New floor

Lots going on aboard Gannet this week.  Managed to get a day on her myself last Friday and got plenty of photos of the work in progress.  

Dave has been busy building the new floor extension in the chain room.  The idea is that the door through to the master bedroom (in photo below covered in plastic) needed to be more central due to the lube tank.  That meant that there was no walkway chain room side of the door just a plunge to a grizzly death at the bottom of the chain bucket.  The new floor will sort that and provide the landing for the stairs down.

Now most of the heavy cutting is done it is time to sort the rubbish and recycle the scrap.  Dave has agreed to project manage the exercise and get some trusted labour in to help.  Basically there will be skips put along side and the rubbish will go in them.  Then the scrap will be offloaded in further scrap bins.  Finally the bilge diesel water mix in the barrels will be pumped out and barrels removed.  We will also get the paraffin and lube tanks pumped out in the chain room enabling us to use them for other things.  Not least of which it help removes a fire hazard.

The old coal bunker is now clear.  Perfect size for the ensuite.  Removed the planks already.  There is an existing air vent out onto deck which will help with ventilation and the extractor fan etc that will be needed.

The problem of the poles is still to be solved.  The two middle poles will really need to be removed to fit the bed in.  Advice is being sought.  We may need to strengthen the beam above but that should be easy to do.

The final task in that front explosives locker was to decide what to do with the room (under the hatch below) at the bow of the ship.  It is a very nice little space (see photos below) with the anchor 'tubes' which connect the deck with the outer hull at the bow and which was where the anchor chains ran down over the big metal 'runners' (apologies for lack of nautical terms) on deck.

The condition of the hull here is amazing.  The pain looks mint condition and like it was painted only yesterday.  The idea would be to remove the ladder, put a skylight on the hatch above (probably a porthole rather than skylight) and use the space for storage.  The question was how to get in there.  I am investigating (again advice being sought) cutting two hatch ways through from the master bedroom on either side of the bed.

More pictures of the new floor.  Now boarded for safety

Still more to do but lots of exciting progress.