December 7, 2020

Arietta 5

Monday

After a brief water wash, I sanded the new laminate on the cockpit sole and poop deck, smoothing the edges and bringing them flush with the adjacent deck while lightly scuffing all areas.

At the same time, I began to prepare the other areas of the cockpit for refinishing and minor repairs, including sanding off the existing nonskid pattern from the seats and reaming or grinding out any further fastener holes, cracks, and dings throughout the work area.  I also lightly sanded most of the cockpit well and cabin bulkhead, though additional detail and finer sanding would come a  little later in the process.  For the moment, my goal was to prepare any areas for filling and fairing as required.

After cleaning up and final preparations, I applied a coat of epoxy fairing compound to the new laminates, and skim-coated the cockpit seats to help smooth the surface left over after removing the nonskid pattern.  Then, I applied filler to the various screw holes, ground-out cracks, and other areas I’d prepared earlier.

During the deck inspection, I’d discovered water around the hawsepipe on the foredeck, and now I removed the fitting to inspect the area and determine repair possibilities.  I’d initially thought the core was saturated fairly far out from the hole itself, but instead was pleased to find that I could ream out most or all of the damaged core from the small opening.  This was good news because although refinishing the main decks was a project on the list for the future, it wasn’t part of the job scope for this session, largely due to schedule constraints of my own, so it was pleasing to think that I could repair the opening satisfactorily now without any worries of cosmetic damage in the process.

I planned to let the opening air out for a while to allow any residual moisture to evaporate before I filled the voids with thickened epoxy sometime down the road.

Meanwhile, I’d advanced the project as much as possible for the moment, so I worked on other things at the shop while the epoxy in the cockpit had its required cure time.

Total time billed on this job today:  4 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  26°, clear.  Forecast for the day:  Mostly sunny, 33°