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Working on boats over 30 years old have plenty of challenges, not the least of which is the engine. On my Cape Dory 330 the original engine bed was made of mild steel and rusted to where I did not trust it. As it turned out the rust damage was worse than I thought.
Our old Universal 5424 is still running strong, but as you can see it is a bit of a oddball engine. It has three instead of the usual four motor mounts. When designing the new engine bed I wanted to make sure it would work for a new engine if there is ever a need. We should be able to easily install a Beta or a Yanmar in the future.
The engine compartment as it was when we bought SV New Song.
This is about all I could see of the engine bed. It was enough to be uncomfortable
II’m glad I took the time to replace it. The weldment was rusted through and cracked. With the the way it was installed this damage could not be seen until it was removed from the boat.
New engine bed being glued up out of GPO3 and West System Epoxy.
New bed epoxied and glassed in place
Painted and ready for the engine
The final product.
A friend wanted to replace his old Volvo V-drive with a new Beta. The new V-drive is a 15 degree angle as apposed to the original 20 degree. We built a new engine bed to accommondate the change.
Our Cape Dory 330 came with a thirty gallon water tank under both the port and starboard settees, however the space below the sole is huge. Inspired largely by the work of James Baldwin at Atom Voyages I decided to build integral tanks below the sole.
This frees up a large amount of storage that is easy to reach, dry, and clean compared to storing anything in the bilge.
The completed water tanks
Beginning of the tanks. The tanks are made of fiberglass panels.
Tanks ready for painting
As well as the two water tanks I’ve added an integral diesel tank. The tank is where the original holding tank was. The new tank is 35 gallons, a significant increase from the original 20 gallon tank.
fitting the tops
All tanks coated with three coats of Brew Coat, a potable water epoxy coating.
A friend wanted to install a below deck autopilot on his Cape Dory 30. We had very little space to work with so we came up with an indirect attachment. The autopilot ram moves a shuttle back and forth on a linear bearing. The shuttle is connected to a short tiller mounted to the back of the rudder post via a couple dyneema lines.
