank the weight with no problem. The frame has to be high enough that the tank will clear the floor once up out of the engine room with a 2x4 slid under the tank. I also have to attach the come-along to the tank and the frame. They are 21” fully lifted. So 27” + 21” + 2” plus some slop is 50”. I intend to only make the frame 48” (1/2/ an 8’ 2x4) so the come-along cannot be attached to the top of the tank, but down lower on the side of the tank.

I had planned on all day Saturday to build the frame. However, but noon it was pretty much completed.  It stands 48” high (1/2 of 8’) and clears under the galley cabinets. It is 32” wide (1/3 of 8’) and the feet are 48” wide so they can sit over the closed side hatches and provide some support. The feet are also padded so they can be slid around on the floor as when the list frame is in place I cannot open the refrigerator, and that is where the beer and pizza is kept.

Because I finished the frame early, I started moving the tank into position.  It has to move from  its port aft position to the center of the boat. From there is goes forward about 8’ to between the engines. To get to the center of the boat it has to come up over two stringers on the port side. It is too tall to just slide over to top of the stringers. So the move goes something like this. Skid inbound about a foot so it falls off of its platform base. That drops it down about 4 inches. Now it will tip over backwards on it back. So now it is only 18 changes tall instead of 27 inches. Slide to the center of the boat over the two stringers. The next step would be simple if not for the sewer tank in the center of boat. Without that, the tank could be tipped up vertical again. However, I don’t want to remove the sewer tank for several reasons. One it is more work. Two it is a smelly job. So with the sewer tank in place, I moved the tank forward in front of the sewer tank after removing a bracket holding the port engine exhaust in place. I also had to remove the inboard cover to the generator to get enough room to tilt the tank. Now there was about zero inches of clearance all around to get the tank upright. You can see from the picture how close everything is. I actually have some paint touchup needed on the exhaust manifold on the port engine where the clearance was less than zero.

Sunday 6/5/2011

This is tank pulling day. Everyone was off doing something else today and my wife was on the boat, so she got nominated to run one of the come-alongs. I have been thinking all night about how to sling the tank. It is not that heavy but I do not what to drop back down the hatch and break an engine. So the sling needs to be at the end of the tanks because the come-along overlaps the tank and it needs to not slip off half way through the lift. I used one of the boat’s spring lines doubled over under the tank the long way. That leaves a loop at each end for hooks. That is the black line in the pictures. Then I tied a yellow line around the tank in several places that tied to the doubled line under the tank and this spread the double line over the bottom of the tank. This kind of gave the tank a wider base for the lifting line. (This will get improved for the next lift, but at least it worked here.) One issue was that the front of the tank had to lift first to clear the exhaust manifolds. So I attached the front come-along and essentially pulled the tank forward between then engines and lifted the front of the tank ahead of the rear. Everything worked fine except I had to remove the port engine fuel filter and attachments to make room for the tank to slide all the way forward so I have a vertical lift. After that is was just cranking on the winches.

Here the tank is still in the engine room but coming up. The engine was padded with rubber mats to keep down on the touchup work on the engines. The black line is the sling. What we see if the left over line. The yellow line holds the sling under the tank. Everything is a tight fit, but it works and I don’t have to pull an engine. At the top of the tank, you can just see the come-along going down past the tank top.

Here is the tank emerging thru the floor. One thing we found as we got up from between the engines is that the tank wanted to tip over. It was already top heavy, 18 inches at the top and 14 inches at the bottom and the sling was on the narrow end of the tank. If you look closely at the picture you can see a red line that crosses over the tank. This line is what was used to keep the tank upright. As we lifted the tank, we pulled in on this red line to keep it balanced over the sling.

Once the tank cleared the floor, we slid two more 2x4s under the tank and clamped these to the lift frame so they would not move and drop the tank once is was off of the winches. We lay plastic across the floor between the tank and the aft door in the salon. We also used two more 2x4s to act as a track we could slide the tank on to get it into the cockpit. Good thing these were only 100 gallons as they could be moved by hand. I would not have wanted to try 200 gallon tanks.

Once in the cockpit, we hooked the tank to the dingy hoist and lifted it over the cockpit on to the dock. Here is it still attached to the dingy lift and a new sling that goes around the center of the tank. Once on the dock, the tank was loaded onto a furniture dolly and wheeled to the parking lot and loaded in our van. We took the tank over the Graham’s house as he has been making a CAD drawing of tank that we can send off to a tank builder. He is a pipe guy and I wanted him to check all the fitting that we need to get the correct sizes. If we get the fittings wrong the existing plumbing will not work and I am counting on not having to rebuild the fuel plumbing.

Here is the tank in the parking lot. It is laying over on it back so we see the bottom. The fitting in plastic is the drain and it was covered to prevent any fuel from getting on the carpet in the salon. While this tank did not fail, it certainly does not look great. These are black iron tank (steel). There has obviously been water on the tank because of the rust. That paint has pretty much failed also. The tank sits on a plywood shelf. That does not seem like a good idea as the wood will retain the water and keep it up against the tank bottom. That is evident in the picture. The unevenness of the rust is because the tank bottom is uneven. Probably because of the heat during welding. The worst rust is at the back of the tank on the bottom and rear end. My guess is that tank sits in the boat with the back end down just a little, probably all the junk in the cockpit of the boat weights down the aft end. While this tank had not leaked, we could tank my keys and chip big flakes of rust off the bottom in the same place the leaking tank leaked. I would guess that this one had a few years left before it leaked but not much. I wanted to look at this non-leaking tank to see it condition before deciding to do all four tanks. With this much rust on a non-leaking tank, all four are going to be replaced. It would just be a matter of time before the leaks spread.

This is the shelf that the tank sat on looking aft. All the dark stains are water damage. Near the top is what looks like a 2x2 that held the tank off of the side of the boat where condensation could get on the tank side. That seemed to be a pretty good idea. However, about a foot up from the shelf is some dark lines of water drainage. These are from some screws that hold the external exhaust tub to the side of the boat. Our exhaust goes right from the engine thru the side of the boat and down long this tub along the water line.  It gets the exhaust overboard quickly, so hot exhaust line are not inside the boat. As it is ¼ full of water, it also acts as a muffler as the sound bounces along the water as it exits the tub. I think the screws we see are at the bottom on the tub, so under water. I need to check this. As I don’t see another set of screws, maybe these are not original. I cannot think that a builder would have put screws through the side of the boat causing these leaks. So there may be a good outcome to having the boat with a starboard list right now. The exhaust is out of the water so I may be able to get to the bottom screws and replace them, or at least bed them down so they do not leak. I think if I can stop the water leaking in the screws, I can remove any water on the shelf. I also want to rethink the use of a shelf that allowed the water to sit up against the tank in the first place.

While the tanks are out of boat, this whole area is going to get refinished.

Carpe Diem Fuel Tanks

Saturday 5/29

Today is removing the vertical posts holding the tank in position. There are four posts that hold the tank to the side of the boat. There a fiberglass wedges that keep the tank from moving fore and aft. So between the wedges, the side of the boat and the four posts, that is all that holds the tank in place.

Each post has two bolts at the bottom that hold to post to ribs under the tanks and two bolts at the top that go into the floor joists. From removing the center section of the ceiling the inside of the bolts are accessible. The nut on the end of bolt is also above the ceiling over the tank. The aft most bolt took all day Saturday to get at and them remove. All the ceiling aft of the tank had to come down and that meant the hot and cold water lines also had to be lowered. Part of the work on this project is committing to remove something. I try not to take apart any more than I have to so some time is deciding how to do something and not doing too much.  But once committed, then the parts come out. I am not happy removing this much ceiling as I know I have to put it all back together. Once I could get at the nut on the bolt there was only enough space to use a little wrench to undo it, 1/8 of a turn at a time. Then, of course, the bolt would not just slide out, it also had to be unscrewed 1/8 of a turn at a time. The bolt was 6” long. So that was a good hour of work. It would be nice to have power tools for this work.

Sunday 5/30

To make a long story short, the other 7 bolts came out today. They were a little easier as the ceiling to be removed was smaller and once the nut was off, I hooked up my power screwdriver to a socked and powered out the bolts. Much easier then yesterday.

With everything obvious clear of the tank, the big test was it move toward the center of the boat. With my crowbar and hammer I could wedge outside of the tank and with one big pull the tank moved several inches toward the center. Success! This tank is free. Now we have a de-tanking party.

Carpe Diem Fuel Tanks

Saturday 5/21

There are two jobs for this weekend, removing all the vent lines to the Port Aft tank and getting all the fuel out of the tank. There are two vent lines per tank. They are both 1” lines to vent the 2” fill. My guess is there are two incase one gets blocked like with bugs and it was easier to run 1” lines than 2” lines in the space provided. The lines have been there for 23 years so they are pretty stiff to move. It takes removing the back of the cabinets in the salon to get at the top of the vent lines to move the, enough to detach them from the tanks. Here are the four port side vent lines, the engine room blower host, the 2” fuel fill and the black water tank vent lines. I clipped most everything loose to get some play in the lines and then removed them from the tank which is below the floor. This picture is inside the cabinet in the salon. The tanks are just below this picture.

The next job was to remove all the remaining fuel in the tank. I cannot have fuel dripping out when the tanks are moved. I have drained and pumped out all the fuel I can get to so the only thing left is to open up the tank and bail out the remaining fuel. These tanks have a large access port in the side of the tank for cleaning. Although, I don’t know how that was ever going to work as it me days of work to uncover the access port. So this certainly is not a yearly maintenance project.

Once the tank was opened by removing about a dozen nuts the cover could be unstuck from the sealer preventing leaks. This sealer and cover worked well as there never were any leaks here. This is the inside of the tank looking toward the rear at one of the baffles that keep the fuel from sloshing around at sea. There is a little red fuel at the bottom of the tank and that is what needs to be bailed out. The sides of the tank look pretty much brand new as they should being flooded with oily fuel most of the time. So the sides of the tank certainly would not have leaked from the inside.

Here is another picture of the inside looking at the front of the tank. You can some gunk in the tank which felt like grit. This is probably dirt or rust bits. But I am pretty impressed with how clean it actually looks. I could have seen a ½” of sludge in the bottom if water had gotten into the tank. There is so little stuff in here that the filters would have no trouble filtering this as the fuel moves through the filters.

Sunday 5/22

I spent some more time this morning bailing fuel. I used one of the big 18” x 18” fuel absorbent sheets to bail fuel. I would soak up the fuel inside the tank and then squeeze the sheet out into a fuel can. This actually worked quit well as the sheet could be used over and over like a sponge.

Later in the day a friend came over to take measurements of the tank. I am going to need accurate measurements to order some new tanks. The tanks are 60” long, 27” high and tapered from 14” at the bottom to 18” at the top and hold 100 gallons. From that we estimate they weight about 200 lbs. We also wanted to be sure we could move them to the center of the boat over the stringers. Once in the center, they have to be moved forward between the engines and out the engine hatch. There is some tilting and sliding that needs to be done to de-tank them from the boat and the measurements show we can do it with about 1” to spare.

Once we get them out of the boat the final measurements will be done and the placement of all the opening for fuel lines carefully measured. I want identical tanks to go back in so none of the fuel lines need to be changed out. I could increase the fuel capacity by probably 100 gallons if I wanted by making the tanks longer or wider but it is not worth playing with as all kinds of things would have to be changed.