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Thursday

After a day away from the shop working at a remote project, I got back to the deck and hull work with the usual round of sanding, this time mainly with a less aggressive finishing sander now that most of the fairing work was in its final stages.  There’d be additional, finer rounds of sanding soon ahead, but for the moment most deck areas were pretty much where they needed to be, other than some minor lows still requiring filling.

After sanding, some of the ground-out divots and gouges on the hull still required additional work, as many had received only one coat of fairing compound, but it was too awkward doing serious work on these areas with the staging at the higher height meant for deck work, so for the moment I planned to leave the hull mainly alone for more detailed attention as needed later on.

I removed the masking tape from the hull in way of the various through hulls I’d filled earlier, and as needed gave these areas a light sanding to prepare for the new fiberglass over the outside (and eventually inside).

After cleaning up the coachroof, I applied a first coat of epoxy fairing compound over the whole area, starting to even out the contours of the curved surface.  The first application was intended to fill the most obvious lows and bring some semblance of an overall contour to the area, but there’d be plenty of sanding and additional fairing to come.

The main bulkhead was pinned in place with some wooden blocks that were bolted through the cabin top with these barrel bolts.  I planned to remove these and secure the bulkhead in another way (tabbing), but for the moment I just left the fairing compound away from the bolt heads.

On the remainder of the deck, I focused mainly on little details, like cleaning up and re-filleting some of the corners in and around many of the areas I’d repaired earlier and between deck and cabin trunk/cockpit coaming, and continuing to fair in the large coaming repair on the port side and the repair to the port cockpit locker opening.

Total time billed on this job today:  5.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  42°, fog.  Forecast for the day:  Fog lifting, sun for most of the day, around 70°

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Tuesday

First thing, I sanded all the deck areas as needed, removing excess fairing compound from the various areas currently underway.  Most of the fastener holes and small repairs would require some additional fairing work, as expected.

This time, in addition to cleaning up the decks once I’d finished sanding, I spent some time cleaning the bilges, interior, and related spaces, where I’d not really ventured in some time and which had become a Stygian mess.  With some of the upcoming work soon to require my reentry into the cabin and other spaces, it was too dirty for anything, and I had to make it at least remotely habitable by cleaning up the extensive dust, core debris, and other detritus that had accumulated over the past several weeks of intensive deck work.

After a solvent wash, I went around the decks and applied additional fairing compound as necessary, mainly focused on the cabin trunk and cockpit coamings with their myriad  small repairs, but I touched up a few areas on the main decks as they became evident.

It seemed like as good a time as any to apply a first coat of fairing compound to a number of small places I’d ground out on the hull during the early stages of the project.  I’d worked on some of the uppermost sections while I was rebuilding the hull/deck joint, and now I went around the rest of the lower sections of the hull to begin the repairs on the remaining divots.

With a bit of time left in the day, I decided to get to work on the through hull openings, which I’d earlier ground out from outside the hull, ready to accept new fiberglass once I’d made some other preparations.  To start, I used a drum sander as needed to clean up the insides of the old holes and remove any remnants of sealant or other contaminants.  Then, I solvent-washed inside and out as needed, and masked over the openings from outside so I could fill the holes with a thickened structural epoxy mixture as a sort of plug over which I could later laminate the new layers of fiberglass, both outside and inside.

In the cockpit, I similarly filled some larger holes leftover from the bilge pump and other installations, after masking the openings from inside.

Finally, I prepared and installed new fiberglass over the port cockpit locker edge to repair and reinforce the damaged gelcoat and laminate there, and which I’d ground in preparation out earlier.

Total time billed on this job today:   7.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  30°, clear.  Forecast for the day:  Sunny, 70s

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Monday

Another  round of sanding brought both sides of the hull/deck close to where they needed to be, leaving only a few areas requiring  additional spot  filling.

Before continuing work on the main rehabilitation of the coachroof, I  wanted to prepare and fill the various fastener holes and test holes I’d drilled earlier in the project, as  well as prepare a large hole left over from  the solar vent for patching.  As needed, I used  a countersink, small grinder, or (for the solar vent hole) large grinder to prepare these areas for filling later in the day.

At the same  time, I went around the rest of the decks and cockpit to prepare some additional old fastener holes for patching, and also to grind out with a small sanding disc a large number of small dings, cracks, voids, and other issues in the cabin trunk, cockpit coamings, and elsewhere as  needed.  At the cockpit locker openings, I prepared the port side for some fiberglass patching, grinding a section that had been previously repaired and damaged  by the action of the locker lid hinges, and drilled out the fastener holes on the starboard side so I could fill them and allow flexibility in configuring the hinges sometime much later in the project.

After a thorough cleanup, I went around with epoxy fairing compound and a  trowel and spot-filled all the areas I’d just prepared, including fastener holes and spot-ground repairs, and also applied additional fairing compound to portions of the bridgedeck, hull/deck joint, and port sidedeck that required some fine-tuning.

On the port forward side of the cabin trunk, there was an older crack that had been previously filled by some other person, but early in the process I’d ground out the old filler since the crack needed additional reinforcement.  Similarly, in that timeframe I’d also  ground out a nasty section of the port cockpit coaming.  These areas have been showing up in other photos of the progress for weeks, but my focus was on the major repairs and these small details had to wait.  A few other repairs of similar magnitude, including patching the myriad instrument holes beneath the bridgedeck, loomed ahead in the immediate future as well.

Now, I prepared some biaxial fiberglass to fit the two patch areas and installed it in epoxy resin.  For the forward crack, one layer was sufficient to bridge the existing crack and help reinforce it, but at the coaming the damage required more of a buildup, mainly at the top edge where I’d had to grind back quite a bit of crushed and crumbled material.    I added in enough new fiberglass to at least approximate the original height for now.

Total time billed on this job today:  7.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  38°, mostly clear.  Forecast for the day:   Sunny, 70°

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Friday

I began once more with the sander, sanding all the hull/deck joint as needed, interrupted for an hour or so while another boat departed the shop for the season.  The port gunwale, with two coats of fairing compound, was nearly at final and appropriate contours on both hull and deck, but the deck side featured numerous chatter marks, pinholes, and other low areas from the previous application that would require additional work.  The starboard side and taffrail had a single coat of fairing compound, but with the original hull and deck in better shape on this side, things were already shaping up well, though additional applications would be required.

After cleaning up, I spot-applied more fairing compound on the port side, mostly focusing on skim-coating the port sidedeck to take care of most of the tool marks and other interruptions.   I’d planned from the getgo to use the fairing process from the hull/deck joint glasswork to bring the whole deck contour to where it needed to be, and with this application it looked like I’d be nearly there once it cured and I could sand it.

On the starboard side and taffrail, I used a wider trowel to bring the new gunwale edge smooth and fair into the existing deck surfaces, much as I’d done on the port side earlier.  Here, I expected that the second application would essentially complete the fairing work, with only minor spot-filling left to go.

With the most major deck repair work now approaching some state of completion and readiness, I looked forward in the coming days to focusing on the remaining (and still relatively substantial) deck work, including additional hole patching (instrument holes and other areas in the cockpit, plus several small repairs on the cabin sides), as well as continuing surface preparations and fairing work on the coachroof and nearby areas.

Total time billed on this job today:  4.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  48°, mostly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  Mostly cloudy, chance of showers or thunderstorm, around 70°

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Thursday

I sanded the new fiberglass on the starboard hull/deck joint and across the transom, and also sanded the first round of fairing compound on the port side.

On the coachroof, I sanded off most of the old paint and did what I could at this point to even out the surface, my next step towards improving the appearance and finish of this large area.  I had to strike a balance between how much paint I could remove and how much to sand the fiberglass surface, since the paint had been applied without benefit of any fairing or smoothing and there were numerous areas where the paint was deep in the weave of the cloth and other low spots.

After cleaning up from the day’s sanding efforts, I applied epoxy fairing compound to the hull/deck joint as needed, with the first coat on the starboard side and transom.  With the second coat on the port side, I used a wider trowel to continue the overall fairing efforts on the rebuilt sidedeck (and other areas as needed), incorporating it into the new hull/deck joint.

Total time billed on this job today:  8.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  55°, mainly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  Clouds and sun, showers, around 70 but becoming cooler in the afternoon

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Wednesday

To get started, I installed the two layers of biaxial tabbing on the starboard hull/deck joint, repeating the process I’d completed on the port side earlier.

After a break for a few hours while I completed some work on another project getting ready to leave the shop later in the week, I lightly sanded the new fiberglass on the port gunwale to prepare it for fairing.

After cleaning up, I installed two layers of tabbing over the taffrail/transom section of the hull/deck joint.  Here, I required shorter sections to better approximate the curvature of the seam.

Finally, I applied the first coat of epoxy fairing compound to the port gunwale, beginning to smooth the new work in to the existing surfaces of hull and deck.  For now, I focused on filling the edge between the top layer of tabbing and the existing surfaces, and filled the weave of the cloth in the remaining areas.

Total time billed on this job today:  5.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  40°, clear.  Forecast for the day:  Sunny, 80s

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Tuesday

I continued with another round of sanding on the deck areas as needed.

The coachroof would require a fair bit of work going forward, as the existing repairs, while apparently sound, were far from cosmetically acceptable.  As a first step, I had to get rid of the remnants of the old adhesive that had secured the Treadmaster.  In this case, since the existing surface was such a mess and wasn’t remotely fair to begin with, I used a sanding disc on a grinder to quickly remove the worse of the old adhesive and aggressive nonskid paint on the coachroof, taking care not to go too far and leaving behind a skim of paint that I’d remove another time with a less-aggressive tool.

My next main focus was the hull-deck joint.  Now that the port sidedeck was rebuilt, and the first round of fairing applied that had brought the edge to similar contours as the remaining portion of the deck, it was time to get to the fiberglassing.  To prepare, I masked off below the edge of the area I’d prepared on the hull to catch the inevitable drips of resin during the installation, and pre-cut a series of 24″ lengths of 6″ and 4″ biaxial tabbing that I’d use to glass over the joint.

I spent the remainder of the day installing the two layers of fiberglass over the port gunwale, starting at the bow with a couple special pieces that I cut to incorporate a hole repair over the old anchor hawse located near the rail.  I staggered the seams between the two layers by 12″, and, installing two sections at a time, worked my way aft to the transom by the end of the day.

To finish up, I pre-cut a couple special pieces for the starboard side, mainly to fit around the winch island, which would save time in the morning when I wanted to repeat the glassing process on the other side.

Total time billed on this job today:  7.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  30°, mostly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  Clouds and a shower, then becoming sunny, 60°

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Thursday

I continued to close in towards the effective end of the most significant deck repairs with another round of sanding.  With many smaller cosmetic repairs still to go, as well as the work on the hull-deck joint, I looked forward to wrapping up this round of major work so I could focus on the rest.

After the usual cleanup, I applied additional fairing filler where necessary.  The bridgedeck and coachroof (and other, smaller areas) were all more or less at the proper contours, but there were sundry trowel marks and low spots that required attention.

On the new port sidedeck, I applied an initial coat of fairing filler to fill the weave of the cloth and bring the deck to an approximation of its final shape.  There was a sort of oddball transition at the forward end, where the “old repair” had met the existing foredeck, and where I’d cut out additional suspect material in order to make the new work better.  The need to start somewhere and build off the old work, particularly with the damaged and oddly-build inner skin on this side of the boat (and where it transitioned to the original construction in the area in question) required this transitional area, which had also been evident in the old work before demolition; the fact that it was evident was indicative of the overall effectiveness of that now-dismantled repair.

Now, though the little bump necessarily still existed, this section would fair in properly with the new after portion of the deck without much trouble.  The first coat made good strides in this direction.

Total time billed on this job today:  4 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  50°, fog and showers.  Forecast for the day:  Fog and showers, then improving in the afternoon