MFV BF494 'Pansy', an old Motor Fifie Conversion

gone but not forgotten, just a bit of an impasse at present, should I shouldn't I will, will I won't I that sort of thing. I blame the weather among other things

so perhaps a little little reading might be in order to keep you going. found a few interesting articles around about the place and have a few I might scan in from old copies of classic boat and the like. Background stuff on Fifies, Zulus, Herring Drifters, Scottish fishing boats in general, other mad people, that sort of thing

bit of Fifie & Zulu history and background type stuff

Also got a few plans and drawings I've squirreled away from various sources, and a few I've drawn myself, based on the sketches of Edgar J March in his book "Sailing Drifters". Well worth tracking down a copy. hard to come buy and some folks want silly money for a copy. Not quite destitute enough to sell mine just yet though, but have seen them with £250 price tags!

The plans are canny for any trawler model makers out there, so might upload them and post a link or several if any wants them

will probably add a few bits to this as time goes by

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Edgar J March - Herring Drifters

have been talking to a small publisher who can reprint this on demand for £25 or so a copy if any one is interested.....

**/

We have a boat called Pansy, she's named after a flower as are many other boats. We have taken mild abuse due to the less than manly reputation of the word pansy. An easy remedy to any of the cheeky jibes I have faced is to tell the comedian in question - she was built and named in 1937 and took many brave men to sea and back home safely, never lost a man overboard, I believe, doing one of the toughest and most dangerous jobs going. - It shuts most people up.

Right, that said she has taken on the moniker of The Panzer for some time, a term of affection born as a result of her level of cuddliness and readiness to bend to our will.

I'm pushing it a bit here but until the ice machine is installed and the masts are glued back on she has taken on the mantle of Pandora.

Aye! You know where I'm going with this - open that box and you're in for an interesting time.

Just back from our kid's after just getting there - me Nana's decided to have a stroke for christmas!

Might get down tomorrow, if the thaw's still on could get some caulikng done. It was flipping brassics up there mind

Pumped her oot btw before we left - not a lot in, less afterwards (obviously) AND ...................I fixed something!!! Granted I broke it in the first place

Still can't get the other bilge pump to work and you refuse to tell me the secret, looked in tengine room, bit of water under tgearbox, almost lunched it out but thought feck it, I'm here (See positive attitude ). Smacked me little shoulder on something sharp crawling up tladders to get the rubber gloves on which was great - I felt like you for a wee while. Carefully removed no.1 bilge from it's ole, don't want the bladdy hose to come off now, halfway through the into the next bit move the fella stops dead. Eeek, ran up the ladders - ish thinking, nee bilge pump, I'm halfway to Glasgow with me Mam in the car, the boat is definetly going to die! Flipped the bilge pump switch on the dashboard off and on again (My little heart sank when I saw it was in on mode, thought it might have just tripped or some other simple electronical hoo haa.) Nowt. Turned the big green thing on and off, Nowt. Took a deep breath, thought what would Scott or Shackleton have done in this situation - so I ate a penguin - then instead of skulking back along the pontoon with my hands in pockets, whistling tunelessly - I went back down!

2 deep breaths (and a 5 minute coughing fit) later I slowly scanned the whole environment looking for any type of clue, after half an hour I decided to concentrate my energy on the bilge pump, as that was what had broken. It was silent so the first thing I looked for was the volume control - it was that minging I was reluctant to check for an on off switch. Thought right, cables ya radge, saw the first 2 junction things which are all encrusted with matter and kinda squeezed them a bit, nowt.

Shouted out really loud just to check I hadn't gone deaf and it had actually started working, heard myself so I was dead chuffed not to be deaf, great feeling - I've taken to closing my eyes for a bit then opening them only to find I'm not blind - brilliant, got it down to a fine art and have called it "blinking" will it catch on?

I did a standard cable checkback list troubleshoot which involved some strenous following or "tracking" the cable's alignment with the Mk1 Human Eyeball. Saw an area where something didn't just quite sit right, took me right back to Nam It was a bit of cable with two bits of metal string coming out (like veins, bit scary really, blue and red they was) joined to another bit of cable just the sham. ONLY ................ one of the veins was not attached to it's other vein end - therefore disrupting the flow of fluxity to the pump. I leapt at the thing and grabbed the bits and stuck them together - a git big spark event occured, the pump went off in my hand and I would have fallen over backwards if there was room (Farted with shock instead)

Yeah - fixed the *******. Might get back on the VSO Radio course thing, on a roll.

Will that help the Google rankings Skippar?

Had the great pleasure of busting a few moves on the new deck today! We decided to take a chance and roll back the the tarp for the first time in yonkys to let the new floor breathe for a while, what a wonderful expanse of lovingly laid wood. You could land a chopper on it! I may have embarrased myself by testing (stroke) celebrating it's expansiveness with a wee Peter Crouch / MC Hammer / David Brent medley of dance classics .

Skip has a lovely new pair of multi-purpose boots as well, he's already tested the upper ankle support by stepping of a ledge into the bilge, can't wait to see how they hold up to: Cheeky Nails, Fire, Electric Shock, Chemical Spillage, Circular Saw Abuse, Floods, Famine and "That stuff what is on the deck". I'll post a picture of a comedy shoe when I can suss out how do it again, daresent ask No.1 as he's probably still working out how to undo the revolutionary lacing system on his fantastic boots.

/** strictly come dancing... **/

what no brucie bonus??

thems is special forces boots them is, top secret, nuclear powered, on full auto they can snap a badgers neck from 630 yards and out run an otter on a moped

Lidl's £9.99

Monkeys *Ahem*

Another winter comes stuttering and staggering our way, not sure weather it's made it's mind up yet on this global warming affair. My born again enthusiasm and general - do a bit more fellah - attitude took a knock recently. It's getting dark early and I thought to myself - shucks can't do nowt during the week until there's at least enough light to see cricket ball travelling at 100 mph (That's about a frazillion kph for our continental brothers and sisters) Good excuse - don't tell Rear Admiral Hardy though. (Can the Skipper see all this?)

Then I remembered last year

Worked all through that pesky old season, it was quite pleasant actually - nice and toasty in the engine room with the heat from the lights and a strange electric heater (with a safety tilt switch which would only make the heater come on when it was facing the opposite way from where you were, or if you put it on your head pointing upwards!)

Inside little Pansy's tummy it was cold ................Until the raging beast was unleashed - MachineMart "Boat Burning" stove, woof - the sweat it just run off me neck I do believe we have waxed lyrical about Old Vesuvius before, did I ever tell you about the time ...........

Expect a flood of reports now I have realised I can work after work - I may even do things.

/*** AHEM! ***/

just thought it might be worth mentioning before a rush of enthusiasm causes number 2 to swoon gracefully, but all seating facilities have been removed, thus removing sitting down and thinking type opportunities and all flat spaces have been buried under 'stuff' or have nails pointing out of them thus removing lying down and thinking opportunities, which only leaves polythene pauline, pansy's plastic pal as a source of comfort and she has got a puncture

/***HAWAY! ***/

I pride myself on being able to find a kip, anywhere, anytime - the whale like interior of Panser allows a man to stand up whilst curving towards the ground. that's a kin to a kip! There are small areas of "floor board" left - kip! I shifted a bit of stuff around in the wheelhouse recently and found some "Space" kip! The day I can't find somewhere to have a kip, I'll have a kip and find somewhere else. ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Ouch what was that

I've found my niche and it is fire! Maybe we should have bought a disused cornfield and tried to convert that into a boat! Over the last three weeks I have managed to burn off at least 473 square units of paint with this gun type thing. I thought the fact that it it burst into flames every 40 seconds was some kind of safety device to stop a man working too hard, I've since found out that it was due to the blowtorch being "knacked", skipper fixed that with some tape soaked in Polar Bear tears. The whole process has been great as the area I have been working on requires me to either -

a. Sit on the pontoon with my little bare trotters in the water, happily burning and 'a stripping or ..........

b. Actually lying down and getting the job done or ........

c. Do a bit of kneeling, but I've got my special forces knee pads to make sure no-one shoots my patellas off or I get hard skin on an area of my body as yet untouched by blemishes, liver spots or mange.

I've been wearing gloves as well which are great, although I still haven't got used to them properly, as previously mentioned the torch still explodes into a fire ball every now and again and I've learned that blowing furiously at it doesn't work. I was always taught that blowing on fire puts it out! I have a routine now, turn off the knob thing, take glove off, get lighter out of pocket, put glove back on, remember lighter is still in hand, take glove off again and put lighter in other hand, put glove back on, try lighter which doesn't work, take glove off, shake lighter, put glove back on, realise lighter is in glove, repeat above and fire up the torch. I'm learning soo much working on The Panser that I feel it's only a matter of time before I know everything in the world.

The most satisfying thing is seeing Skippy's fatherly reactions to my naive fumblings. The way he tuts and rips little bits of hair from under his berry is very encouraging, he hasn't punched me in the mouth yet which means I'm great. (Deck beams, gear box change and deck relaying may tip the lad over the edge though)

*Saveloy*

Skip may be along soon with a bit of an update on the chabble saw - when I say soon, one has to take into account the fact that his typing speed may be 10% slower. (There's pictures and everything )

This comes hot on the heels of the: "Sawing off of the knee cap with an angle grinder" blip; "Spark in the eye", "Mell hammer thumb" and "Down the hatch" glitches and the minor but nevertheless hilarious "Hopping around on deck like a silent film comedian with a plank nailed to the bottom of the foot" escapade. You see a pattern forming here?

I knew it would end in tears, it's a factual statistically truth that if you don't do anything you stand less risk of hurting yourself. (Yes there may be times when this maxim may not hold true, like if you've been beamed back down to Earth in your underpants onto the middle of the M25, and extreme sloth will kill you - eventually!) but I do believe the fact that I can still count to ten is down to the Skyper doing to much while I am saving myself for a late (and safe) slovenly power walk up to the finish line.

Legal note

The last shift adhered to all Heath and Safety legislation by making sure that everything you could see by peering through the wheelhouse was all stowed away and left in an orderly manner. We had no visual contact with the death trap we left down below.

/** ahem **/

counting up to ten is no big deal, out where I live there's folks that can count up 12, 14 or even 16, depending on what generation they are from and wether the include toes or not

So yes a minor mishap, and apologies to me dear departed nan, who said it's rude to point but I can't do much else at present, could of been worse, could of been the whole finger... Dave Allen did alright, and still smoked plenty of tabs.

I do have a sneaking suspicion that it was all a ploy by number 2 to get me 2 slow down and leave a load of stuff for him to do: the cleverly, and rather loosely place piles of timber surrounding the table saw, the fact that one of the legs of the saw was hovering over a hole in the floor, and the fact that not being all bad, he left the first aid kit in plain view in the wheelhouse, and had even gone to the extent of opening all the big bags in the box to provide easy access. Although that may just have to pre-infect all the dressings with swine flu

It did sting a bit, but the liberal application of bog roll and gaffa tape and I still managed to shift half a ton of ballast out of the bilges, up on deck then along the pontoons into the back of a Scotsmans car.

Its only a scratch, although there's the odd shard of bone in there somewhere

Not sure who said that first - possibly someone who was just offered a cold cup of sick to drink

Most of what we originally took ownership of, has now been burned, taken to the recycling plant in Byker, given away as Easter presents or possibly fallen overboard during a bit of a freak storm a while back. The "Cathedral like beauty" of the space in the bow which contrasted cheekily with the interesting and vaguely usable interior has now been gazzumped by Pansy's bowels taking on a "Jonah" like vibe. It's like walking into the belly of an old wooden whale - I swear I heard a belch while we were in the wheelhouse

Me and the ships's cat had a bit of a prowl around today and did not hurt ourselves at all. I impaled my head on a spike, Smokey didn't sever any archeries (Couldn't get the lid back on the first aid box Skipper, sorry. You know how it is though, we opened it up, emptied the contents, didn't find what we needed, put everything back in and there was at least 4 X as much stuff needing to be squeezed back. We managed but I quipped to Snuggles that the next time you need the first aid box you'll pop the catches and the lid will spring open and have your eye out).

We have a new tool on board - Skippo reckons it's a table saw! He bought it at some clearance sale. I agree, he's been down to Shepperton Studios and brought back one of those machines they strap secret agents to, to saw them up the goolies with

Myself and Tigger were quite sober today so decided not to go anywhere near the rascal. We did put tape round the end of some wires to stop them causing explosions. I suggested we kept them in a bucket of water to negate the possibilty of electrocution or fire but we couldn't find any. Buckets that is - the last one's now a cowl for the burny burny thing Skippar, remember to remove before setting Satan's Stove alight!

And a smaller deck! We have a lot of stuff on the boat at the moment, most of which is being fed into our antique MachineMart (C 2009) wood burning stove. By the way Skip that hole what you cut in the roof is a little larger now as the chimmley is setting fire to anything within 14cm of it. We have purchased some more big green radios, a couple of wide screen TV's to use as monitors so we can watch seabed TV and monitor any collisions we are about to have in 3D realtime and a pinball machine (Note to self, disable tilt warning) A new deck is in the offing after my SDS drilling attempts today - It's got a life of it's own skip, keeps diving into the timber and making a break for downstairs. Lump hammer and cold chisel, now ya talking.

** hoy hoy **

unaccustomed as I am to slipping a little something in from behind (ahem) but thought I'd share a thought that crossed my mind following a wee telecon' with No 2 this afternoon. The wee stovey thing, open the throttle, wind in the right direction and aye, it does get a bit 'furnacey'. The stove in question, is a called the 'boxwood' long thin with a door at the end, have a look on machine mart's site and you'll see what we are on about. Anyhoo... a good while back, we did get a request or 2 from a funeral director about potentially using the old girl to despatch someone's nearest and dearest to the deep, that thought came back to me today with the realisation that we could be in a position for a world first, a totally and utterly unique service, that not even an Americanist has thought up -cremations at sea for midgets, the stoves the right shape, right size and certainly does the do on the burny front - any takers??

*Peeep*

You'd be hard pushed to get a rabbit up the furnace bracket Skip - A Meerkat perhaps but the market's a bit limited round Wallsend way!

Saying that though once you find one Meerkat there's often a few more more Hinging aroond. Nosy buggers aren't they? Rodent Rubberneckers !

*No.2 Sneaks into a lifeboat and pulls an old bit of sail over his head*

"Oi Oi!"

"Can't hear you mate, you're hiding in a boat covered in a sailage"

"Aye - ok can I come out?"

"Course you can you lemon, this is a virtual conversation between 1 person, everyone's a winner"

"Cheers"

I've tired myself out typing all that stuff so here's a quick infoblast

Fuel tanks are shiny and green

Fishfinder died due to moisture

Deck is about to be tackled with whatever it takes!

The prepacked hot chocolate Skippo left is causing arguments, stick with beef tea, you know it makes sense.

Wood burning stove about to go in

Etc.