One suggestion; don’t pay in full until the work is fully completed. Despite Russells many promises to finish my boat; he never returned even though it had been paid for in full. He was full of lame excuses. Pisses me off thinking about it.
That really surprises me to hear about Russell. I know a lot of folks in that sort of business operate exactly the way you warned of, but in my dealings with Russell as well as his dealings with friends and family of mine alike everyone has been extremely pleased. I dealt with Russell a little when he was doing warranty work for Scout along with his own business, so I feel confident in him helping me now.
I will let him know there’s a former customer who’s unhappy. Check your PM’s, Redeye.
More grinding and sanding. Almost ready to start building.
Will have to fix this area on both sides. Somebody’s horrible repair job.
Last of the hardware coming off the boat. Nothing structurally wrong up here. Just needs cosmetic repair.
Plan to make this anchor locker access a little bigger and design a motorized anchor line spooler reel that hangs from the casting deck. Line and chain will come over a fairlead and get spooled up instead of someone having to deal with everything by hand.
You can see these fuel vents were doing an excellent job… and that I didn’t do an excellent job grinding out the crack in the top right of the hole in the gunnel.
Was getting late, so I had to knock off. Tonight I have to cut out the outside ring where the rain gutter will fit for the port side. Got a few more little things, and it will be time to start glassing.
Got the gutter inset area cut out for the port side box and drew in where drains would go in the back corners each side. Outside dimensions of the fish box access holes themselves are 9x19.5"
Should be able to easily tell when scamp grouper are legal.
I am thinking of a painted in fish ruler on the bottom of each lid though.
More foam excavation on starboard side
Done except for grinding around the top edges where the gutter sections will get glassed to existing deck.
I tried to line up the inside of the box lid edges with the outside of the helm vertical edges. This should make everything look like it flows together well.
I picked up my fuel tank from the freight terminal Friday.
Took it to Marc at Carolina Custom Rigging in Mt. Pleasant Saturday to get mounting brackets welded on. Dude can flat out weld!
Also made a trip to Billy Freeman’s shop Saturday to get some advice. Have always been told newer boats “ain’t built like they used to be.” I can honestly say that I am shocked at how overbuilt Billy’s boats are. Combine that with new material types and really high quality control, and I know now why Freeman Boatworks has taken off so fast. Saw his new pilot house that he has built for the 33 (and the 37 in the future), and here is the new Freeman 28. It looked very nice. Really well laid out too!
Anyway… back to reality…
Got more of the deck core out of the aft corners
Then got rid of the prism beams below the deck that ran where I want my fish boxes.
You can more clearly see where the prism beam was as well as the drainage from the forward storage lockers that has to be moved outboard of where they are here.
At this point, I went to the convenience store a few blocks away and drank a red bull and mentally prepared myself for maximum exertion to defeat whatever was inside the transom before the day was done.
There will be no more updates here for a while. I am extremely discouraged right now. Have been in damage control mode for the past 8 hours. Things I could never Have imagined have been going on we’re going on apparently, and I am still in shock somewhat that people can behave the way they have.
I removed the person and “business” that had been mentioned in this thread and will not bring him up again unless I’m asked in an email or private message. I am not going to change the focus of this thread to give any attention whatsoever to this guy…
I am not going to say anything else about what has happened. I hope no one else has to deal with what I have, and that’s all I will say about the severity and ridiculousness of it all.
A huge thanks to Chris V for helping me out of a huge bind, as always, and also to Russell Dill for being a continued friend and help even when he is leaving the country soon to go work and doesn’t owe me a thing but continues to help me. Billy Freeman and Roy and Mike at Pioneer also. Everyone has kept me from doing everything wrong!
Thanks also to all my friends who have been helping me so much also. The guys who have helped me out will be the ones holding up fish in some pictures soon. I won’t let you guys down here. It will just take some time for me to get the cart out of the ditch this time. I know I can’t do it alone, and I know who has to help me. Just have to be patient.
I have learned a whole lot, and things have definitely been put back into the right perspective for me.