It’s been a while since I embarked on a largish project so a Boat Car it is!

“Constant Hope” belonged to a friend of mine ‘Bartholomew’ who has since moved to a Rib for his nautical pleasures. The boat clearly hasn’t been used for a while and was taking up valuable space in his hedge and thus it needed liberating.

The ‘Arran 16’ is a popular little fishing boat and looks almost identical to a, Orkney 16 and I presume the two do get confused.
The trailer wheels have a little play, but I believe the bearings are good enough to do the 10 mile or so trip back to base and amazingly there was still some air in the tyres, although they are starting to perish.

No jockey wheel, but it does have a serviceable tow hitch, so all should be good for the trip.

Just got to hitch it up to the car and pull it out of the hedge and we will be on our way.

The inside was somewhat full of leaves, sticks needed a good clean. At some point in it’s life it had a layer of paint added to inside the hull, I presume it was some sort of Epoxy/ Polyester paint, but it clearly hasn’t stood the test of time and most of it came out quite easily with a vacuum cleaner. The remaining may need some scapeing or even a light media blasting.

The storage lockers are ply and rotten, the same goes for the buoyancy tanks sand thus they will be removed as they will not be required.

To make life easier in my workshop, the trailer which is very heavy will be put to one side and the boat boat moved around on a pallet using a pallet truck or the forks on the telehandler.

Bow view.

Port View. It is also worth noting that the cabin is removable, which will help make the initial part of the build easier.