The Cornish Puffin

[J3JCV]

Bought a small boat for the family to explore Falmouth Harbour and the Carrick Roads, she was built in 1973 is 19 or 20' long and worked as a Fishing boat between 88 and 91 as PZ452.




Most recently she has been heavily used a leisure fishing boat, so to make her in to a family launch will take some effort!




oddly she happens to be stored on the hard right next to our old Hurley 22 that we old before moving to Italy about 3 years ago.


We had great times in that boat.

I will update with work in progress.

[J3JCV]

Ha Vaseline...... those photos were taken on my first look aboard, some of you should have known better and spotted the blue tin of Morris Grease to Port, thats the real stuff for ramming in the stern tube to keep the bilge dry.

Anyway this is how it looks now!



I have also taken most of the deck fittings off to reseal and replace.



The mighty Beta 30

[J3JCV]

No.....not on Pistonheads shirley.

[J3JCV]

So it was antifouling time over the weekend, I popped down on Sat morning and put on a bit of epoxy over some of the worst bits, taped it off and went home for lunch.

When I came back I was faced with this..


Some doofus parked a car with a country mile between it and the Discovery, but less room than the length of my roller to the boat! Patchy epoxy and blue tape in a boatyard at this time of year can only mean one thing and this was not obvious to said parker.

Anyway a couple of coats of Micron 66 later and she looks like this.


I have ordered a new prop from Teignbridge today as this one is way to big, shame though as it is fine and will be a waste just to leave in the garage.

[J3JCV]

Yep it's at Mylor Yacht Harbour, I grew up on that yard as my dad ran the place for nearly 50 years!

[J3JCV]

So it was round two of doofus parking today:


But I was only down to de-winterise the engine, & put on the shiny new prop.



I have also fitted a decent bow roller, as I will keep her on a swinging mooring and will be using 10mm chain for the pick up. This week I also added a small boarding ladder on the stern for emergencies, doubt I will use it for swimming unless I get used to the UK sea temp again!!

[J3JCV]

I have got my tiller back from the finishers at work and my god I could never imagined a 40 year old piece of timber that was water stained and bashed up would look so good!

Picture doesn't do it justice, but the first thing a friend said when he saw it was "you should take the rudder off and get the whole lot done properly as its a shame to stick that in there".

[J3JCV]

Took her for her 1st run today and its all good, needs more ballast up forward though, as she tries to leap out of the water from about 2500 to 3500 rpm but only up about 1 knot boat speed.

[J3JCV]

Fishtigua said:

What's the classic M/Y next to Puffin in the photo?

she is called Caramba, nice old boat http://www.cockwells.co.uk/refits/project-caramba perfect for round these parts.

[J3JCV]

Fantastic 1st trip, All the way up the River Fal to Malpas and back, which is around 14nm and approx 3hrs steaming.


Beautiful sunny day and very warm out of the wind, the children loved it and I was amazed at how good they were, as I thought they would be bored after 1/2 an hour. We were on board for about 4 hrs and they were still smiling when I dropped them on the pontoon, great result.

[J3JCV]

Having a great time:

[J3JCV]

Thank you for the kind words, we are getting plenty of use with all the good weather we have had this month. It is boating in its simplest form and I think I may have used £20 in fuel, no need to fill the tank for a couple of weeks yet, you have to love a 30hp diesel!
This was our anchorage today, it was blowing a Northerly so we popped round to the tranquility of Castle beach.

[J3JCV]

zed4 said:

Beautiful! Great job.

I really like the look of your boat, it's perfect for the Fal. We're on the look out for something similar to keep down there too.

No good having family living in Mylor if there's no boat to use!

There has been a few cheap Pilot 18s on findafishingboat recently, but try the classified section on the thisiscornwall website as it's the online version of the WestBriton, which is good for boats around this time of year.

[J3JCV]

Still getting tons of use, as one would expect with this weather!
Favourite anchorage, some will recognise the lighthouse.

Same spot earlier in the day and fine enough to swim in to the beach.

[J3JCV]

V41LEY said:

Non-'boatyperson' question. How are props attached to the drive shaft. That looks highly 'thievable' held
on with a split pin and a retaining nut (especially when out of the water).

They are pressed on pretty tight, put it this way I couldn't get the old prop off without significant help from a hot air gun, a swing arm puller, an iron bar and maybe some loud swearing, that said getting a brad new one off would be a lot easier.

However there are tons of variables with props, you have the pitch and the diameter, which all relates to engine size and vessel weight etc, then you have the shaft size and taper which is particular to when and where your boat was built. This means you are unlikely to take a prop of one boat and fit another unless it is like for like.

[J3JCV]

GTIAnni said:

Saw this whilst in Cornwall and thought you may like to see it.

B-)

That's funny, where did you see it?? I guess they recycle the boat licence numbers but I'm keen to find out which cove it worked from so I can look for old photos if any exist.

[J3JCV]

After an amazing summer of mostly doing this;


I decided to take her out early as Im away for the rest of the month. So last weekend I had one last camping / fishing trip with a bunch of school friends (from over 20 years ago

Parked up with a friends Hurley and it was a beautiful evening;


Woke up to this view;

The ripples / lines in the middle distance happened to be three common dolphins who spent a few hours feeding in the channel, it is very deep in that part of the river.

I paddled the dinghy out to try and get a good photo, but not enough light and a phone camera resulted in a series of very blured images. Shame as a big seal came close as well, it is amazing what is swimming around so close in at 0700 in the morning!
I took a photo of the boats in the distance and our camp was just behind the beach on the right.


Anyway the fun had to end, so yesterday she was hauled out ready for winter and hopefully a lot of developments on board.

Edited by J3JCV on Tuesday 17th September 21:39

[J3JCV]

So the message here is; fix the boat up a bit and we can have this standard of picnic! (At the moment its a bit pasty in bag and can of pop affair)!

[J3JCV]

Cheers Mick, Merry Christmas to you to!

I ended up back on the Riviera for most of my travels this winter, as a lot is going on out there. I'm long overdue a trip to Palma so expect to be out there soon.

Have a good new year and catch up in Jan.

[J3JCV]

So she is back in the water with a few modifications for this season...

I took the mast off, cut it down and re-mounted it on the Pilot house roof with nav lights added. I have also changed all the grab rails to stainless and added a VHF antenna too.
Before..

After..


I have also properly installed two batteries with a fuse panel and switch, this meant I needed to situate a second battery somewhere in the cabin, so I chose against the bulkhead behind the helm. This has allowed the steering gear to be boxed in as I was always worried about the kids fingers when they play in there!
Before..

After..


I have also added a VHF and Plotter/fish finder combo along with changing the blue to white for a cleaner look.
Before..

After...


I have also had a stern locker added to clean up the cokpit area, but have not had time to paint it yet!
Before..

After..


The weather hasn't been quite right for a family trip out yet, so I took it for a little run up this weekend, just as it blew up to 35-40kts!!



Looking forward to some sunny days now.