One of the challenges of owning the Palani is that the previous owner died so I don’t have an easy source to what the game plan was and the boat was part way through a refit before I bought it. As the Cabot’s were sometimes sold as just hull and basic interior shell with the new owners outfitting as they saw fit there isn’t a standard “owner’s manual.” I’ve tried to find drawings and documentation online but have only been able to locate these scans of the original blueprints.
As you can see this image is difficult to see details.
Boat Book Development
Another challenge I have due to this lack of documentation is that I’m always stumbling on “new” storage areas. Putting a square room and floor into a round hull leaves a lot of little voids everywhere, and these make nice storage areas. So I did an overlay graphic over the top of the sketches and placed in all the storage areas I’ve located. I then scaled this out to something readable to be printed and put in the boat book.
I’ve made a sheet that will go with this that explains what type of storage area they are and what their sizes are. I’ll then be able to build inventory sheets and code them for ease of use. As my boat needs to be 90% self-contained (kind of hard to UPS to an atoll in the South Pacific where your address is only a GPS coordinate). As there are so many little spaces, you can forget a year or two down the road where you stuffed that oil filter or impeller. In the middle of a passage or in a storm being blown into a lee shore is not the time to scramble trying to find things. Also, this will make it easier to communicate with a 3rd party (like someone doing repairs) when I’m not at the boat.
The boat book is also going to have listings of all part numbers for things that commonly break or are items that are used up so as filters and impellers.
I haven’t been posting much because I’ve been working on a complete head (bathroom) remodel. What started out as “just going to paint the walls” has turned into a complete gut and remodel. I’ll be finishing up the painting this week (and starting on the V-Berth remodel) and should have all new fixtures and wood in place by next weekend, so will have pics 🙂
