Lackey Sailing | Skeedeen 2020 4

April 27, 2020

Skeedeen 2020 4

Monday

Picking up where I left off, I began by stripping, then sanding smooth and clean, the port toerail. The owner was seriously considering leaving the toerail bare, as he was intrigued by the combination appearance of some bright/some natural (not to mention the ongoing problem with the toerail varnish failing at the deck edge), so I over-documented the condition of the rail from various angles to show the condition and character of the bare wood.

To augment pictures from last time of the starboard toerail:

Similarly, the owner was contemplating whether to also leave the eyebrow bare, so I took additional photos of the trim’s condition on both sides.

Moving on, I worked next on the handrails, forward sides of the windshield, and the forward hatch surround, sanding these as needed to prepare them for maintenance coats of varnish. I had to scrape away a few small areas of failed varnish on the windshield, mainly at the wood seams near the corners; this coating was getting rather long in the tooth after 11 years since the last total re-do, but the owner wanted to stretch it out for another year or two based on his long-term plans and upgrades to the boat, so I planned to patch in these small bare areas before recoating the entire windshield with several maintenance coats this time around. This treatment was far from idea, but it was what was needed at the moment.

I also removed the anchor roller and sanded the varnished anchor platform, which we’d decided to leave bright, as needed to prepare it for maintenance coats, though I didn’t seem to take any pictures of this.

Continuing, I moved into the cockpit and worked on all the necessary prepwork on the inside faces of the windshield, plus the companionway trim, engine box, and adjacent areas as needed. I had to strip the after piece of trim on the engine box, as this was in poor condition, and also spot-scraped a few small areas on the windshield, much as I’d done on the forward sides.

After vacuuming and solvent-washing all areas, I got started on some of the masking, beginning with the tightest, most difficult areas on the aft side of the windshield and behind the helm area, along with the engine box trim and some of the other windshield areas.

After a while of this, and with the day growing short, I wanted to get a sealer coat of varnish on the various bare patches I’d scraped and sanded on the windshield and elsewhere, so before knocking off I took care of this. I wanted to get several spot coats on these areas before I started with full maintenance coats.