1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: The Missus’s Custom V-berth Mattress

Bad news: the surveyor never showed up.

I got to the marina at 6am and set about cleaning up. I emailed the surveyor to confirm today was the day, but 9am turned to 10, then 11am, and I got no response. Finally, around noon I got a text from the surveyor. He’s in the hospital with congestive heart failure. The docs think a change in medication will help. Over the course of the afternoon, we worked out a path forward where I provide him with a list of everything I’ve done since his original survey in 2019, and an accredited associate of his will walk through the boat on Wednesday and confirm it all.

So, the goddess of the seas is apparently still messing with me and my Roamer. We might still splash this week.

That said, I mentioned previously that it’ll be handy to have a place to sleep aboard while I’m getting the boat prepped for its first voyage from Deale MD to the marina closest to my house. Over the 2022 winter, I suggested to the missus that the V-berth is in need of a mattress, and she enthusiastically took charge of that mission.

Step One: make a mattress cover that fits the goofy V-berth bunk

This bunk is for a single person, and it fits me just fine. It also fits the missus just fine. But it definitely won’t accommodate us both at the same time. Think of it as the place the loser of an argument gets to sleep while the winner gets the (future) aft cabin queen-size mattress.

Nice fit

8″ memory foam mattress at Costco was a bargain

It’s amazing how compact these foam mattresses are out of the box

The mattress comes with a cover, but the missus initially didn’t plan to use it.

Next day, the mattress was fully expanded

You can tell this was a project the missus was leading because she was the one who told me to put the mattress on the dining room table.

Lay out the cut lines with a fat Sharpie to match the missus’s mattress cover

I bought an electric bread knife specifically to cut this mattress and future cushions.

It took two passes with the bread knife before the first cut was done

Nice!

Laying out the next cut

We used the cut off scrap to make the opposite side corner. We’ll use contact cement to hold them together.

Kinda like that

After gluing the mattress parts together, we wrestled it into the cover the missus made

It was very difficult to get the foam mattress into her cover. It was as if the foam was grabbing ahold of the cover material and wouldn’t slide into place. But before cutting the mattress, we had noticed it was very easy to put the mattress back into its original cover. The foam didn’t stick to it. So the missus decided to convert the original mattress cover from a boring rectangle to the goofy shape of our V-berth bunk. Then we’d put the covered mattress into the missus’s custom one.

Dr. Frankenstein’s mattress cover

I am in awe of my wife’s sewing skills

Zipper on the bottom side

With the FrankenCover on, the mattress slid much easier into the missus’s custom cover. I took it to the boat today…fit like a glove.

That turned out really nice!

It’s very comfortable, too

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Deck Helm Doors III

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Fixing Fuel Supply Manifold Leaks

I really hoped when I built and installed the fuel supply manifold in November 2022 that it would be a ‘one ‘n done’ deal. I’ve used plenty of pipe fittings without problems over the years, so I was confident in my abilities. What I didn’t foresee was the poor quality of the threads cut in some of the 304 stainless Tees, street elbows, and hex nipples I bought on ebay to make the manifold. They were all made in China. I used a highly recommended thread sealant (Gasoila Soft Set), but I ultimately ended up with five joints that leaked. Oddly enough, none of the joints for the stainless valves (also made in China, bought on ebay) leaked.

As much as I dreaded taking the manifold back home and re-doing it, there really wasn’t any other option.

Back on the bench

I only disassembled the joints that failed. Instead of using Gasoila, I picked up a tube of Loctite 567, which several pipe fitting professionals said is the only thing that works consistently on stainless fittings. After putting it all back together, I decided I didn’t like some of my earlier supply and return line tubing work and needed to re-do it.

Not my proudest moment…

As I described when I made the fuel return lines, the engine room floorboard support angle is very close to where I installed the Swagelok bulkhead tubing fittings. The best spot for the fuel return manifold was also very close to the same longitudinal aluminum angle piece. So I looped the tubing under the angle with two 90° bends, followed by another 90° bend to align it with the bulkhead fitting.

Each 90° bend adds the equivalent friction of ~15′ worth of straight tubing. So that one 9″ return line tube had the equivalent of 45′ of friction. Plus, I kinked the tube a bit in a couple of spots, which only added more internal friction. What can I say? I’m just a weekend warrior and that was my first attempt at a solution to a tough problem in tight quarters.

After staring at that tube for a while, I figured there was a way to make the connection with a single 90° and another 45° bend.

That’s a lot more elegant

That’s much cleaner

The huge hole in the bulkhead was for HVAC ducting the previous owner had installed. In retrospect, I probably should have welded a plate in there, though it’s not mission critical…just unsightly.

I next re-installed the manifold and filters

I used the fuel primer bulb to pull fuel from the tanks and fill the system, then closed all the valves and strategically placed absorbent pads.

Everybody keep your fingers crossed!

Hopefully, they’ll still be pristine white tomorrow when I go back to the boat for the survey. White diaper means no fuel leaks. Presuming the boat passes the survey, I need to get my insurance company to authorize the splash. If they do, I’m going to want a place to sleep aboard while I’m getting it ready for the trip to the marina closest to my home.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: The Missus’s Custom V-berth Mattress

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Fuel System Fixes

When I first attempted to start my Cummins 6CTAs in November 2022, both engines seemed like they wanted to run, but something was off. One of the problems I discovered immediately was a leak in the fuel return line on the starboard engine’s injection pump. Another problem I noticed while priming the system was that the on-engine mechanical lift pump on the same side was leaking fuel. If the lift pump leaks fuel under pressure when I manually pump it, it may also be pulling air into the fuel supply on the vacuum stroke. That could contribute to the engine not lighting off.

Cracked fuel return line leaks

The return line is attached to the front of the injection pump

Surprise!

I used a cutoff wheel to cut the fuel line behind the bracket that attaches to the front of the pump, which I also thought I’d have to cut to remove the line. But the bracket was broken and the line fell off when I finished cutting through it.

I planned to reuse the flare fitting

Unfortunately, my tube flaring tools don’t fit in the available space

I don’t want to start taking the injection pump apart to make space for my flaring tool. Even if I cut back the tube so it aligns with the flare bar, there’s not enough room for the yoke.

This injection pump wasn’t designed with easy maintenance in mind

The red arrow points to the broken bracket, which is secured to the pump with a bolt. There’s 1/4″ between that bolt and the gear drive housing on the front of the engine; I would have to pull the pump to access it, which would be a massive chore.

You can also see the banjo fitting where the return line attaches to the pump. The nut for that is ~1/8″ from the intake manifold. So, again, there’s no way to remove it without removing the injection pump. I can loosen the banjo nut, though, which allows me to rotate the return line just a bit. And that gave me an idea…

Swagelok fitting to the rescue!

I used a 5/16″ tube to 3/8″ MPT Swagelok adapter to connect the tube to a stainless 3/8″ elbow, and a 3/8″ MPT to 3/8″ flare adapter for the hose connection.

Nice!

I rotated the return line up until the Swagelok fitting came in contact with the injection pump, then used a stainless hose clamp to lock the two together to make a more rigid assembly. Then I attached the hose to complete the repair.

Next, I got a new lift pump. I thought about ordering two pumps just to have a spare, but only got the one. That would turn out to be a mistake, but more on that in a future post. The new pump housing was bare aluminum, so I decided to prime and paint it before installation.

I brushed self-etching primer on the new fuel pump

First coat of brushed on gloss white looks good

I’ve had an unopened gallon of Blue Water Mega Bright White one-part polyurethane paint for longer than I’ve owned this Roamer. It was leftover from the last repaint I did on my 1967 Chris Craft Constellation 52. One-part polyurethanes don’t hold their shine like AwlGrip, but for the engine room this is fine. I thought it might have hardened over time, but after opening the can and thoroughly mixing the paint, it was like new.

Two coats of white was plenty

Easy installation…ready to test fire again

I was preparing to prime the system again when I noticed wet spots on the diaper I placed under the fuel manifold I installed in August 2022. So rather than fill the system with fuel again, I decided to pull the manifold and see if I could stop those leaks.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Fixing Fuel Supply Manifold Leaks

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: The Starboard Engine Runs!

I’ve been super busy with other things and haven’t had time to post updates here. I hope to get back into regular posting before long.

Despite the lack of posts here, I have been making progress on the refit. If things go as planned, I’ll begin dismantling Tent Model XXX the first week of June 2023 and splash the boat once I get the green light from my surveyor and insurance company. I’ve decided to keep the boat in a slip at the current marina for a month and will be making sure all necessary systems are 100% before taking off and heading to the marina closest to my home. It’ll be a 15 minute hop on country roads to go mess with the boat instead of the hour+ slog in awful Swamp-zone traffic that I’ve been doing since 2012.

Anyway, I posted my first attempt at getting the engines running last fall. The big news for today is that I recently resolved some problems I was having with the starboard engine, which I’ll cover in a future post, and got it running. It was 52°F overnight, so the engine room was cool when I first tried to start it. I installed oil pan heaters years ago but haven’t been using them, so the engine was at ambient temp. After two attempts cranking the starter for 10 seconds, it lit off on the third try but had a loping idle. The video below was the fourth start, and it jumped to life. Idle is rock-solid and the throttle behaves as it should.

Click “Cancel” after the video ends, or it will autoplay whatever video Rumble is promoting.

Stay tuned! I’ll post more (hopefully) soon.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Fuel System Fixes

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Deck Helm Doors II

My overarching priority has been to splash the boat as soon as possible, but not before the bottom is water-tight and the topsides are weather-proof.

I’ve taken care of all of the holes on the bottom, so the boat is capable of floating now: the swim platform is installed, as are the CAPAC reference cell and anode, and I welded in new raw water inlets for the Cummins main engines then installed all of the seacocks and strainers.

There are just three places on the topsides where weather can get in to areas I’d prefer it stay out of: the mast base on the cabin top; the bilge vents in the toe rail, and the port and starboard entryways to the helm from the side decks. It was a very long process to finally get the sliding helm doors installed, so I’ll present everything in a couple of articles.

When last you saw the helm doors, they were varnished and primed

It was November of 2020 when I first wrote about building the helm doors. But I’d struggled for years to find sliding door hardware that would work in this application.

I looked at other boats with sliding doors and found that many used sailboat rigging tracks and traveler cars, like Harken makes. But there were major supply chain disruptions and nobody had anything that would fit my boat. Out of desperation, I bought a set of heavy duty sliding door tracks for outdoor cabinets, but they attach to the top of the door and I was concerned they wouldn’t hold up in marine use. Still, they were better than nothing, and I was trying to splash the boat as soon as possible.

So I turned the cabinet sliding door tracks over the Boatamalan professional.

Helm door temporarily fitted with overhead slider track

It was at this time that I discovered a problem that had been hiding in plain sight since I first had the aft deck enclosure built in 2008: the aluminum side deck slopes down from the bow toward transom, but the top of the door openings of the aft deck hardtop are either flat or slope slightly down from back to front. So the distance from the welded-in door sill to the top of the door opening is shorter at the front of the opening than the back of it…by about 1/2″.

But it gets worse, because the sliding door hardware is 2x the width of the door (~48″), so when the door was slid open the aft bottom door-to-sill gap was ~1-1/4″ higher than the bottom leading edge when the door was closed. With the bottom of the door hanging free, it opened and closed just fine. The door-to-sill gap just went from 1-1/4″ at the back when the door was open to 1/16″ at the front of the door when it was closed. Problem: there’s no way to install any kind of door guide that would keep the bottom of the door in position with that kind of gap variation without looking seriously goofy.

And then, I found what I was looking for on Amazon: linear motion tracks.

Linear motion tracks

I’ll use the heavy tracks on the left for a pull-out sofa bed in the salon. The tracks on the right would be perfect for sliding doors.

The slide-out sofa bed tracks are stainless and aluminum…very heavy duty

The smaller tracks were sold as “stainless bearing steel” tracks and balls

The tracks are 1/2″ wide, 1200 mm (47-1/4″) long, and very low profile, even with the cars in place. Perfect!

But not really. Because over the bad times from February 2020 to 2022, when I wasn’t able to work on the boat very much, the tracks just sat in the galley gathering dust…and rusting from exposure to humidity.

Turns out the $100 tracks weren’t “stainless bearing steel,” they’re just hardened steel. So they’re completely inappropriate for exterior sliding doors on boats.

I spent days online searching and finally found a place in Virginia that makes almost identical linear motion tracks in 316 stainless. They sell them by the millimeter. The price for ONE with two cars…$7,000. And I need two, one for port and the other for starboard.

I went back to the Harken website, but their tracks and cars are really too big for my doors. And even if they weren’t, they were still having major supply chain problems and nothing was available. I was about to give up when I found a place called PBC Linear that had the solution to my problems: Mini-Rail Miniature Linear Guides measuring just 1/2″ tall including the cars. There are no moving parts. Everything is anodized aluminum, with a proprietary hard plastic bearing material. They have very smooth action. They also sell by the millimeter, but the set with four cars cost ~$500, which was even less than the sailboat hardware I was considering.

PBC Linear miniature linear guide with custom stainless door…perch?

I don’t know what else to call them. But the door will sit on the stainless angle, with screws securing the angle to the door.

The stainless angle is attached to each car with four screws

I got a 4-foot stick of 1″x 1″ 18 gauge 316 stainless angle, cut the length to match the width of each door, then cut one leg off each piece down to 1/2″. I used the scraps from that to make the pipe clamps for my fuel manifold.

So, at this point I had the track I wish I’d had back in 2020 when I started making these doors. But I still had the problem of the variable door-to-sill gap to work out.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Deck Helm Doors III

 

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Helm Windshield Wrap Up

The helm windshield has always been a big challenge on this Roamer. But it needs to be fully sealed and functioning properly before the tent comes down.

I first removed the original windshield back in 2013. I also messed around with various Chris Craft windshield frame extrusions to try and make something to replace the sheet of clear plastic a previous owner had installed for a center windshield. Getting the original windshield frames to fit back in where they came from was also a big chore. Then, just when I thought I had the windshield frames figured out, the bastard thieves cleaned out the boat and stole a bunch of aluminum extrusions that made up the windshield frame among other things.

So I regrouped and took a totally different approach. I had a fabricator make a new windshield frame that looked nearly identical to the original Chris Craft design, but it was welded together as a single unit rather than using 10 different extrusions held together with brackets and screws. Unfortunately, fabricators around me have been consistently awful, and the fit of the new windshield frame to the cabin top and helm roof were really poor. Since I couldn’t get a fabricator who could make the new frame fit the boat, we made the boat fit the windshield frame instead.

With the bodywork around the windshield frame done, I made patterns that I sent off to Motion Windows. Their clamp-in style of marine windows should work perfectly here. Unfortunately, Motion Windows really botched the build. Despite confirming the sizes three times, they made the clamps rings and individual window frames too big to fit in the new frame!

But finally, in 2016, the windshield installation was done. And it looked good, too. The only thing left was to refurbish and reinstall the center windscreen opener, which I finished in November of 2022. But there was a problem that I only discovered when we were washing the boat in late 2022: the center windshield from Motion Windows leaked!

Water is leaking through the screw holes for the center windshield clamp ring

The Motion Windows frame is installed from the outside of the main windshield frame. There’s a clamp ring that’s installed with screws from the inside of the main frame. The water isn’t leaking past the window glass…it’s coming through the screws of the clamp ring. This doesn’t seem like it should be possible.

A leaking clamp ring screw

Surveying the scene from the outside, I found a problem

The original Motion Windows exterior seal, which has only been directly exposed to sunlight for ~12 hours since new, has shrunk 1/2″.

The side seal has also shrunk

Those seals used to form a tight joint at the corners, when the windows were new. I’m guessing the fabricator pulled the seal material a bit, stretching it out when he cut it. It stayed stretched as long as friction from the rubber to glass joint was dry. But washing the boat for the first time lubricated that joint and the rubber retracted to its natural size.

I contacted Motion Windows about the problem. They very kindly sent out a length of their rubber seal so I could re-do it.

When I removed the original seal, I found more strange stuff

The glass is bonded with urethane to the windshield extrusion. That seal is fine. But there’s a very lightweight strip of foam filling a gap in the extrusion just outside of the glass. That foam strip is covered with dust and dirt that presumably came in with water through the gap at the corners of the outer seal. The screws for the clamp ring thread in to the space in the extrusion on the other side of that flimsy foam seal.

Found the breach

There’s only ~1/16″ of contact area between the extrusion here and the flimsy foam strip, but in this one spot there was zero contact. Even if the foam strip was watertight everywhere else, water could easily flow into the screw gallery here, then out the screw holes and onto the dashboard.

I cleaned up all of the dust and dirt and prepared to seal the gap

Another odd thing: notice in the picture above that the flimsy foam seal stops halfway up the window. That would seem to leave a large area where water can flow into the screw gallery portion of the extrusion.

I applied a generous bead of Lexel crystal clear sealant to fill the gap and cover the flimsy foam strip

Lexel claims that it ‘sticks to anything’ so I applied some to the rubber seal joints

That should hold the joints together

Ready to press the last section of new exterior seal home

Boom. Done

The new seals have been in place for two months now. Rain has come through some holes in Tent Model XXX’s shrink wrap skin (which is long past its expiration date) and I can confirm that the windshield no longer leaks.

Yea!

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Installing the CAPAC Anti-Corrosion System (mostly)

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: DIY Positive Crankcase Ventilation

My Cummins main engines are 1996 vintage and came with a very basic arrangement for dealing with crankcase fumes: a metal tube connects a hole in the crankcase to a housing that contains a coarse steel wool-like metal filter that’s supposed to condense oil on it and let it drip back into the crankcase. A hose was routed from that housing down to the base of the marine gear. That’s it. It just vented fumes, oil mist that didn’t condense, etc into the bilge.

I previously owned a 1967 Chris Craft Constellation 52 that had Detroit Diesels, so I know how nasty bilge spaces can get when venting crankcase fumes straight into the engine room. I was somewhat familiar with Walker Airseps, but at $750/engine I just tolerated the mess in my Connie. Racor also makes a Closed Crankcase Ventilation system that retails for ~$550; again, too rich for my old Connie.

But with my Roamer, I’d like to control the engine fumes. Tony Athens over at Seaboard Marine has a great article that discusses the various CCV systems and provides a bullet list of features that he believes good CCV systems should have. One of the things he’s particularly critical of is CCVs that dump the liquid in the fumes back into the oil pan. He ends by discussing his EnviroVent CCV system for the Cummins B-series engines. Mine are older generation C-series, but as I looked at the pictures of the EnviroVent installed on a B in the article it was obvious I could make something like it for my engines.

It was only after I started buying components that I realized Tony also makes an EnviroVent for 6CTA engines like mine. The price: $375 each. I thought I could beat that.

I found the best prices for Greenleaf nylon fittings at Tractor Supply

$31.91 for all the fittings for both engines

That’s a 1″ hose barb, a 1″ Tee, a 1″MPT to 3/4″ hose barb, a 1″MPT to 3/8″ hose barb, and a 90° 3/4″ hose barb.

Probably unnecessary, but I assembled the fittings with GasOila

The engines came with new air filters, so there’s no additional cost for them

I used a hole saw to make space for the 90° hose barb

The hole was just the right size to thread in the fitting.

The fitting snugs up tight to the air filter end cap

1″ Shields Rubber Series 141 Multiflex Hose was $18.49 at West Marine

In the picture above, you can see the OEM crankcase vent filter in the upper left corner. From there, a 1″ hose used to be routed down to the bilge near the ZF gear. In the lower right corner of the picture, you can see that I routed it inboard of the engine stringers to the Tee.

From the Tee, the 3/4″ hose goes up to the fitting on the air cleaner

I had leftover 3/4″ Multiflex hose that I use for bilge pumps, so there was no additional cost, but it would have been ~$16 at West Marine. And this appears to be the same hose Tony Athens uses for his EnviroVents.

Aluminum coolant overflow reservoirs were $23.47 for two on ebay

Bicycle water bottle cages were $10.44 for two on ebay

I think these bottles look better and are more robust than the clear plastic condiment squeeze bottles used in the Seaboard Marine EnviroVents.

The water bottle cage holds the reservoir firmly, but it pops out easily when it’s time to drain the contents.

I installed the cage at an angle because the reservoir is unvented

As Tony described it in the article, fumes condense as liquid on the long hose going down to the Tee, so mostly only gases and air take a turn up at the Tee and continue on to the air filter. Vacuum from the turbo inlet is present inside the air filter and will also be present inside the hoses, which will provide positive (rather than passive) crankcase ventilation.

The liquid will run down the hose and accumulate at the bottom of the Tee until it spills over into the 3/8″ hose and drips into the tank. Since the hose enters the tank near the base it’s necessary to orient the tank at an angle to maximize the amount of liquid it can hold. Once the liquid level gets up to the hose, it’ll back up into the hose since the tank is unvented. If I vented the cap of the tank by drilling a hole, engine intake vacuum would draw unfiltered air through it. I don’t want that, so I think my approach is the best compromise.

Oh, and the mount for the cage is just a piece of 1″ wide 1/4″ aluminum bar cut from some scrap. I coated it with Bar Rust 235 epoxy barrier coat after drilling and tapping the mounting holes.

Starboard side is done!

Similar approach on the port side

Total cost for my DIY positive crankcase ventilation systems on both sides: $100.31.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Helm Windshield Wrap Up

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Wrapping Up the Helm Dashboard

The helm dashboard was a real mess on this boat when the refit began in 2008. In 2013, I had the original gauges rebuilt and rechromed, and I installed the gauges in 2015. Toward the end of 2022, I made a custom gauge pod that fits between the OEM tachometers and houses turbocator (boost and exhaust temp) and gear pressure gauges and bilge pump telltale lights. To wrap up the helm dashboard, I need to install a bunch of pretty rechromed switch knobs and lights. I got some really cool stickers for the shift levers, too. But I also had to fix a problem caused by careless Boatamalans when they were priming the hull back in 2009.

The painter and his crew of professionals had taped off the window openings in the salon and porthole openings in the V-berth and aft stateroom before he sprayed the primer. But they didn’t tape off the helm station dashboard. I had already removed all of the gauges and switch knobs, but I hadn’t removed the engraved switch plate that goes across the bottom of the dashboard. That was a piece of 1/8″ thick black-faced plastic with white lettering that goes from the Ignition switch on the left side, then Anchor, Compass, and Instruments light switches, three Wiper switches, followed by Nav light, Searchlight, and starboard engine Ignition switch.

It got oversprayed with primer. Not too bad, but it was ugly enough that I asked the chief Boatamalan painter to clean it up. The following weekend he handed me a ball of plastic that used to be my switch plate. Turns out he thought soaking the plastic plate in lacquer thinner would soften up the primer…which it did, but it also melted the switch plate into a deformed mess.

So, for the last ten years or so I’ve been planning on one day having a new switch plate made. That day happened last month, so I finally wrapped up the instrument panel.

Quick recap of what I started with

Fast forward to 2013

Fast forward to 2022, when I couldn’t keep my starboard engine running

In October, when I test fired my Cummins main engines, the starboard side would light off but then die as soon as I let the key go from START to RUN. The problem was a bad ignition switch, but I also found a weak primary start solenoid.

So I bought a replacement ignition switch

The problem with the shiny new ignition switch for the starboard engine was that it really highlighted how marginal the port switch looked. It worked fine but was ugly.

So I got a new ignition switch for the port side, too

New ignition switches are installed

New red LED dash lights are installed

OEM engine alarm switches were ugly but had potential

When you turn on the ignition, the alarm bells and lights turn on. Pushing these switches shuts off the bells until you get your engines running and all the alarm sensors turn off.

Those cleaned up nicely

These rechromed switch parts have been sitting in a bag and wrapped in tissue since 2013

The switches are in position, but I couldn’t thread the rechromed nuts on

I used a razor blade and very small screwdriver to clean that grey powder out of the threads

Once the threads were cleaned up, the knurled nuts threaded on just fine.

Nice!

Ignition on…lights and alarm bells on…push button…bell shuts off

These OEM alarm lights haven’t been on since ~1985. They’re very cool.

Horn switch is installed

Time to whip up a new switch plate.

After measuring 4-5 times, I created a CAD file for the new switch plate

I used the free version of Sketchup to make a 2d rendering of what I needed.

You probably noticed the three unlabeled switch holes in the middle. The boat originally came with three sets of windshield wipers. When the professional fabricator made my new windshield frame after the bastard thieves stole some of the original aluminum frame extrusions, he didn’t put holes in the frames for the windshield driveshafts to go through. I wasn’t thinking about windshield wipers when I asked the Boatamalans to prime and paint the new frame. It didn’t occur to me that I forgot about the wipers until I was installing the big pieces of mahogany at the top of the windshield, and these wires were hanging down and getting in the way. I didn’t want to cut holes in my brand new windshield frame, so I decided I’d just be a regular user of Rain-X and skip the wipers.

Fast forward to 2022, when I was finalizing the switch plate, and I realized I have three wiper switches here that I don’t need…or will I? In one scenario, the Rain-X works fine for the way we use our boat, and I’ll never need windshield wipers. Plus, wipers don’t make the boat look better. It looks better without them. Maybe I can use those three switches for something else…like the Accusyn engine sychronizer I (mostly) installed a few months back. Or, maybe, Rain-X will be a total bust and I’ll decide to install wipers later.

So I made the decision to leave those three switches unlabeled. We’ll see how it goes. Whichever way I go, I can always have the new switch plate laser embossed with whatever labeling I want.

I did some checking around and, after being told “we can’t make that” by a lot of places that advertise being able to engrave anything, eventually settled on Las Vegas Custom Engraving. They took my 2D graphic, turned it into a CAD file, and the results were almost perfect.

This blog hosting site won’t let me save or link to the .dwf file. But if anybody wants a copy of the CAD file of the switch plate, feel free to ask in the comments (oh, and the tip jar is just to the right 😉 )

That’s pretty much a match for the handcrafted template that I based the 2D file on

I also had them make a switch plate for the windshield opener switch

First test fit was a bit tight in the corners

Shave off a bit here…

…and a bit there…

Perfect…almost

Some of the switch holes were off by very small fractions of an inch

Four of the switch holes didn’t line up perfectly, so I did some adjusting with a Dremel tool.

Knock off a little here and a little there…

Perfect fit after sanding the razor-cut corners

Nice!

The CAD file directs the machine to laser-cut holes in exact alignment, but the 50-year-old hand-drilled holes aren’t so precise. But after removing some material with the Dremel, the switches fit just fine.

The right side of the dash pod called out for a switch plate

This’ll do

I don’t recall how the original switch plate here was labeled, but this will do fine for me.

Done

Next, I installed rechromed switch nuts and knobs

I ran out of rechromed switch nuts and knobs

Fortunately, I’ve got a lot of the old Chris Craft switches with those cool hourglass knobs. I sent a bag of them off to Frankford Plating in Philadelphia, along with a few other items.

The last thing I installed were some really cool cover medallions for the Morse Control shifter and throttle levers.

Original Chris Craft control lever stickers

When I sent my control levers off for rechroming, the OEM stickers didn’t survive removal. I’d planned to just leave them rechromed but without stickers, since none seemed to be available. But then a friend let me know that he’d created new cover medallions for Chris Craft and Hatteras control levers. He didn’t have the original Chris Craft ones to model his replacements on, so he came up with his own design. I have to say, I think it’s even better than the original.

New control lever stickers

These aren’t just paper-thin stickers, either. They have depth to them. And the colors and font are exactly the same as emblems that came on many 1960s Chris Crafts originally.

It’s a very nice finishing touch

If anybody would like to buy a set, they’re available through this ebay ad. If the ad link goes bad, just search ebay for “Chris Craft cover medallion” and my buddy’s product should come up so long as they’re available.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: DIY Positive Crankcase Ventilation

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Wrapping Up the Salon Entry Door

This is another article about work I finished a while ago but never posted about. Gotta keep clearing space on my camera’s memory card…

I first started working on the salon entryway back in 2018. In March of 2020, I finished making the folding salon entry hatch. In August of 2022, I finally wrapped it up (mostly).

March 2020: doors fitted but not installed

Tape off the hinge plate-to-dash joint in preparation for caulk

Ready for caulk

Caulked and off comes the tape

That turned out real nice! Now for some hardware.

Original salon door knob just won’t clean up enough

Back from the chrome shop and locksmith

You would not believe how hard it was to find a locksmith who could cut a key for this 50-year-old Schlage lockset. Nobody with a “locksmith” sign out in front of a brick and mortar shop could do anything with it. But I got a reference from a guy who knew a guy who knew a retired hippy locksmith who hand-filed a key blank in the back of his work van for 15 minutes or so and PRESTO! I had working keys for the old lock!

Figuring out how to put the door lock back together was a challenge

I took this thing apart back in 2008, when the refit first began. Fortunately, I’d left all of the parts sitting in a plastic sandwich bag that never got in the way but was easily visible in the salon. So…the good news was that I didn’t lose any of the parts in the 14 years since I first removed them. The bad news was, it took a lot of trial and error before I finally figured out how it all went back together.

Done on the inside

Push the lock button, and the door locks. Twist the knob from the inside and the door unlocks

Done on the outside

OEM chromed bronze hook holds the door open

Next, I needed a hatch holder-upper

New Made In USA hatch holder-upper in 316 stainless will do the job

It doesn’t exactly look period-correct, but it does look nice.

That ought to do

A temporary foam strip seals to the door and holds heat inside when the hatch is closed

Nice!

You can also see in the above picture a stainless handrail I installed at the entryway to make it safer going down the steps.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Wrapping Up the Helm Dashboard

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Recommissioning the Trim Tabs

Like the swim platform, raw water intakes for the main engines, the Panda genset, and the air conditioning systems, since the trim tabs are under the waterline, I want them functional and sealed water-tight when the boat splashes.

Longtime readers will remember way back in 2013 when I made patterns for replacement trim tabs. A highly paid “professional” fabricator had previously taken mine back to his shop, then either threw them away or lost them. In 2016, I partially installed the new stainless steel trim tabs, basically just applying caulk and bolting them up to the original locations, without connecting the actuators or wiring. At the same time, I disassembled the “Roamer Cruise Control” gauge, which is basically a set of trim tab angle indicators, and found some components inside had “let the smoke out.” Fast forward to October 2022, and I thought I’d see if I could wrap these things up.

Port tab easily connected to the actuator shaft

Starboard tab’s actuator pin was welded on crooked

It’s only a few degrees off, but that matters. It’s amazing to me how consistently incompetent the marine contractors are in my area.

I put a large wrench on the tab and bent it into position

The pivot pin wouldn’t go fully through the actuator shaft, so I had to redrill the hole

I was finally able to connect the starboard tab and actuator shaft

Next, I applied bottom paint

I didn’t put bottom paint on the trim tabs because in my experience bottom paint quickly falls off of stainless.

Trim tabs are done on the outside

On the inside, the “Roamer Cruise Control’ actuators could use a cleaning

The motors, gearboxes, and jackshafts worked fine. They just needed to be cleaned and re-greased.

I’m not keen on that gap between the gearbox and mount

I added two washers to fill the gap

The gearbox screws are a very unique design

These two screws hold each gearbox in position. Unfortunately, I lost track of one of the screws for the starboard actuator. For years, I’d been looking for it on the boat and in my garage.

The screw head fits inside the hole in the mount with a couple thousandths of an inch clearance

With only one screw in place, the gearbox twists out of alignment. With a replacement screw that isn’t the exact same size and shape of the original (even if it threads into the hole in the gearbox just fine), the gearbox twists out of position, though not as badly as with only one screw.

I was at the point of taking one of the screws to a machine shop to see if they could replicate it when–lo and behold–I found the wayward screw under some plywood scraps I was saving in the aft stateroom!

It was absurd, the joy I felt at finding this little bugger

I probably should have noted which wires go where

The Roamer Cruise Control gauge at the helm gets the signal for the angle of the tabs from this gear-driven rheostat that rotates when the actuator jackshaft turns either direction. There are three wires coming off the rheostat but only two wires coming from the helm gauge for the actuator on each side.

Fortunately, a fellow Roamer 46 owner was able to snap some pictures of the connections and that got me back in business.

With the electrical connections figured out, I painted the motors

I wrapped up the actuators with new shrink connections where necessary and cable loom for the wires

Next, I moved on to the helm switches.

Swapping wires from the original switches to new ones

The original switches were mechanically fine but ugly. New Cole Hersey nickel-plated DPDT momentary-on switches look much better.

Next, I tried to tackle the Cruise Control gauge.

The Roamer Cruise Control gauge

Inside, it was mostly intact

These resistors appear to have red, white, brown, and silver bands, which makes them 290 ohms ±10%. Or that first band could be orange, which would make them 390 ohm.

Alas, this resistor vigorously ‘let the smoke out’

With so little of the resistor remaining, it’s impossible to know what ohm value it was. What’s clear is that something really bad happened inside this gauge.

The varnish also got cooked off of the super-fine coil wire here

The wire still has continuity, which is pretty amazing given what happened to the resistor. I coated the coil wire with clear enamel spray paint to restore something like the original varnish insulation.

I dug through a box of resistors and found a close replacement

This is a much larger resistor, which means it can handle more power without degrading. The bands are orange, black, brown, and gold, which makes makes it 300 ohms ±5%.

When I put 12v to the pins I (fortunately) marked B & W, then grounded the pin for the starboard angle indicator in the gauge, the needle immediately went to the pin stop in the UP position. I repeated the process for the port gauge, and the same thing happened. So the mechanisms are working. But when I took it to the boat and put jumper wires on all of the connections, the needles stayed dead regardless of whether the tabs were full up or down.

I disconnected the gauge from the boat wiring and put 12v+ to the center pin on an incandescent bulb. I then put a jumper wire from the actuator rheostat signal wire to the ground connection for the bulb. When I cycled the tabs up and down, the bulb correspondingly got brighter or dimmer. Which I think means the rheostat is sending the proper signal.

I took the gauge back home and tried some different approaches to see if I could make it work. A daisychain of resistors on the 12v supply, effectively dropping the supply to 9vdc, finally got the needle to move a bit without slamming into the UP stop pin.

Finally, subtle needle deflection

Same on the port side

I’m stumped. The tabs work fine, so they’re not holding me up from splashing or driving the boat. But it would be nice to have a working Cruise Control gauge. Off the boat, I can trick the gauge into sort of working. On the boat, the needles don’t move, though incandescent bulbs DO grow brighter and dimmer based on the tab position. It seems like the gauge should work, but it doesn’t.

If anybody knows of a Roamer on Purgatory Row of a boatyard somewhere with this Cruise Control gauge, I’d be interested in buying it. And if anybody knows the value of that resistor that got smoked, please let me know in the comments!

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Wrapping Up the Salon Entry Door