toerag

Figurehead under the bow??

Wedger - get some parallel motion wipers to replace the ones you've got on there, because believe me you'll need them. I virtually always have to give mine a rinse with the hose when I put it back on the pontoon as they do tend to ship spray and worse over the front in anything other than a calm sea. You may also find water comes inthrough the side windows if they don't drain properly.

Sounds like you had a reasonable trip. The fishing at the moment certainly isn't a patch on last year, especially on the banks. The quality is there, but the quantity isn't. Wrecking has also dropped off at the moment too, I think the early may bloom we're getting is the cause.

If my experience is anything to go by, sharks don't show up on fishfinders. Well, the one that did this didn't! :-

This was also on a wreck in the deep, it ate half a cod as well.

I also believe that FF are best used to showstructure, I can catch fish off a wreck all day long and not see anything on the sounder. Having said that, both my sounder transducers are mounted inside my hull, so I don't get the best out of them.

and to throw a spanner in the works, I have loops on the boat end of my permanent mooring for the springs, and a simple rope for the direct lines, ie. I have a stern and midships cleats with matching attachments on the pontoon. I moor up with the eyed lines (springs) then use the other lines to attach the boat tightly to the finger. The cleats aren't big enough for 2 cleated off ropes, so one has to have an eye. Bow mooring is done with 2 eyes, one from each side.

The secret to neat splices is to colourcode each strand with different coloured tape, and to use each one in turn in exactly the same order each time, neatening up the splice after each set of tucks. If you do more tucks with one particular colour then it all goes wrong. Having taught about 60 scouts to do eye, back and joining splices I'm pretty qualified! Oh and it also helps to not let the strands get untwisted, 'cos that's messy too.

Cheers for the suggestions guys, most appreciated. I'll let you know how I get on, but I suspect I'll go for a Saeplast and re-site the rod holders on my enginebox so it can sit in front.

I have disc anodes on the upper surfaces of my stainless tabs and they last a season. As you're not sure, put anodes on and if they don't dissolve then don't bother replacing them. You can never have too many anodes!

I for one will be trying to slow my drifts down next summer, cos it's quite clear to me that my current 2 knot drifts on springs are too fast!

Mike

Not for turbot they're not. I just trip my anchor and drag it backwards, then steam back up towing it behind me like the charterboats do. Works well.

Just for info for you guys, I use a Jabsco 'water puppy' to feed my 2 baitwells on my MI, each of which is about 6 gallon capacity. The pump draws 8 amps, so after about 3 long drifts for flatties on the Schole with the engine off, the battery voltage will be about 11.6V with the pump on, not enough to crank the engine. Turning the pump off normally gives enough voltage to start her up, but failing that I switch on the other battery. I can keep mackerel alive all day long with this setup.

Right, I need a big coolbox for the boat to use as a slushbox. The commercial guys here use the Saeplast B series ones, but they're a bit too square for the space on my deck, I could do with something more 'coffin shaped'. I have seen the coleman & igloo ones, but I have a smaller colemen and they're hard to keep clean. Any other recommendations? I have looked up FrigidRigid, Iceytek and a couple of other australian brands but they're even more expensive than the Saeplast ones, and that's without shipping!

To give you an idea of cost, a Seaplast B4 is

By far the best stuff for removing weed is sodium hypochlorite. 

I could be wrong but I think one would end up in serious trouble with the Environment Agency and the local water board as the run off from this chemical might enter the surface drains which go straight into top water disposal either in the sea or rivers.

Mad Mike

It's not a problem, I used at an oysterfarm situated in a seawater filled quarry cut off from the sea for over a week at a time. It simply dissolves, much like the phosphoric acid in the Ece chemical tanker that sunk. Besides, it's only the same stuff as is in bleach, but bleach is diluted down to make it 'safer'.

PMSL!! Nice one wedger!

I must also warn you that sikaflex sticks to everything you don't want it to, it's much more 'grabby' than silicone sealant. It doesn't peel off like silicone does once dry either, you have been warned!! Best to mask off either side of the area you're applying it to just in case.

Have a look on here, this site gives the buoyancy in lbs for each buoy.

http://www.saeplast.com/servlet/Saeplast/g...ductgroup=BUOYS

Weigh your anchor and chain, then work out what buoy you need. I nearly collected a washed up A6 bobber last weekend, but someone else got to it first!

also, skin fittings insulated from everything ie. in a GRP hull and connected to plastic pipe do not strictly need any galvanic protection (the techy name for anodes!)

Also, boats in freshwater need magnesium anodes as zinc ones don't work well enough.

As your anodes are eaten away the metal removed becomes a plating on whatever it was attracted to.

Finally, if you use a stainless washing machine drum hung over the pontoon as a livebait container they need the big alloy spindle left on the back or they rot really quickly. - This seems to contradict what I have said above about not having to protect skin fittings, yet my bronze water inlet for my bait tank is fine, no de-zincification at all.

De-zincification - poor quality bronze/brass (can't remember which) will have it's zinc atoms corroded out of it and become weak. Random Harvest nearly sunk because of this a while back, one of it's skin fittings disintegrated.

3 pollack and a gurnard between 10 of you? I'd call that an abysmal day myself!!

By far the best stuff for removing weed is sodium hypochlorite. It is the active ingredient in bleach, and is available in 5 gallon drums. We used to use it at the oysterfarm I worked at as a nipper. Simply dilute it 1 part SH to 4 parts water and spray it on with a weedkiller sprayer. Leave it for an hour or 2 then wash all the dead white weed off. Be warned, it is REALLY strong stuff, you need full waterproofs, gloves, goggles and facemask really. Bleach is something like 2.5% strength, we used to buy it at 40% I think. Sprayed neat onto wood is like painting it white!!

Normal bleach does work, but nowhere near as well, and it's more expensive.

For what it's worth, I use Micron optima on my MI21 which lives on a marina mooring all year round. Once you get at least 3 or 4 coats on it you do not get any fouling at all on the underside of the hull as it simply gets 'washed off' as you drive around. The transom and waterline however, does suffer a bit of green hair which is easily removed by wiping with a sponge. The antifoul is so 'soft' that anything like a scrubbing brush will remove the antifoul very quickly and allow weed to adhere to the underlying material (gelshield in my case). When it was laid up for re-antifouling this winter I simply used a wet rag to 'sand' down any imperfections. I like it because it's water-based so you don't need any nasty solvents or awkward cleanup procedures. OK, it's not cheap, and you'll probably need to touch it up every season, but it is good. Perhaps not so good on a trailered boat as the launching and retrieving will wear it away too quickly. Perhaps the best solution would be to give it an 'undercoat' of a compatible 'hard' antifoul?

You can actually join the club and fish our comps, with the excellent quality of fishing down your end, I bet you will do really well.

You obviously don't know how good he is at fishing then!!!

Hi guys,

one of the switches on my 9-way switch panel has died, does anyone know if it's possible to replace them individually, and if so, how much they cost? The little LEDs seem to be wired into the panel somehow. It's similar to this but black and with more switches:-

and GAS MAIN congers

There was a story going round Guernsey a couple of years ago about a conger seen in the Cherbourg fisherman's co-op that winter by a Guernsey skipper when he landed his catch there. It was caught in a trawl, only 7ft long but had a head like a 5 gallon drum. Allegedly it weighed 130.......KILOS!!!!

Many thanks to one and all for sharing your knowledge and very broad experience.

The great thing about this forum is that it's all like-minded individuals. I've learnt stuff on here, and I hope I've helped others in the short time I've been on here. There's not much on the net with regard to doing things to small boats, so this is a great resource.

toerag.

What can you tell me about this issue please?

Wedger

I've not had any problems with mine, nor do I know anyone that has, but it's one of the few places where you're drilling holes in the hull. I do know people that have had leaks via their keels, but that was on bigger boats that dry out and get bounced on the bottom everyday. Sorry if I scared you, but time spent doing things properly now will save time later. If the boat's been out of the water for some time and is dry then you're probably best to replace the keelband now, rather than after it's been in the water for 6months. Mine has a stainless band fitted with countersunk screws. It's not one piece, it's 3 I think. The front comes up to about 3 inches above the waterline, If I was fitting a new one I'd run it up as high as I could to the bow (yes I know the trailering eye gets in the way) as that's where you hit pontoons when berthing bow-on if you're not careful.

...where leg driven boats were turning back into Braye harbour in Alderney this August due to very nasty notherly wind over tide conditions three shaft drive boats headed home across the channel.

I've just read the article in sea angler, one of my mates in Alderney said that the sea angler guys were over to do a boat test and it turned crappy. What weekend was that?

BobF - your method is completely correct, I just couldn't be arsed to type that all out....

It's also useful to compare your plotter conversion with the one on the wrecksite to see if there's any anomalies.

I hate numbers people give you like 49-59-30 1-10-20 - you never know if they should be 49-59-300 1-10-200 or 49-59-030 1-10-020!