Motor Well / Splash Well

I have cut and fitted all the parts for the splash well and things are looking good.  My good friend Art Atkinson came over and helped me lift my 40 hp Johnson outboard onto the transom.  I wanted to see if I was going to have enough clearance before I epoxied everything into solid state.  Well, the answer was not really.  On the first attempt the motor did not fit on the transom because it measured 2 1/2" thick so I got out my router once again and cut away.  Now the transom width measures 2 1/4" and the motor slipped right into position and the clearance around the splash/motor well is good.  So now, I need to get at drilling two drain holes and start to epoxy everything into position.

Fuel Tank Install

I know it has been a while since my last post but I am back at boat building again.  I have struggled with the placement of the fuel tank.  As a matter of fact, I purchased a portable and a permanent fuel tank but at the end, I decided to go the permanent route.  I like the idea of a portable because I really don't need a lot of fuel and it would be nice to take the tank out for filling on shore but I just did not feel that I had the room to get the tank in and out and the bottom line is that I really did not like the look of an open well in the rear of the boat.

So, my final decision was a mounted fuel tank.  I choose a 12gal tank which I am mounting in left aft of the boat.  I ran into a few problems and they were all related to space.  The tank was just a little high because I had an 1 1/2" stiffener epoxied to the floor batten.   Using a router made a fast work to remove the vertical stiffener allowing the fuel tank to sit directly on the floor battens.  The position of the tank was important because I needed to allow room for the bilge pump between the tank and the transom knee.  Another area that I needed to pay close attention to was the slope of the splash well.  The top corner of the fuel tank needed to clear the bottom of the splash well.  I will have photos of the enclosed splash well fitting in my next post.

If you look very close in the photos you can see that I have epoxied stainless steel bolts into the floor batten making a hard point.  I feel that these hard points, attached using nylon nuts will be much stronger than screws.  All of the fasteners are not installed in the photos but you can see how the fuel tank is clamped into postion.

The only problem with this fuel tank location is that the rear seat box will need to be removed if there ever is a need to take the tank out for service.  It can be done, but will be a challenge to reach your arm around the tank.