DIY Bridge Crane Success! Lifting Engines & Installing Sail Drives + F2 Eco Paint Episode 59

This week aboard our sailboat we hit a huge milestone in the refit — installing the sail drives, mounting the props, testing a new eco-friendly rudder paint, and moving the engines into place using a DIY bridge crane we built ourselves. It was a big week of progress and one of our most satisfying yet. ⚓ Project 1: Installing the Sail Drives With the mounting surfaces prepped and aligned, we finally lowered the sail drives into position and secured them — a major step toward getting this boat back in the water. ⚓ Project 2: Installing the Propellers Once the drives were in, we fitted the props and torqued everything to spec. Another big checkmark on the list. ⚓ Project 3: Painting the Rudders with F2 Eco We tested F2 Eco, a new opalescent white marine coating that’s just entering the recreational yacht market. It looks stunning and promises environmental benefits — we’ll be watching closely to see how it performs. ⚓ Project 4: Moving the Engines Into Place To move the engines into their homes and bolt them to the sail drives, we built a DIY bridge crane out of Unistrut and used a compact chain hoist from Amazon. It worked beautifully and made this huge job manageable. Every one of these tasks brings us closer to launching, and this week felt like a major leap forward. ⛵ In This Episode: Sail drive installation Propeller mounting Rudder painting with F2 Eco DIY bridge crane build Engine alignment and installation Real-life sailboat refit progress F2Eco link: https://f2ecousa.com/ Original music created with SUNO 00:00 Intro 00:38 Channel into 00:57 Install sail drives 04:28 Install props 10:00 Paint the rudders 19:31 Move engines into place 24:25 Wrap up 24:39 Coming up next week 24:59 Like and subscribe 25:29 End card ----------------------------------------------------------- #SailingLife #BoatRefit #CruisingLife #DIYBoatProjects #SailboatMaintenance #SailDrive #SailingCouple #EcoFriendlyBoatProducts #PropInstallation #MarineRefit #CatamaranRefit © Sailing Roam 2025