[ILikeRust]

My boat had four, and possibly five, previous owners. The good thing is that everyone kept all, or at least most of, the paperwork and passed it along to each subsequent owner. So I have a file box full of all kinds of old paper.

The bad thing is that it seems most of them were loathe to actually discard ANYTHING.

Just recently, I went through the paperwork and cleaned some stuff out that was completely obsolete and moot. For example, there was a big user manual for a Loran. Well, there are wires on the boat that I presume once, a long time ago, were connected to the Loran, but it's looooong gone. From some of the paperwork, the Loran was added in the late 70s/early 80s. But obviously none of the POs could bring themselves to remove either the old, abandoned wiring (which I have since done) or discard the completely useless manual (which I have since done).

I also found paperwork in there for an old battery charger that is nowhere in sight and a few other items that are no longer on the boat.

I've reported before the miles of wiring I keep finding that are connected to nothing - or - worse - connected to power at one end and then disappear off into the boat with nothing on the other end. I still have some wires to trace, but I have removed a bunch of that kind of nonsense.

I have found several interesting "repairs" or "modifications" - can't tell whether they were done by the immediate PO, who I bought the boat from, or one before him, but I have yet to see one that was done to what I would consider "workmanlike" standards. Sort of functional, yes; but neat, tidy, aesthetically pleasing - eh... not so much. Some of them also seem kinda half-assed to me. E.g., if the cabinet door catch is worn out and no longer catches the door, what should you do?

(a) Go buy a new catch to replace the old, worn-out one
(b) Slap a big hunk of duct tape across the door to hold it shut
(c) Whittle a little piece of mahogany and screw it into the face frame of the cabinet to function as a turn-catch on the outisde of the door to hold it closed.
(d) Take the door off and throw it away.

I suppose I should be glad he didn't do (b) or (d), but he didn't do (a) either. There's a little hunk of mahogany screwed to the face of the cabinet that you twist to open the door. It's clearly not original and kinda clunky. I figure someday I'll replace the old catch.

Another example - the door between the head and the V-berth originally opens forward into the space between the V-berths. But some PO made an extra "filler" piece to bridge the gaps between the V-berths so that the entire V-berth space can be made into one big bed. This filler piece occupies the space into which the door would have to open. So he put the hinges and catch on the other side of the door to make it open into the head instead of into the V-berth. Only problem is it's not very neatly done, and it makes it awkward to use the head, because it's already a teeny-tiny space, and the door from the galley opens foward into the head. So you have to close the forward door first, then squeeze your body out of the way of the other one to close it. I probably will fix that, which might require some woodworking to repair the big hinge mortises he made in the door.

The cool thing is that my box of old boat paper includes the original invoice for the boat. She cost over $15,000 in 1968, which is equivalent to about $130,000 today.