To make the final move of “ElizaLin” from The Hinckley Company to my backyard, (Using a hydraulic trailer.), the Bilge Plates had to removed from the exterior of the hull. Because I had already planned on doing this, (The “shoes” that support the attachment of the Bilge Plates to the hull need to be replaced.), I decided to tackle this job the “quick and dirty” way.
Below are two images that show the Bilge Plates. Their location conflict with the “lifting arms” of the hydraulic trailer that will be used to move the sailboat into my backyard.
I made the decision to cut the heads off of the bolts that are used to fasten the Bilge Plates to the hull, and just let the plates fall to the ground. I used one of my Makita grinders that had a “cut-off” wheel mounted to it, and another Makita grinder that had a grinding wheel mounted to it, (To remove remaining burrs from the cutting process.).
There were 10 bolts per Bilge Plate. Five on the inside and five on the outside of each plate.
When I had the heads of the bolts cut off of the port Bilge Plate, I loosened the jackstands on the starboard side of the hull and tightened up the two jackstands on the port side of the hull. Doing this, lifted the port Bilge Plate off of the blocking it was resting on.
I set up more blocking underneath the Bilge Plate.
Then, using the blunt end of a maul, I pounded on the bottom flange of the Bilge Plate.
The Bilge Plate began to yield to the blows with the maul.
And, down it came!
I repeated the process on the starboard Bilge Plate.
This one took only 30 minutes to get it off of the hull!
Then, I used a forklift to load the Bilge Plates into a trailer to haul them back to my house.
Unloading the trailer back at home.
Waiting for delivery!
Black Lab Adventures 
super cool , looks like it will be home soon …nice work , Bro/dude !
Great production work on the videos! What an adventure!!
Thanks, Bob!
I had heard of bilge water but not bilge plates. I had to look it up to see what they were. So they use plates on smaller ships for stabilization and they intake water on the big ones to make the weight and weight distribution work?
Hello Clay,
With respect to sailboats that were/are designed in the U.K., (As is the Golden Hind 31′), most have bilge keels. Most often, there are just two instead of the three “keels” that are on my boat. The main reason for this is, the cruising grounds in the U.K. has fairly shallow water. At low tide, most boats are left “high and dry” on their moorings. The beauty of bilge keels is, a boat design can still carry enough ballast below the waterline, yet navigate shallow water, and settle into the mud while staying relatively level. To me, this means that I can “careen”, (Google that last word!), my boat on a beach, and do a whole bunch of work on the hull if I have to, without having to rely on a yard and a Travelift to haul the boat out of the water. I save money!
Check out this image and you will see what I mean.