I have returned... with a Starcraft this time!

[jbcurt00]

Around here, interlopers between 10 and 11p would lilely be opossums, or raccoons.

Hope its not a skunk......

 

[BWR1953]

Around here, interlopers between 10 and 11p would lilely be opossums, or raccoons.

Hope its not a skunk......

Yeah, I had a 'possum problem several years ago. But that went away. Heh heh.

Me no likey skunk interloper!!

Man, I'm stuffed! Some good eats 'round here today! :hungry:

 

[Watermann]

Trespassers can turn into thieves pretty quick so I don't blame you for not wanting them around. Maybe a nail board slightly buried where they cross the fence or some 40Lb fishing line strung up with a treble hook tied on every foot or so. :lol:

Less damaging ideas include a hot wire or even just an electric fence warning sign to deter them.

 

[BWR1953]

Trespassers can turn into thieves pretty quick so I don't blame you for not wanting them around. Maybe a nail board slightly buried where they cross the fence or some 40Lb fishing line strung up with a treble hook tied on every foot or so. :lol:

Less damaging ideas include a hot wire or even just an electric fence warning sign to deter them.

Yeah, when they were walking by the last time I saw them, about a month ago, they were within 10 feet of my boat shelter. Didn't like that at all.

I also thought of some pungy sticks gently buried in the sand! I like the fishing line and treble hooks idea. Could claim it was just some gear that fell off the boat! :lol:

My neighbor has a hot wire on his fence that adjoins my property on the east for his horses. He offered to just hook me up into his system. May end up taking him up on that offer. Bzzzzztttttt!!!! ound:

 

[BWR1953]

Progress! Nothing like being pumped up on powerful steroids to get a guy moving!! :lol:

Got out there this morning and went back to work on the little Kingfisher. Felt great to be working again. :joyous:

Continued Phase 1a; prepping and painting the Gluvit along the splash rail inside, plus the deck. Decided to just do a section at a time to see how it went.

So far, I'm a happy camper.

Gonna have to replace the front of the console with my Cloroplast panels and also paint these rod holders at some point. Probably with the same light gray that I'm using for the deck. Have it planned for Phase 2. But I have to complete this Phase then Phase 1b after that. So it could be awhile before I make things prettier.



Did a test of the epoxy paste today. Works great but does take a long time to set. That's expected though, it's the same consistency as very thick and sticky peanut butter.



Cleaned with vinegar and partly masked.



All masked and ready to prime with self etching primer.



This section primed. Took a lunch break to let it dry and am going back out now to paint with porch paint. Woo hoo! :laugh:

 

[BWR1953]

Sitting in the boat now while the boy cleans up. This section done! Tomorrow we continue.

Will upload pix when I go in the house.

 

[BWR1953]

Done for today. Letting paint dry now. Took us 5 hours to get this section prepped and painted including a 1 hour lunch break. Slow but steady! :lol:


Mr. Helper painting the tight spots where I don't fit! Better him than me, I say!



Done for the day. The boy did most of the painting. His first time ever painting anything, boat or otherwise. He learned a lot and did pretty well. I told him that he can be proud of the work he did today.

 

[BWR1953]

And this happened while we were out there today.

 

[BWR1953]

Phase 1a is done, y'all!!

Just waiting for the paint to dry. Will post more pix tomorrow once it's all set up again.

 

[BWR1953]

Post-painting pix. I just need to reconnect the battery to the trolling motor and depth finder, then re-strap down the battery box and fuel tank and the Kingfisher will be ready to fish.

But I know the rules around here... pix come first!

 

[jbcurt00]

Nice work.

Whats Phase 1B entail?

 

[BWR1953]

Nice work.

Whats Phase 1B entail?

Thanks! :joyous:

Phase 1a added improvements, components and accessories as well as painting the Gluvit and deck. Getting the Gluvit covered was a priority. Later on I'll be adding side panels and flotation which will cover the sides, so no painting needed there. And believe it or not, Phase 1a had 31 individual steps!

Phase 1b will be dealing with the donor boat and currently has 27 steps... if all the steps go well.

That means stripping the donor and moving parts over to the Kingfisher as appropriate. The biggest deal with Phase 1b is getting the 50HP Mercury engine running and working correctly, including the tilt and trim. If I run into problems there, it might take awhile to resolve. However, I won't be physically moving the 50 over to the Kingfisher until Phase 3.

So:
Phase 1b = strip donor boat and get engine running
Phase 2 = replace Kingfisher transom and install other stuff
Phase 3 = move big 50 onto the Kingfisher
Phase 4 = completely strip the Kingfisher and do a full restore including new decking, painting the hull, etc. (Way in the future!)

And I'm looking into other options on what to do with that 50HP Mercury even if it does run well. Always in motion is the future. :lol:

But for now, no more boat work is planned for the rest of the year.

I have some serious landscaping to do on the property here so that I can move boats around and get things organized. I drove my little tractor around the place the other day and counted 60 trees that need to come out. Sixty! This, after I've already removed a couple hundred off this little 1.5 acre parcel over the last 9 years. From big to small, plenty have been removed.

I'm hoping my neighbor buddy will be able to help me dig the Saw Palmetto bushes out. Those things are tough!

 

[BWR1953]

I've gotta say that I'm totally bummed that I haven't been able to get pix of my animal intruder. :blue:

The camera has been set up in a variety of spots and distances and configured different ways, yet I'm not getting any pix of the critter at all. Actually, no pix at night.

Last night we heard that animal go under the house and after a couple minutes we heard it "ting-ting-tinging" on something metal, like it was trying to pull something off or maybe get out through an area I blocked off a couple years ago.

My wife smoothed the sand near the opening and we took a couple pix this morning. The critter is either a raccoon or opossum. I can't really tell from the pictures. Could be either one. Any experts out there who can identify the tracks?

 

[BWR1953]

Found a reference and been looking at the animal tracks. I'm beginning to think it's an opossum. The arrow in the pic below shows what I think is that opposed toe thing. Maybe?

 

[Watermann]

Get at a live trap from animal control or wildlife dept and start a trap line.

The KF is looking good and your able to go fishing down there, not here very cold and windy.

 

[BWR1953]

I forgot to mention; as can be seen in the deck pix above, I chose not to fill the gouges in the plywood caused by extracting the rusted deck screws.

While the PC-7 epoxy paste did an excellent job of filling the gaps in the one area I tested, doing so was simply aesthetic and didn't provide any functional improvement at this point of the project. And applying, then waiting for all that epoxy to set and cure was time consuming.

So I just painted over the gouges and at some later Phase I'll replace the deck so they won't be a factor anymore. Works for me!

 

[BWR1953]

Get at a live trap from animal control or wildlife dept and start a trap line.

The KF is looking good and your able to go fishing down there, not here very cold and windy.

Ah reckon ah'll jus' fire three warning shots into its chest. :lol:

Looking forward to going fishing and a little bit cooler weather here!

 

[BWR1953]

I'm now 99% sure it's a 'possum invading our space.

We heard it go under the house awhile ago, then it started making angry, fighting noises. Thought there may be more than one, so we went outside to investigate. Didn't see it and the trail cam wasn't set up correctly, so no pix. But the sounds were just like the ones in the video below.

After awhile it got quieter, then loud again. Sounded like it may have been caught up in something? A friend told me about one he found in a junker car. The power window had apparently slid down and the 'possum got in there, then got caught up in something and expired. He said there was only about 1/2 the possum left and the stink was super rank. He just pulled the window up and moved on to the next car. :lol:

Anyway, after about another 1/2 hour this evening, we heard the animal exit the house... we think. Will investigate in the morning. I really need to get that access hole permanently blocked off but I don't want to do it if the 'possum is sleeping in there in the daytime. Ya know? :blue:

 

[BWR1953]

Gonna try this tonight.

Don't want that critter under the house or climbing up into boats and causing problems!

 

[Watermann]

Trap line set, looking forward to seeing the catch.