Rain has Arrived

I have discovered that almost every small project I work on takes about twice as long to complete.  I want the restoration to turn out well and I'm enjoying every part of it.  I don't want to rush a good thing.  So I have installed the foredeck and I have laminated the joint together with tapering plies and then covered most of it in chop strand matte.  I then have used a fiberglass fairing compound smoothing the whole exterior surface.  It looks good and I have bought a quart of color matched gelcoat soon ready to apply temperature pending.  The weather is too cold right now to go to town with resin so I've began to focus my attention elsewhere.  I have installed the beautifully powdercoated mast base (Thanks Commercial Powdercoating of Bend OR).  All of the hard points are installed in the deck.  I guess the lesson I learn over and over is that good preparation results in good results.  Also the adrenaline rush in mixing up resin is a bit exciting.  I don't want to screw a repair up.  I get nervous and I'm against the clock for the material kicking off.  I have learned and am learning to calm myself and not worry about the result but to pay a little extra time to finish the job tightly without making a mess of it.  I like working with fiberglass because you can take a risk, possible make a mistake with the worst case scenario equals a do-over with a bit of work with a grinder.

I have buffed out the topsides with Perfect It polishing compound.  This is easy to do with a machine buffer.  The gelcoat is in excellent condition under the oxidation and I have discovered a few areas that will require some repair but for the most part the majority of the gelcoat is in good condition.  The non-skid has been cleaned and the cabin top has been buffed out.  Tomorrow I'll be laying out the window cutout templates with a Faro arm at lunch.

I will try to include some before and after pictures.  But below are a few of the current state of the project.

Starboard topside showing reflection, note the dog gate.  Dory is a nice companion chilling out.

Mast base and compression post, ready for install.

Autopilot for the tiller, Thanks Kieth Seiler!

Swab the Decks

Today was a great productive day.  A special thanks goes out to Jilann and Sally and RD as well as Meh-meh (Megan) for watching Inchy (Emily).  Today we taped up all of the holes in the deck with aluminum tape.  This stuff seals well and is easy to remove without leaving adhesive.  The deck was covered in a splotchy mold and years of dirt so we gave her a bath and she cleaned up well.

Above:  Jilann and Sally scrubbing the decks.

Rd came over and we all cleaned for about two hours.  Soft scrub with bleach worked well on the non-skid.  The smooth areas will get cleaned with the machine buffer and a polishing compound.  We have completed about the first quarter of the port bow with the machine buffer and the gelcoat overall is in great condition.  This weekend a lot got done.  The foredeck patch is installed and I used similar aluminum rivets to tie it into the return flange mechanically.  I will be spending much of this week glassing in the forward and aft sections and will begin the fairing process.  The glass work is a lot of building up and tearing down.  To finish up the bow I plan to add multiple layers of 6oz glass and will tie in the seams.  I am planning on alternating the ply orientation by 45 degrees with layers of mat in between for good adhesion.  The foredeck is not perfect but very close for the fit.  I will use fiberglass fairing compound to get it perfect before gelcoating.  The reason for the rivets and structural putty rather than 5200 is that my plan is to match the stiffness of the surrounding structure.  I will overkill the fiberglass on the inside and will put the vacuum pump to work this week.  The last thing I want happening is for stress cracks to appear in the gelcoat when we bend the mast aft and tighten up the forestay while going upwind in heavy air.

The foredeck is installed, the decks are bright white, and the topsides are getting polished out.  You can see reflections in the gelcoat.  The solar vent is getting installed.  I am testing out the de-coreing process of all deck penetrations.  I am using a step drill from below then I remove the balsa with a dental tool.  I then tape the hole from the inside and inject structural fiberglass putty with a syringe.  I will come back and create a clearance hole through the hard point.  I think I will try epoxy for the other hard points but I will keep them on the small side so they do not generate too much heat and crack when curing.  The plan is to close up the perimeter holes first so she is easier to tarp with the rainy season quickly approaching.  I have to finish the foredeck before the toe-rails can be re-attached.

Acetone, I love you and hate you.  I have used this solvent to clean up the resin that has glued my arm hairs together and it is great, beats a razor.  I also have gotten some on my expensive black diamond head lamp and I managed to spill a small amount on the display of my digital scale, nice now I can barely read it.  I should be able to polish it out.