Being pulled in many directions...

[Allan S]

I go to my boat, which is STILL on the hard intending to do one, two or maybe even three chores or tasks. Then my wandering eye takes over and instead of finishing an glassing in the raw water sea-cock, I sand a divot in the dinette and fill that in OR, instead of putting away the clutter I follow the sink drain to find out why its sooo slow in draining. I need focus.

[Cheechako]

Yeah, boat work can be distracting. Maybe make a list on what MUST be done to get it in the water, seaworthy and not a worry, focus on those items. Then once in the water you will have a sound basic start, and the rest can be done.

[colemj]

HAH! I do that! Believe me, you do not need focus. After many years on board now, I find that I am most efficient when I do work I want to do, rather than what I planned to do (very occasionally those two are the same).

The boat project list is infinite and growing daily. Unless it is essential for safety or immediate for life, keep doing what your inner boat master tells you to do. In the long run, you will get more done and be happier that way.

The big problem may be with any admiral on board. They tend to like to make lists and check them off in order and don't take truck in any of this "inner boat master" stuff...

Mark

[model 10]

If you are easly distracted then a check list is the way to go. You should only work on a divit if you can't figure something out and need a distraction and then it should be something important not a divit.. If you were to do a good inspection of the boat you would not be distracted by some new problem like the sink drain because everything would be on a list and you would already know about it.

[daddle]

Ask yourself why you don't want to go sailing. Why you prefer being on the hard.

[Lake-Effect]

One of the smartest things I ever did was to commit to getting our boat on the water as quickly as possible, and putting off anything that could wait.

Granted our boat is small, and small boats have small problems... but still, this got us out and sailing within 3 weeks of our purchase, which helped get us hooked.

[atoll]

i find that either starting at the bottom and working upwards works well,or starting at the front and working back,or starting at the bacK and working forwards works well!

with this system,you only do one specific job ie plumbing,so you only have your plumbing tools out,,before you start buy everything you might need for the jobs,ie hose clips ,hose,skin fittings,nipples,sikaflex,keep a note book handy for any stuff you've missed,so you are not wasting time continually having to run to a chandelery.

you can also save a lot of money if you pre order in bulk online.

dont get sidetracked when you find other stuff that needs doing ie electrical

,instead make a note of it,and the materials you might need,so you can pre order,and when you put your electrical hat on use the same M.O..

having a second and third note book helps seperate material and job lists from the current job.

most important keep on going till you get to the other end,with every plumbing job finished.

i also use a few buckets to carry my basic tools and materials in for the type of job,ie:
a plumbing bucket with only plumbing stuff in it.
an electrical bucket with tools and materials specific to electrical.
a fiberglass bucket,
an epoxy bucket
a rigging bucket
a varnishing bucket etc

works for me on the last 7 boats ive built and rebuilt!

[Allan S]

Great stuff guys. I am off work for four days and made a list(s). Going to see if I can hold to it.

Today, Friday, May 17: 1) Finish glassing in sea cock
2) Install expansion tank and rebuilt raw water pump
3) Unclog sink drain

Saturday, May 18 1) Polish fuel with home-built polisher.
2) tidy up

Sunday, May 19 1) Remove prop, disconnect shaft from transmission
in preparation to changing cutlass bearing (shudder).
2) Measure old bearing after removal (As if I'll get it out
that quickly).

Monday is a holiday so we'll just put around the boat cleaning up.

I will be honest about what I did and didn't do.

[Allan S]

Originally Posted by daddle

Ask yourself why you don't want to go sailing. Why you prefer being on the hard.

Daddle, I ache to be on the water, as I wrote the list, I realize i must be postponing the cutlass bearing work. Nice bit of psychoanalyzing me Dude, it was spot on.

[hpeer]

Sometimes I find I need to do one job at a time, no matter how inefficient it seems. If I need a screw, I go get it (always buy two), or a clamp, or a whatever. I used to try to make lists of thing to get at West or Home Depot, but I found that nothing ever got done. I got distracted, confused, forgot things, etc.

So, for me, one job at a time, no matter how many trips, seems to work best. At least I get something done, eventually.

[daddle]

I need to have dozens of projects going at the same time. Each can move forward a bit at a time. I can never have all the right tools and parts on the boat. I work on the most important one first. When I can't go any further because I lack something I write down the item and move to the next most important project. Only go shopping when there's nothing to do on any project.

Here on the edge of the yachting world we can only go to Manila once a month. And anything more rare gets shipped from wherever in a month or two. In my case even the drill motor gets borrowed once every few days, all the drilling gets done at once.

I've done several complete refits this way. Never stop working. Stay busy. Going shopping is lazy, do it on the way home or whatever.

[Talbot]

Boat work is not going right if you have not had to visit the chandlery at least 6 times per day.


It is, after all, only constant visits to a chandlery that provides that inspiration for the next little project.

[s/vPainkiller]

Allan,
Atoll's advise is spot on. The only thing I would add to his post is to Prioritize! I tend to keep a running list of projects based on 1) must be done asap, ie, safety or nav related, 2) important for comfort/convenience or will save more work/money later to do now, and 3) low priority, maybe get around to it if I feel like it but not really essential. I'm kind of AR about making lists. I don't know how people can be organized without them.

I also agree that it helps immensely to plan ahead to make sure that you have all the parts and tools that you need. There is nothing that bogs a project down more than to get started only to find that you don't have what you need to complete it. Of course, I don't always follow this advise as it seems that every project takes a couple trips to the marine / hardware store....

It also helps to have some dedicated time to focus on the boat. We've had some things that needed to be done that we haven't been able to accomplish on weekends. So the admiral and I both just took a week off work for spring comissioning, etc. It was nice because we knocked out a ton of projects, some big like bottom paint, compounding and waxing the topsides, installing a wind generator, and a lot of smaller ones too. The admiral, God love her, polished all of the stainless, cleaned lifelines and jacklines. Man, what a good feeling to have the boat in Bristol condition.

Scott

[tlgibson97]

I make lists but it is still distracting. When I got on the boat I only had three things to do. After I make the list I have 20. Since I have a hard time focusing on one thing, I try to work on a few priority things at once and rotate from one to the other gettnng them all done about the same time.

[kthoennes]

I'm with Daddle where parts and pieces and bits and hardware and tools all drive what gets done. Here in South Dakota on the Missouri River (for now) - a billion miles from any salt water, I'm lucky if the hardware store has a stainless washer. I have to mail order stainless setscrews for the rail fittings, 1/4"-28 x 1/4" thank you. Yep, for some of us working the list depends on which box arrived in the mail today.