1980 HydroStream Vamp resto-mod

That is one sweet light, the boat was built to fit that specific light I would say. Good find!

 

Yep, the little pocket is designed for it, thats why I had to find this exact light. All the other ones I tried just didnt fit well and left giant gaps.

 

More trailer prep this morning. Got the guide bar cut off and ground smooth, sprayed some self etching primer on there to protect the metal. Also started removing the wood steps from the sides. The wood was dry rotted pretty good, so I had to break it off then cut off the bolts that held it on (carriage bolts that are too rusty).

 

Winch tower is on, I put the old winch on there for now, It works fine, not sure if I will put a new winch on or just replace the strap for it. But, once I put the bow eye and the transom eyes on the boat will be ready to pull out and flip over.

The winch tower is in the wrong spot right now, but I need to move the boat to get it in the right spot. Ideally the front roller would be above the bow eye, but the bow eye is so high up on this hull.

I had to move the tongue jack to the other side as the winch handle was hitting it. I do plan to replace the tongue jack with a new one.

 

Hatches fit perfect, just need to seal up the balsa I cut into and seal the edge of the glass. Also put the seats in so they are not just flopping around in the garage. Getting ready now to measure and cut in the 4 gauges.

 

All the gauges now sit in the dash. I will have to decide how I want to organize them when I put the steering wheel on, Im sure some of them will be partially blocked by the wheels spokes. None of the gauges are super important, but nice to see the info on them.
I have:
Voltage
Trim
Fuel
Temperature

Aside from the temp gauge, the rest are pretty useless for normal day to day driving. But also most outboards have a temperature alarm that buzzes when the temp gets too high.

 

No work on the boat this weekend, we all got sick, but I have decided on my final "flip the boat" solution. I am picking up a gantry crane this week along with some long straps. The gantry crane will lift the boat all together with a sling instead of using the bow and stern eyes. This will give me more control over the boat, allow me to hang it there for longer, and just in general be safer. Then I can use the crane to lift the motor back on when time comes for that.

 

^^^
Didn't like the sick part.

The gantry sounds safer than trusting the bow & stern eyes.

I was going to build a gantry at one point - got a forklift instead.

 

Wish I had the space for a forklift... hell, I dont even have space for a gantry crane right now. But I think I can repurpose it to store seasonal items above the boat or car or whatever is parked under it.

 

The great thing about having a forklift is that you can unload just about anything you can drag home on a trailer.
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The bad thing about having a forklift is that you can unload just about anything you can drag home on a trailer.

 

That is the way to go for flipping the boat. Much safer solution. That being said, I am really enjoying watching your progress with this. Kind of make me want to do something similar. Nice work!!!

 

There is one slight issue with the gantry crane though.... It says its 104.5 inches tall, my garage rafters are 101 inch tall. Now I have a work around on this, and I think it will work. But the caster wheels add about 5 inches of height. So by removing the casters I wont be able to roll it around, but I dont really want to roll it around once I have the boat in it.
The other option is that this is a height adjustable crane, so you can raise or lower it, but you have to use locking pins to hold the beams in place. If I can lower it all the way then drill new holes for the locking pins, I should be able to get it lower than the "minimum" they have listed by a few inches.

Another option I have, not a great option, but it is a option, is to cut some sections of roof beams out temporarily, then bolt in new beams when I am done with the hoist.

I do need to figure out the best way to go about slinging the boat to rotate it. I can get 2 chain hoists, one for each side, then using both of them I can lift on one side and lower on the other side.

This guy does some pretty good modifications to his crane to make it taller and wider. Many of the things he is doing can be reversed to do what I want.

 

Wow, that is a LOT of work. If I was closer I would offer to help but it is a bit of a drive from California!

 

Wait, I found a better solution! hidden in the depths of northern tools website, they had a gantry crane! Its only 94 inches tall! and its like $300 less. I can pick it up tomorrow. It actually seems like a better design too.

So, Im ordering it now, will pick it up tomorrow morning and get it built this week and wheeled into position.

But yea, help with this project would be amazing. Right now I have 3 friends that can help, 1 is an idiot that I dont even trust to borrow my battery charger, the other is a hands off helper, the 3rd person I would trust my life to, but he is 3 hours away from me.

 

Nice!!! Glad you were able to get that locally. Your "Help" sounds a lot like mine when it comes to these things.

 

Yeah, my help generally sucks, always has been that way for me after my dad moved down to FL, but when he comes up to visit, we pack a years worth of projects into a week. My son helps sometimes, but he has a severe case of "I cant do that!".. boy you believed in santa for the past 9 years, you can believe in yourself for 10 minutes.
I really need to get him in on this boat flip though to boost his confidence.



These are the 2 cranes, the first one is a hair too tall, But this second one is a perfect fit. BTW, neither comes with the crane hook cart thingy, you have to buy that separately. I dont really want that part, as I want to use my 12v atv winch anyways so I can have the remote in one hand and guide the boat with the other hand.

 

Alright, 400lbs of crane is now sitting in the garage waiting to be built.

 

Well, this is disappointing... They just dump all the bolts, nuts and washers into a big sack and shook it for 5 weeks on a cargo ship from china... Guess Im going to be sorting these for a bit.

 

Alright, the crane is now built into 3 sections that just need to be bolted together. But I have to get the boat out of the garage and get my other boat down from the rafters before I can finally bolt it all together and get it ready.
I do need to replace 1 bolt that would not thread a nut right, not terrible considering the robinhood style bag of loot they called hardware.

 

Trying to decide if I want to go pick up another one of these cranes... might pay for itself after a little while of doing boat repairs... Start charging people to lift their boats off the trailers for minor repairs.