(thanks, Bill, for the much easier ride down this thread!)
Problem: Get an 8h Yamaha 4 stroke electric tilt to be happy in an antigue Ariel motor well.
Problem: No way to get the motor's muscular multipurpose arm operational unless strate-up vertical with the added ignominy of the rather large hatch open and clipped to the backstay.
Problem: Yamaha's muscular clamp drags in the water when mounted on original clamping board. [chorus, 'Get a Nissan 6, weighs only 20#!']
Solution: Cut the blinking offending cross bridge away and raise the motor 4". No brainer. [chorus, 'Didn't take any brains to make That change.']
A block and tackle end-of-boom mainsheet (no travelor) could conceivably still be mounted there. But a mid-boom (actually aft of mid-boom) sheet on the dodger frame over the companionway makes mucho better sense IMCO. I can see no structural compromise to the boat with the bridge taken out. [Chorus: hi-ho any engineers amongst us?]
Of course I don't believe that 100%. SO. You can surmise from Bill's photo that the cockpit well is not connected to the bulkhead. While there still is access we can get in from the cabin thru the side lazarettes, the cockpit will be heavily tabbed to the bulkhead and the bulkhead tabbed to the hull (missing in 338 under the cockpit.)
The white stuff in the photo is cardboard and doorskin. the ply clamp board is temporary. Playing with the space you can see what happens when you raise the 'gascan' deck up to the top of the original well. Looks to me we got at least an 8gal space each side (all the foam, everything's gone in the laz execept the well collar, so it's not hard to see.) Think: built in vinylester gas tank, bladder with access plate, foam positive flotation, or plain stowage - I opt for glassed in tanks. Who's going to insure this boat, anyway? OK, this gascan deck is the major element in the integrity of the well and the whole rear end of the Ariel. Distributes the vibration and loads of the motor thruout the stern. This could be the arguement FOR solid foam-in-place. What we took out was 3/8s fir ply with 1/4" laminate over. (remember, even that, all that polyester didn't keep water from entering the foam underneath.)
Just raising the clampboard 4 inches seems to create a possibility that the arc of the motor may have more or less the same radius as it is tilted in relation to the rise of the stern and the transom. So if the same portion of the shaft protrudes from the boat a solution to the backwash problem might be a simple overlapping rubber gland to protect the opening yet let the motor slip up and down. Certainly the slot in the transom might be treated this way Like a backflow flap on a thru-hull. Then again, it may all be rubber duck's breath.
Reply With Quote