With the V-berth head finally painted, I had the chance to do one of my favorite things: tearing off plastic and masking tape to reveal the finished paint job. I couldn’t resist temporarily putting a throne in the throne room, as we’re calling it. With that done, I spent a weekend dealing with my busted truck, but I also finished up the exhaust riser insulation. The risers are ready to install.
Finally! Light through the porthole opening!
The fume extractor worked great, but having the duct in the porthole opening made the head very dark inside.
Test fitting “the throne”
Shower basin turned out very nice.
I think it looks even better than the plan
The Throne Room plan
Now…on to the exhaust insulation.
Starboard riser, double insulated and ready for final wrap
I wrapped this riser before with Inferno Wrap when I was still thinking about using a fiberglass hard shell. But since I’ve decided to skip the shell, I wanted to do a nicer job on the wrap.
Nice and uniform wrap
I’ll use stainless safety wire to secure the wrap when I install the risers
Time to insulate the port riser
Cheapo Craft Bond holds the ceramic blanket in place well enough. It’ll cook off the first time I run the engines, but it only needs to last long enough for me to get the Inferno Wrap installed over the blanket material.
This bend before the showerhead will be much easier to insulate than the starboard side
Several people have asked about the purpose of the 1/2″ tube coming off the showerhead. I explained my raw water overflow bypass idea in the article on Welding the Starboard Exhaust Riser.
Cutting the ceramic blanket for the mandrel bends
The leftovers come in very handy for filling in small gaps later on.
First 1″ layer of ceramic blanket is installed
Straight sections are easy
Double-wrapped with 2″ of ceramic blanket rated at 2,600°F continuous
The seams are where the leftovers go
Ready for Inferno Wrap
Ready to be installed
And that, as they say, is a wrap.
So, finally, the risers are ready to install. Booyah.
Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Installing the Exhaust Risers
1969chriscraftroamer46 
http://www.yachtworld.com/boats/1963/Chris-Craft-Constellation-3040258/Seattle/WA/United-States#.WJhrOdIrJ6p
Just came across this.. I’ll bet when you’re done– Your Chris will be nicer than this one.. All though this one is a Beauty..
That’s a pretty boat, Kurt. I used to own a sister to it, but mine was a 1967. Woodies are nice, but the maintenance…
Cheers,
Q
Q, can you epoxy resin the Inferno Wrap, once it’s in place?
I absolutely could apply resin to the inferno wrap. I even have the high temp epoxy to do it! But one commenter mentioned that he’s used just Inferno Wrap by itself for 10 years, and it still looks like new. Another commenter pointed out that with a hardshell, if the riser ever develops a leak, the only way to access the metal would involve destructive disassembly of the hard shell. So I decided to leave it soft shelled with just the ceramic blanket wrapped with Inferno Wrap.
Cheers,
Q
Given what I’ve seen of your welds, and the fact that you’re using stainless steel for the riser, I highly doubt it will ever develop a leak. What I would do is pressure test the system to ensure there are no leaks and I would just go ahead and use the high temp resin. Odds are that, by the time you need to work on the riser, it’ll be time to replace it anyway, so you’ll be redoing the whole thing anyway. Just my two cents.