Life's a Gamble, so lets take a Chance Restoration Project

Long John Silver out on his travels with his friends Albert(RNLB Helen Wycherley's owners) coffee mug. While his was at the Zetland Lifeboat museum, Long John Silver met his new wife to be Fran. Tricia acting as a chaperone  Then Simon the father of the groom had his photo taken to make it a family photo. The happy couple having their first photo together as  newly married couple The best man and the bridesmaid  The group photo of the wedding party at Scarborough Lifeboat station.   

The first two photos are of the condition of the starboard side locker fronts were before they were removed from Chance's main cabin at the beginning of the restoration when we were removing as much as possible to lighten Chance for her delivery home to Essex. You can see that the interior was in a tried condition and the varnish work had lost a lot of its shine. Fast forward three years and with a lot of pain-taking work and remaking broken or missing or rotten parts we have been able to rebuild much of what was lost over time. This bit was the hanging locker front at the aft end of the main cabin to hang your foul weather clothes.  Here is complete starboard side locker front now rebuild and ready for the restoration team to do their magic with the varnish brushes and give the complete frontage its many coat of varnish, so it will be ready to refi when the rest of the major hull repairs are done. This photo shows the hanging locker door sitting in the opening to show how much as ...

  These updates are of the restoration of Chance our James Silver Western Isles Motorsailer, now that we have Chance at Titchmarsh Marina in Walton on the Naze Essex. The restoration can and will be easier to do has Chance is now very close to my own workshop and small yard. Starting work on the forecabin starboard removing the ribs and showing round the new inspector round the restoration project which he is going to oversee. Titchmarsh Marina will be Chances' home for the next four to five years while we restore her to her former glory with the aid of our family and friends. Once we have her back afloat we hope to sail her back to the Silver's boatyard in 2028 which will be 80 years a since Chance was launched at the Boatyard.

Day 2 of finally working on Chance, as seen Simon start to remove a couple of rotten planks on the starboard bow. These had come to light when removing the paint on the inside of the hull in the forecabin. Simon also found that three of the ribs in the forecabin are also rotten and will have to be removed and renewed before any planks can go back in place. In order to do these ribs Simon is going to have to remove the foredeck covering board on the starboard bow section of Chance's foredeck. While Simon was looking at the the ribs he found that the beam shelf is rotten in that part of the boat and so the covering board is going to have to be removed as far back as the cockpit . So that will be Simon's next job, to remove the covering board and expose the beam shelf and also the tops of the ribs so that the new ribs can be put in from the top. So the fun is just starting and Simon is going to have his hands full for a few weeks to come.  

  After what feels like an eternity we are back at Chance once again and starting to make plans on what to tackle first and how best to make it happen.As you will see in the video the starboard side of the transom is well out of shape to the intact port side of the transom. So the best job to do first will be to tackle making patterns of the correct shaped port side and make up a set of frames to mirror the port side frames and then move the starboard side of the hull to the same correct shape as the port side as we know that the port side as never been messed about with in the same way the starboard side was over the years and a number of poorly done repairs have left the starboard side in once hell of a state to say the least which we are going to put right over the course of the summer and get the starboard side and the transom rebuild. .

Across the transom of Chance there are two holes which were for her second dinghy. The spacing would suggest that the dinghy which was on these davits was between 8 and 9 feet in length. There is a second pair of holes on the port side sidedeck which suggests that the other dinghy would be about 10 to 12 feet in length.  The aft cabin hatch base is in reasonable condition apart from a few broken edges which can be repaired and so make this hatch serviceable and will be used again once it is sanded back and the opening top refixed and the whole of the hatchis varnished an made good.   This hatch is like the other hatches on the boat screwed in position by long screws from underneath through the deck beams, so it is likely going to mean cutting through the screws to liftthis hatch off the deck beams and replacing the screws later. The deck around the hatch at sometime in the past as been removed a patched up and not with the same type of deck planking as before. they were r...

A walkthrough of the workshop and the yard at J-Star Marine Services aka Chance restoration and Mai Star II restoration headquarters. In the this video Simon shows what the team have been up to on both projects and how the team have sorted out the outside workshop space so it can be used for working on the larger items needed to be worked on under cover before the parts are moved either to Chance or on to Mai Star II in the outside workshop which is now in a position to be used to work on the different bit for both projects. There are a number of small jobs to be done in the main workshop. However in the coming weeks there will be more larger items which will need to be worked on, these jobs will be shown in future videos as they take shape.  

 Here are just a few parts that have been varnished over the past few weeks with still a lot more to come in the coming weeks and months ahead This first photo is of the port side galley doors which have to have a new framework making for them to sit in and the put back in place on the boat once the bulkheads are repaired and re-varnished. The port side door for the portside lower galley unit. The top strips for thew butterfly hatches for the rails to go in to stop people from putting their foot through the butterfly hatch glass and the top cover panels for the aft hatch and the wedges to keep the aft hatch open for ventilation.  The upper part of the starboard galley unit which needs to be varnished and a little bit of repair work done to the ends. The starboard main cabin wine locker door at the forward end of the starboard sideboard front which is being repaired over the next few weeks. The port side lower galley unit front and one of the many drawers we have repaired and h...

While looking on the workshop shelf I was able to find the main cabin door that had been varnished in the past before being put away until now. It will a dusting down and a light sanding and it can be put with the rest of the doors and cabinetry to be varnished before being refitted to the boat as we rebuild the inside of the boat.  These two panels are the lifting parts from the main entrance to the main cabin from the cockpit.  The starboard side galley front being given a sealing coat of varnish while we sort out how to fill in the two holes on the top right hand side part of the galley front. The port side galley corner panels now getting a sealing coat of varnish, before we start to refit the port side galley unit back together in te boat. These two door are from the main cabin starboard side sideboard, the framework was in a bit of a poor condition so we are having to rebuild the framework to fit these door back on to when we refit the starboard sideboard in the main cab...