12th July 2019 – My neighbour is back from the yard. That means that everybody is back for the Kolenkaaifeesten tomorrow.
7th July 2019 – While I was open to the public, I ran the engine for over one hour, including the steering system. It had been a while and no issues came up!
5th July 2019 – A few jobs were done today. I removed rust from the gangway and my mother painted the freshly finished bedroom.
4th July 2019 – After more than seven months, I managed to finish the bedroom. Quite an achievement since it is probably the smallest room aboard….
29th June 2019 – For some time, I have been looking for a yacht. I’m not difficult in what I want. It must look old fashioned, made in metal and it needs an interior that is useful. The budget is very limited. I have two ships in mind.
One is a motorschouw with a broken engine, but a finished interior. The other one is supposed to have a running engine, but no interior.
Today I went to see both of them. The first one was in Raamdonksveer. On arrivial, I noticed it was a riveted ship, but with some rotten parts on deck. Underneath the bollards was fibreglass, and some silicone in the deck to avoid water coming through. The engine is indeed broken, but the ship seems fine. The cap on the back deck needs replacing. It was a warm and dry day, so was the ship. I couldn’t find any other issues of leaks. But there will be something else wrong for that price…
The second ship was much bigger, it was a Ten Broeke kruiser with a massive Mercedes Engine. I was not convinced how the engine ran, never mind the rest of the ship. Metal work was good, but most of the windows needed replacing. The interior was rotten and the smell unacceptable.
Once back at home, I knew which one I wanted, but not at their asking price….
14th June 2019 – I joined a friend to Amsterdam. He is interested in buying a ship and wanted some advice. We were early and I decided to walk around in the marine, looking for old tugs and barges. I found a few…
12th June 2019 – Leaking windows is an issue on all boats. I replaced some old windows in 2007 on the Watergeus with new ones. They never leaked until last week. The reason: the silicone had started to disintegrate. I replaced the silicone on three windows and today, after some heavy rain they were dry. Operation succeeded.
The only windows I found so far that have never let me down were Rafa windows, if mounted in a metal frame. I’m not a shareholder of this company, since I always buy them second hand… This was also the advice I gave somebody a week ago when he wanted to buy a small yacht: go for aluminum windows instead of the glass in rubber!
10th June 2019 – I have been sitting inside the whole day because of the bad weather. Rain…. Let just hope that the whole summer won’t be like this. I really like to continue painting my two ships.
In between two showers I fixed three leaking windows on the Watergeus. Silicone doesn’t last forever…
Later in the evening, I went to the English neighbour and had a few beers, talking about boat conversions and why you should start doing such a project. Another neighbour joined a bit later.
10th June 2019 – My friend managed to get the alternator running. The indicator light was not strong enough to give a pulse to the alternator. The wires are in position. There was an issue with a leaking injector pipe, but that is now fixed as well. Nearly ready to go, to leave Ghent.
8th June 2019 – My friend spent a whole day in the engine room, connecting the new alternator, fixing the cooling system and insulating the exhaust. He came home a bit disappointed since the alternator didn’t work….
7th June 2019 – I was doing small jobs, like working in the bedroom finishing the floor, putting new silicone in the kitchen windows and cleaning the front deck.
6th June 2019 – A spits barge of 30 meters was moored in the Coupure. The owner wanted to leave and to make preparations for going to England with the ship. We helped him moving to my ship. Since I’m painting the Watergeus, we decided to put the vessel alongside the neighbour who doesn’t live on her ship. It took us a few hours since the bridges closes between 16:30 and 17:30 for traffic.