Small Boat Voyages

The rear bumper was a pain to remove and replace, 8 u-bolts held on by 16 nylock nuts took a while to manage off and on again, partly because I only carried a wheel brace and adjustable spanners. I am beginning to really loathe using adjustables they always seem to go out of adjustment and take forever to the readjust again. Perhaps more expensive ones might be the answer. Then again with this little project I’m going to replace 16 nuts with just four. All parts and materials ready and waiting in my shed.

My good friend Mark, a farmer who lives nearby, had a look and came up with a great idea. If I inserted a spacer between the side frame and the arm attached to the bumper on each side I would be able to bolt each arm to the frame directly using two bolts each side.

At the same time I’m wondering if the extra rear support is really necessary seeing how there are already four pairs of rollers (plus a bow support) supporting the keel. I think the overhanging section behind the rear set of rollers extends noore than the distance between each of the other pairs of rollers so really it’s not that necessary.

To this end the plan will be to refit the rear bumper using four bolts fitted horizontally through the side frame and with wooden spacers filling the gap that will be fixed permanently to the side frame.

My limited and aging set of drill bits only allowed me to drill through two of the pieces at a time so slowly managing to drill through two pieces and mark the next set of holes for drilling separately.

One small issue is these bolts may be a little too long and only party threaded. Some temporary padding might be needed to be able to keep it tight.

Parts arriving this week include some 12mm bolts the right size, and extra long 12mm drill and butterfly nuts to hold it all together.

12mm butterfly nuts arrived to complete the project.

I can now remove the bumper by removing four bolts. That’ll make life a lot easier!