Welcome Aboard!

These pages will cover the restoration and upgrades I have done to a 1979 Choate 40.
I acquired the vessel in poor condition at a reasonable price and so far have put twice that amount into her.
From the evidence I have found, she had been de-masted, run aground several times, slightly flooded, run hard and put away wet.
Fortunately, she had new standing rig with a used mast from a Catalina 40 and a recent head job on the motor.
The rest of the info I'll segregate into pages for detailed information.

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

Boat History

Here are the boats I've owned and worked on since the early 70's

This 1958 Dorestt El Dorado was given to me by a fellow worker. I ended up scraping it due to the particalboard that lined the hull and deck, which started swelling and flaking off in the wet/humid weather of Seattle.

This was my first sailboat in 1980, a Cal 2-27. A well built boat that didn't need but just upkeep.

Here the 1965 38' Pacemaker.  Mahogany planked with oak frames and teak trim.  Very smooth and comfortable. But is sucked a lot of gas, 12 gph cruising, 25 gph at 25 knots.

Pulling out the old 409 motors and installing the 427's in the Pacemaker.

A good day diving. 

This is the twin keel 23' Clipper Marine. A Cheap boat but was able to sell it for twice of what I had into it.

Built an extended tongue for launching on the shallow ramps of Seattle.

An 18'  Maximum runabout. Fixed it up and sold it for a $2000 profit.

A 10' Boston Whaler inflatable. Had it for 25 years and sold it for half of what I paid.

Had a Ranger dinghy for a while. Got it free and ended up giving it away free. It needed new gelcoat on the keel area.

And while in the Navy these two boats PBR 32' and the Swift boat 36" were common to come up to the pontoons while I was in Vietnam. Most of the work involved patching bullet holes and running gear repairs. The PBR's had (2) 6-71 Gemmies with blowers (jet drive). 

The PBR's were for the rivers.

And the swift had (2) 12-71 with blowers (3-blade props on a shaft drive).

The swifts were for Coastal runs or river entries only.


Thursday, October 29, 2015

Latest Pictures

Here are some pictures that have been taken over the past couple years. Outside of boat is complete.









The latest deck work.....................................Used Kiwigrip to finish the whole deck surface..






 Except for some additional Treadmaster....

Made up a 5/8" bridle for the Sampson post for anchoring, or a Sea Anchor. Plus, an adaptor for tying to rope rode.


Folding Solon table........................





It didn't turn out quite as planned but this was my first time at trying to seal paper under clear epoxy.




At last, finally getting the head liner back in. Just need to seal the wood and cover it with vinyl upholstery material.



Oh, and finally said good bye to San Francisco! Aug. 30, 2015



Check out the wind speed indicator (28 kt.). This was just the second day. Things got more extreme! The boat sure proved itself on the trip all the way down from Seattle.


Avalon  from the mooring.


And here is a lot of the tools and supplies that was accumulated in the rebuild.  Not including a small machine shop that I sold off recently.




BTW the boat is for sale now. Retirement doesn't supply but a couple boat credits per month to live on. It was fun while it lasted!