22th October 2006 – Another two & halve meters have been added. Since there are now enough plates and ribs, one of the major supports has been added. This support should keep everything straight and tightly together.
While removing a part of the old L-profile, used for the water tanks in the old days, I felt overboard with tools and clothes. I made it safely to my boat, but the tools and gloves were lost. Quickly changed clothes and continued working…
21st October 2006 – I’m busy on my own ship, but decided to help for a day on the Varta. The survey was done a few days ago and while the yard was welding, I cleaned the hull with a grinder.
21st October 2006 – In the morning, I helped aboard my girlfriends barge, cleaning the plates of the bow.
We have added the strips to the side of the plates. These strips will be the ribs of the upper structure. Just welding the side plates is not strong enough. Also the plates will have a waving motive if they are not attached to the ribs.
The set of hatches I’ve bought exists of a beginning and an ending hatch. For those to fit, a special gudder needs to be welded. It took us some time to get in place.
20th October 2006 – I arrived late in the evening. The roof was finished of my new entrance. It looked good. Since it was already dark, I decided not to work, but rather to have a drink on my girlfriends boat that was still at the yard.
15th October 2006 – The first part of the sides were put in position. A couple of the hatches were placed to get an impression. It is not easy to create a side over the length of 24 meters and keeping it straight. Halfway, sand will be loaded in the boat to get her in a better shape.
When the first couple of hatches are placed, the already build part will be finished first. The plates now need to be welded completely.
14th October 2006 – After a heavy night, we placed the roof on the newly created cabin. The roof wasn’t good, so we started again. A very time consuming job.
The Blue board was placed in the late afternoon. My ship looks again a bit more like a real commercial barge.
13th October 2006 – Together with my neighbour we would bring the ship to the yard. Several things went wrong. My neighbour had to unload a cement ship, so we lost some time. During the journey with the Varta, the engine wasn’t functioning as it should. We missed the opening hours of the bridge and had to wait. We were still in time to be dry-docked and had a good party in the evening with all the neighbours.
13th October 2006 – Early in the morning I helped my neighbour with his work to unload a cement barge. Two hours later we left for Ghent. Today, we would sail with my girlfriends spits to the shipyard in Sluiskil. We arrived at 10 o’clock, left at twelve and arrived at the yard around five. Till six o’clock the Varta was completely dry-docked. We had a drink…
12th October 2006 – It looked a nice day but being on my own, I couldn’t do much. I put away my stuff that I loaded yesterday evening. In the morning, I visited Andy’s ship. On my barge, I did some small inside repairs, such a fixing a heater, repairing the compass support and some more.
In the afternoon, I went to the scrapyard in Vlissingen. It’s sad to see so many ships being scrapped, some very nice barges that could have got another future then being cut up. I bought a blue board for my boat. I took it from the Laverna.
The Laverna was a sleepschip built in 1928 by Groot & van Vliet from Sikkeveer. She was 66,97 meters long and 8,119 meters width. The Laverna was motorized in 1955.
7th October 2006 – Inside painting is not exactly my strongest point, so my mother painted the back accommodation, while my father tried to clean and recover as many wood as he could from last week’s demolishing work. Where was I? Working at somebody else boat. My girlfriend, who owns a spits, is going to the same yard I went too.
4th October 2006 – My hatches have arrived. I bought a set of aluminum hatches, an original Friese Luikenkap. It took some time before I got them, but they look nice. Why choosing for such a model? All Luxe Motors did have a Friese Luikenkap; in the old days in wood, later in aluminum or steel.
