The new hinge design looks good – nice and clean up under the beam. Had to use a wood dowel on place of the real steel hinge pin because the metal wouldn’t quite fit past the neighboring brace structure. Must remember to put the real pin in BEFORE mounting the beam to the boat at launch time!

So here’s the basic idea of the engine position. I’ve only seen this placement on Humdinger (the Walter Green tri that’s just now finishing the PAC Cup) and photos of the big boat VirginFire in the Caribbean.

The real trick here is to see if there’s really enough vertical lift room to raise the motor enough under / next to the aft beam brace pole. This wood mock up has the prop fin 13″ above the waterline, much like we sail with the F27 motor tilted up. I need to find a real 20-25hp motor this week to judge how much the engine cover tapers in – thats the part that will hit the brace at the top. Really hoping this all fits as ell as I’m eyeballing it!

PS – the windshield frames are coming along nicely. Probably will have Tap Plastics custom cut and bevel edge the smoked acrylic from templates. Worth paying their cutting fees it seems.