In need of anti fauling in a big way

awesome, finders keepers i say....

Got no idea about salvage rights , but a very intresting story and pictures. Look forward to seeing the how it cleans up .

Just how much TLC went into getting that motor going?? Great effort.

Depends where you found it

We, Carnarvon Sea Rescue, have just recently received a Plakka boat that was found by one of our members full of mud and covered I weed from in the mangroves 4nm south of town.
Dot placed adverts in the local paper for about a month for the owner to claim it, no one came forward so it was donated to us.
It is presently being fitted out as an inshore centre console rescue boat complete with 25hp Etec, Gps, sounder, Vhf, spotlights and a nearly completed custom made trailer. All that needs to be done is sandblasting and painting the trailer, fit the completed console and engine , and to licence both

Before and after pics will be put up once completely finished.

 Looks like a tender. You could probably make up a good clam soup of that lot lol. No ID middle of the ocean...finders keepers.

Where was this?  Very cool find. Hope you get to keep it. Hope no one died in it

 marc found it west of barrow island middle of nowhere we reakon its probablt come off a yacht or somthing like that had a south australian fish size limit sticker on it

west coast

took about an hour and a half work to get it to run smoothly got it to start in about 15 minutes though

Short answer - no,

Sorry to put a downer on it but from my understanding Salvage Rights are more or less rights to recover a vessel rather than being able to claim ownership as such.  Salvage rights are pretty complex but in general to salvage a vessell without the owners permission or permission from some other authority the vessell would have to be "in peril" or in danger of causing other damage (such as a shipping hazard).  You shouldn't have a problem in recovering it as such but if you tried to claim salvage costs from the owner for its recovery you may come across an issue or two unless you were able to prove it was a hazzard to other vessels.  You would also need to keep in mind being a hazard does not nessecarily give rights of salvage particularly where one has the other option of issueing a warning of the hazzard.

Despite what you found I would hazard a guess the vessel was not in peril as any damage had already occurred and the condition was unlikely to get much worse (bar it sinking and the number of barnacles would suggest if it was going to sink it probably would have done so already).

It may be a lost vessel and you may have difficulties there as a vessel cannot be declared abandoned just becasue the owner can't find it.  Even if the owner has discontinued efforts to find it, this does not nessecarily constitute abandonment either. 

As far as keeping it given the vessel has a HIN number I would assume by law you would be required to make all nessecary efforts to identify/locate the owner prior to being able to claim it and given it has a HIN I would assume you or someone else would be able to do so.  You might get lucky and the owner might say you can have it to save them transport costs

Cheers

Owner may have a brand new one thanks to insurance too :)

Hypothetically the rivets to the HIN may have corroded and it had "fallen off" and you could then get a marine place to put a HIN on it and then get it registered.  but then if the owner see's your post/photos.........

Hypothetically I didn't say that either

If thats the case then the insurance company could claim ownership. They would definitly sell it to you

In the case of the insurer claiming ownership send them a bill for recovery of the vessel (even though as above you may have had no right to do so) as given we are not taking about a costly vessel they may allow you to keep it in leui of your cost - worth a try anyway.  Would cost them a packet (and you) to proceed through the courts so that would be unlikely.

 we had every right to recover it it was a shipping hazard so yeh hypotheticly of course

Good score ..wonder how long it would've been floating around for ? .. good promo for the donk brand , don't tell me it's a merc lol 

all you have to do is report it to the local police
if nobody claims it with in 3 months its yrs leagaly.
nice find :)

yes thats "almost" correct.

We found a kayak about 10 years back, 100 miles out to sea.

Brought it in and handed it into the Police (crew wanted to flog it of course!) but as we were outside the Abrolhos I was pretty sure it would have blown off there ands I know quite a lot of guys on there.

As soon as the 3 months were up cops rang "can you come and pick this fkn thing up, we cant close our lost property room door."

I asked is it mine? They said "yes-unless the owner makes a claim for it and proves it was his."

"so what if Ive sold it?"

"you'll have to negotiate a payment to him"

Bugger that, I left it in my shed for 5 years then flogged it!

But I dont believe he was right anyhow.

We found one way out the back of naturaliste reef,think it had blown out from Dunno still had the anchor and 3 mtrs of rope hanging of it, towed it in reported it to police filled out the forms put an add in the paper and after 3 months it was ours no probs.

Mercury outboards would be pretty chuffed with the way it started up so easy. Might be worth giving them a ring and send a them photo (for a beer or three)