Well she has a really nifty driver seat...
ANd she has a couple spiffy steering wheels...
And she even has a couple big grumbly things...
'96... Cherry... 1400 hrs, surveys mechanically and hull like new. Almost every 12volt toy has issues from disuse... No biggie as we're planning to replace almost every thing in her any way... 28kts at 2050(below cruise of 2100) with tabs not working, dirty bottom, barnacles on wheels and the wheels not reconditioned recently or maybe ever.
25knots loafing at 1925. Pins at 2300+- but electrical connections at gps bad and unit shut off before I could get a read but roughly 31-32...
She's got an eskimo icemaker and I am already blue printing to turn drink box into both a freezer and live well...
After..................
This boat only joined us after the Mid Atlantic... I had 136 things on my list to get done before she'd earn her name...
I was figuring on getting that list done in early January in time for our first Bahama tournament... A lot can happen though in a short time when bound and determined comes into play...
I wrote about some of the things done... I'll recap and add... Got our Eskimo makin 600 pounds of ice per day, Got our cockpit cool box converted to freezer, Installed new macerator pump for the fish box, Rebilt two A/C units, replaced 24 recessed halogen lights, rewired entire ship, 2 new plotters, radar like, new sounder, new batteries, new running lights, 2new Vhfs, redid trim tabs (in water), refinished entire interior wood, new bedding all the way around, got windshield wipers working, reconditioned enclosure, installed chair of death, removed old lettering, stocked fridge, re rigged riggers, polished every inch of metal on tower, buffed the riggers, churned out 256 hours in last three weeks and finally she is worthy of... earning her name...
The boss man wanted to do something nice for her. Yall might recognize this print as being from the Ma500 shirts this year...
But very few saw this...
The "Chair of death" just needs some warm bodies to keep it company now...
Yes the girl is now worthy of not only wearing her name but her family name too...
In ocean city tonight... DAMN! Must have a pile of barnacles on her cause she was 5 knots off usual.Eased up a little by end of day and I was back to 25-26 knots but still slower than usual. Supposed to turn to shit I guess mid day tomorrow...
WOKE TO HEAVY RAIN SQUALLS... fILTHY BOTTOM HAD ME MAKE A DECISION. Sunset marina took great care of us on a spur of a moment. Hauled, blasted, new zinc and back in in just over an hour. Cleared the inlet at 11AM and was tied here in Norfolk...3:45
28 knots at 1980rpm all the way and it was 6-8' the last fifty miles before the Bay Bridge... Thats what I call service... Never hopped or pounded once... Beat the hell out of the waves and I think spray we made is still landing...
Am stuck in Norfolk... This sucks... They locked the bridges below me in down position. They blame bad weather. I blame the new president!
Tough night of sleep. Had a drip... All that spray got up between the rub rail and hull and found a path to my forehead. Viking water torture????
At least parked right to seal the leak and no more drip. Ship store hot dogs taste like cardboard....
I'm in Caroilina! Ok Coinjock isn't exactly beverly hills but its closer to Florida than I was... Did you know that there are 15 brigdes from Norfolk to here?
I think I knew that but tried to forget.... Four hours to make 20 miles then one hour and a couple minutes to make the last 30...
Maybe I should do a Deeps waterway guide...
The first three bridges no problem. The next one "Glimerton" That sloth took way way long to open though its demand. I pushed the "no wake" deal as far as I dared and got to the Dominion Steel Bridge...
Doosh berry had to keep me from beating that gal to death. A gal of "color"... I got there 50 seconds early and she refused to open instead having me wait for an hour. No cars there just the ***** of the ditch too f*****g lazy to mash the button...
Pulled into a place called great bridge. The door was closed in front of me then behind me... Funny thing the tide went out two and a half feet in just a couple minutes...
As the freakish one cleared the bridges. I could see all the boats that left pre dawn in fron't of me. Since many of the bridges don't open between 6 ands 9AM... iT makes no sense to get going that early. With daylight short in front of us and 80 miles between coinjock and the next tie up we made a call. Didn't want to run out of daylight in unfamiliar water.
We got the last available slip!
Talk about shoe horned in... TH yacht behind me has his burgee slapping my tower leg and is anchor just over my transom door. I'm gonna ask the yacht in front of me if I can stand in his pit and wax the underside of my pulpit...
Right now you could read a paper by the light... My butt is glowing cherry red after my day...
Last night was a great one in Morehead. Box, Raven, Gottafly, Capt. Tim, Ponytail, Surfergirl, Joeksr, the artwork of Mr. Ray made for really one of the best nights I have had in a long time.Thank all of you!!!
She was puffin pretty good this morn so I decided that I'd ditch run to Cape fear then head south from there... First forty or fifty miles was pretty good. Then I hit the traffic jam. THis is where Jersey and her kinds fault. Insurance companies hate Florida...They seem to think its the only place that gets hurricanes and won't let their covered boats head south til now unless the poor insurees want to pony up double or tripple premium. So by the zillions they wait to go in mass.
With the bad weather recently it held them up til now and I had a solid wall four wide of every rag boat and trawler in this hemisphere infront of me for the next hundred miles!!!Hundreds of em looked like a forest of telephone poles
I tried to be polite where I could but the skunks that were doing 15 knots got a good rockin when I went to pass them... ... Its ok for them to run at maximum wake speed then they get pissed because I have to pass to keep from falling off plane and burning tripple fuel???? Heard my name on the radio a few time and saw a few birds flipped... Hey trawalers... Tough Shit!
I got to southport too late to make any good ground outside so I stuck to the ditch and planned on Myrtle...
I have never seen anything like I saw after that... Litterally hundreds if not close to a thousand boats stretched from there to the South Carolina border all setting and pulling gill nets!!! Across the ditch along side every friggin place!!! No way anything could survive that. I saw lizzard fish, pin fish, baby trouts, mullets, nothing of value killed by the metric ton!!!!
The icing on the cake was when I approacged a spot where they were building a bridge. THey dropped a section of span off the barge and a tug boat got hung up on it blocking the whole intercoastal!!!!!!!
Bridges cost me three hours. Netters and hour. The blowboats and trawlers got me for another and the stuck tug stole one more. 6 hours... 170 miles worth! I should be in Hilton Head by now...
Got here in the dark... Damnit... I'm Tired... but I feel better now...
North south east or west its all the same the weathermen are full of shit... Left the dock yesterday on the promise of 15 knots from the west... Inside was glass smooth but I didn't have another day of dealing with rag fags trawlers and maple leaf flags left in me...
Just outside the inlet the 15 knots was there but off the Carolinas you can't hug the beach unless you want to find out just how far the shoals stretch off shore... Nope you gotta get several miles off the beach...
Well out there it wasn't fifteen... It was 25! The promised 2 foot sea was replaced by 4 to 6' crap spaced about 15 feet apart... How do I know that? Cause when my bow was blasting one. There was another here at the helm and a third one rolling under the transom. The boat didn't hop but 4-6 on any boat is wet and slow when its on the dead center head...
This leads to the second "Ain't" 220 degrees on the compas ain't west... Its a bit more west than south west and happened to be my course...
Harbortown in Hilton Head is a beautiful spot but for what they charge couldn't they hire someone who has a clue and more importantly knows not to grab my stern line as I'm backing in a slip then cleat it off on the OUTSIDE cleat when I'm backing in!... I almost bought a 100 foot westport...
Thn today the promise of 5 foot was replaced by 2 foot... Instead of subsiding though it was growin and the full promised five by the time we hit Ponce... One more day then I'm done with this run thank god...
Ponce inlet can make your butt pucker. Getting out of the marina you brush the dust off the sides of your bottom then stare into a seething caldron of white as the slop busts across the rock pile and right across the channel... That or 16 hours in the ditch and a late night dark arrival...
Took the bumpy option. This time the weather man was on the light side of what was... Solid 20+ from the north east had worked up 5-7 slop and was standing it taller every inch of the way. Canaveral is a pain in the ass... They run you long around it and with the shoal situation often we found our selves in full blown roller breakers even thoughwe had twenty feet or more of depth...
We just slammed our way south with slop on all sides. 5-7 became 6-8 with an occasional "oh shit" mixed in... We often went full minutes unable to see because of the spray. Litterally the whole ride was spent in the middle of it.
Off Stuart the weeds were solid. I could only envision a hidden board or plastic bag ruining my day. I did hear a guy who found a rope in it the hard way and crippled a wheel.
Though I was hugging tight, just above Jupiter the gulf stream had worked all the way to the beach and really built an ugly ugly sea. I heard a charter guy call it quits after filling his cockpit with a nasty one. About thats same time I saw what looked like one of the alps in front of me... Wow was that hideous! 14' or better. I missed it though...
What a thrill when I slipped between the break waters and pulled the sticks back... Made our way to our new slip. The shore power box had been burnt up but being modular and a competent dock owner near by it was replaced by the time I got through my engine room check....
Most excited about getting away from ditch grub and having some of Mrs Deeps chocolate chip cookies and some real food...
The rebirth of Mirage is going along swimmingly... To date we have now changed every pump, switch, electronic device and lightbulb in her... I have resealed every caulk bead from stem to stern and laid wax on everything I can reach. The metal has been brought to like new with help from Never Dull and Alumaguard... A lot done and a lot to go.
Some of you may remember that I had some water seepage issues getting in from under the rub rail where there was no caulk... Thats gonna require carpentry. In keeping with the boss's criteria that we do things 100% right we are going to redo the entire interior section by section after the damaged wood is fixed...
We could have gone to Viking and had them do it but the boss put me to the task of getting the best and it looks like I'm going to have help from old friends... How about this for a dream team... Jeff Murray (Son of Ed Murray) and Ray from Rybovitch!
Question is will we be a Viking Custom Murray Edition or will we be a Rybovike?...
While they create art inside I will be tending to the bottom and doing new thru hulls... A good layer of Micron Extra, some hand painted hoos, New trim tab lines, a new boot and a shine on our wheels will have that part playing the part of an '09 new machine...
I have both Jeff Murray of Murray Brothers (The Real ones) fame and Ray from Rybovitch working on that right now... None of that is gonna be outside though... This is still a competition rough tough tournament boat...
Finally done with all the wax and detail crap... Went to gather up all the cleaners and junk thats crowding my boat and while under the sink I found a new project...
There was some water down there. I looked and saw my water tank down by about a quarter... Time to go digging...
I know screw manufacturers must go out of there way to make one in a set of a dozen that strips the second you look at at it. They always put it on the other side from where a right handed person could try to work it out... So in I went to dig it out... Someday somebody is gonna invent little kevlar knuckle pads...
A few teaspoons of my grade a hemoglobin every now and then seems to keep the boat happy...
While back behind the wall I found where a Viking work man had lunch one day... Bag and bottle were still there along with mummified remains of a 1996 samwich of some kind. On the bright side I also found 28 cents in there....
Rybo man was aboard and getting ready to address the starboard while I continue my attack on the port... I'll keep you posted...
I had no idea that doing a disposal and other plumbing work would be so easy... Damn if it wasnt a breeze though... Had enough tome left over to start turning my attention to the "fishifying" of Mirage... Stowed away secret weapons of death and then some today...
A lot of people scracth their head as to why I'm always months ahead on making rigs and stuff... Perfect example today. I have the entire Bahama season worth of stuff packed away so now I can focus on the sail stuff for the next couple months and continue bringing the big girl to like new condition...
Been a while since an update so here goes... Got back from Whale Harbor on Monday. The Contender motors were still hot when I grabbed the big girl and slid her over to the sling... A quick snatch and pressure spray and got to see what I would be up against... When we got her. Somebody had pulled a fast one and slapped some fresh looking paint on her but now after a couple months I could see what was waiting under...
I can't believe four owners before us and not one ever did the bottom right. Hell blame Vike too. They missed large areas on the bottom and forgot the primer...
This was gonna be no quick sand and coat... Not if we want this boat to truly be like new... I slapped the 36 grit and grinder to her but she just laughed... TIme to bring in the big guns!
I called in the cavalry from all angles...!
Had my canvas artist get to work on new bunks, cushions and repair a bunch of EZ2CY zippers...
On the other flank I put Jeff Murray of original Murray Bros. fame to work to create a new inside- Cabinetry, floors, wall work, entertainment center, etc...
Grabbed a GM Guru to adress not only a couple little things on the motors but to change out our thru hulls. I don't want to hear a bilge pump run the whole time were at chub...
Then imported all the way from Lauderdale the baddest ass soda blaster this side of the himalayas... Man was that some operation. If you respond, TYPE LOUD cause I'm kind of deaf after that...
Raymarines rep finished the complete replacement of our entire E120 system in the little boat. I'm impressed how much they cared when I got to the right people...
Our outboard mechanic got in a pissing contest with our marina and got kicked out... Found a new one I'm comfortable with though so that project is under way.
Back on the big boat I have a detail crew gonna bang it out from waterline up. Compound and seal the transom. Buff out and shine up the sides.
I'm heading up the "on or backs" underneath team... to remove, sand down, reseat, prime and paint her belly... No mercy on the big girl now. Closing in on being "right"...
Watermaker is in route along with another half dozen custom rods and tiagras... Corian countertops, satin nickle plumbing hardware, ARDF, Hdtv, blue ray, all headed for the salon... No turnin back now... I'm feeling a bit like a traffic cop but damn! I love it...
What we looked like when we hauled (after pressure blasting the barnacles, sponges, and small children off)
Closer inspection of the hull found areas that it was just flaking off... or other patches of just wet mush that wasn't stopping marine growth...
So I busted out the scraper.And tried working with that...
That wasn't going so good so I tried the grinder... Thats kinda like giving whiskey to Cochise...
That as you can see was going nowhere so I enlisted the big guns and a ton of soda and a hundred feet of visqueen and hid a crew of three under there for a couple days...
I'm evoking my fifth amendment rights not to post the next sequence... Yall will have to trust me that the boat was white...
After that came the 2000e barrier/ primer coat stuff and before you know it I had three coats laid of that and now the bottom was grey...
As much as I would have loved to leave it that color I had been told that the barnackles love to eat that grey shit so I better go blue and land lay down three coats of $800 per coat Micron 66...
I would have laid the last coat on but I'm beat... Cant lift my arms above my waist right now...
Tomorrow will have to be the last coat, then new boot stripe, wax the hull clear coat the transom, install new canvas, have the interior started with the Murray Transoformation..
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), refinished entire interior wood, new bedding all the way around, got windshield wipers working, reconditioned enclosure, installed chair of death
, removed old lettering, stocked fridge, re rigged riggers, polished every inch of metal on tower, buffed the riggers, churned out 256 hours in last three weeks and finally she is worthy of... earning her name...
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... Four hours to make 20 miles then one hour and a couple minutes to make the last 30...
... I almost bought a 100 foot westport...
Originally Posted by gradywhite273
