I lightly sanded the hull with a small block sander and 320 grit, and by hand on the chines and in the corners, to prepare the surface for the third coat of hull paint. Afterwards, I vacuumed and solvent-washed the hulls.
Later in the day, after a final tack-off, I applied the third coat of the gloss polyurethane paint.
It was a day of minor miscellany. With just a couple smaller jobs left on the docket for this project, I wanted first to wrap up the work already underway, so I reinstalled the now well-cured midships hatch frame with its fancy new lens.
I reassembled the hardware I’d removed from the companionway swashboards and cockpit table.
I’d hoped, and frankly planned, to finish up the hull with the cove stripe, but alas, the order I’d been awaiting didn’t arrive despite promises from the postal service in my inbox all weekend. So I didn’t get anywhere with this small but important step, but did manage time late in the day to go out and pick up the new graphics for the transom, so that was something.
The final step for the new hatch lens was to apply additional sealant to the groove around the outer edge of the lens, which I’d chosen not to do in the same operation as the initial (and more critical) bonding and sealing operation earlier because access to the groove was poor, what with the various clamps and weights securing the lens at the time. Now, with the initial application cured sufficiently, I installed a bead of the sealant abundantly into the groove, then tooled it out smoothly, keeping it flush with the top surface of the protective paper on the hatch lens, as any sealant that overlapped this paper would make it difficult to remove the paper later without affecting the bead. I removed the masking tape from the outer edges, where I’d applied it to protect the hatch frame and make cleanup easier, but for now left the paper in place on the lens so as not to disturb the fresh bead of sealant, despite my urge to remove it and display the finished product.
I took a few minutes to reinstall the transom boarding ladder that I’d removed early in the project.
Next, I masked off for bottom paint, and applied a coat of the owner’s chosen paint, which further progressed the final appearance of the hull. The cove stripe, which would match as closely as possible the boottop, would truly finish off the appearance, but although I’d pre-ordered some striping tape for the job, I’d had a last minute decision to purchase tape in another shade of blue so I could compare the two, and that new order had yet to arrive.
Before leaving for the day, I decided to carefully remove the paper from the new hatch lens. The completed project looked great, and the sealant I’d applied beneath the lens (to secure it to the frame) was now clearly visible through the lens, and as hoped, or even expected, the seal was consistent and void-free in all areas, which ought to do well in terms of securing the lens and preventing future leaks.
To prepare the hull for the second coat of gloss paint, I lightly scuffed it all over with a scotch brite pad, then cleaned with solvent and finally tack rag to remove any dust.
Then, I applied a second coat, using a roller and small brush for application as with the first coat.
After allowing the fresh boottop paint to cure overnight, I could go ahead and remove all the masking. Since this was the last painting step for the hull, I could remove the toerail and deck masking as well. I bent to this task through the morning, eventually removing all the tape, paper, and plastic to expose the completed paint. The boat looked terrific, but would look even better once I finished a couple additional details, like painting the bottom and installing the cove stripe.
Next, I turned to the hatch repair, and removed the clamps from the lens so I could clean up the squeezeout on the bottom side, and remove the protective paper there. I left the paper on the top surface for now, pending application of the final bead of black sealant around the hatch perimeter soon.
The hull paint now had had enough cure time, so to prepare for spraying the boottop, I covered the topsides in plastic sheeting, draped from toerail to boottop. Once I’d hung that, I moved the staging out of the way and masked the top edge of the boottop, using two layers of tape: First a layer of blue vinyl fine-line tape, which resisted the solvents in the LPU paint to avoid bleed-under; then, because the shiny, non-absorbent tape tended to let paint pool and then sag onto the surface below if left uncovered, I applied a layer of my normal green tape over it, covering as much as possible.
I finished up the masking by applying a layer of masking paper above the boottop, to cover the plastic and provide an extra layer of protection, and also provide a non-glossy surface to avoid the possibility of sags from the overspray.
With that, the boottop was finally ready to spray, and during the remains of the morning I applied three coats of Stars & Stripes blue to the stripe, leaving it to cure overnight.
I cleaned up and reassembled the spray gun, which I’d left soaking overnight, and then removed what masking I could from the hull, mainly the various hardware and through hulls on the transom and counter. I removed the masking paper and tape from the top edge of the boottop area. For now, this was all I could do on the hull itself, as I needed to give the fresh paint additional cure time before masking over the topsides to spray the boottop.
This gave me time to continue work on the hatch lens replacement. The lens was intentionally a bit smaller than the hatch opening, leaving a cosmetic caulking groove around the perimeter, meaning the lens could move about fairly easily in the opening. But I needed to secure it in a reproducible way so that I could flip the hatch and trim the protective paper around the structural members beneath. To register the lens from the top side of the hatch, I came up with an easy method using some paint sticks taped to the paper on the top surface of the lens; this simply held the lens from sliding in any direction, which meant that once I’d trimmed the paper, I could easily place the lens in the opening and know that the prepared surfaces would properly mate.
I clamped the lens lightly in place, then turned the hatch over so I could use a sharp knife to carefully score the paper around all the inside edges of the aluminum hatch frame, after which I removed the paper from these bonding areas.
After a final cleanup of the prepared hatch frame, I secured the lens in place with heavy beads of Sikaflex 295UV, and clamped and weighted the lens into the fresh sealant. I did not try to fill and tool the cosmetic seam around the outside of the lens now, as it was impossible to clamp the lens and still access the outer seam; that would happen later, after the initial sealant application cured. All the sealing and bonding of the lens occurred with the initial sealant application, and the outer edge was largely a cosmetic concern. Although I couldn’t get the camera beneath the hatch the way it was supported on the table, I did peer beneath by eye to confirm good contact of the lens and squeezeout of sealant all around the inside. I left the assembly to cure.
I sanded the primer coat with 320 grit paper, using a small sanding block on the flats and by hand on corners and tight areas. Afterwards, I cleaned up the hull and the shop around it.
Next, I applied the first of two or three coats of gloss topcoat, in a custom color to match the owner’s sailboat. I was pleased with how this paint went down on the hull. I applied it thinly with a roller, with no need to tip off as the paint self-leveled well; I only needed a brush for the corners at the juncture of skeg and hull, and at the inner gunwale.
During the morning hours and after final preparations, I applied three coats of gloss snow white topcoat to the hull, leaving it to cure overnight.
Getting ready to do the primer and finish coats on the outside of the hulls, I set the hull halves upside down on a work table and some saw horses to support them during the next rounds of work. The exteriors were mainly ready for primer, but would require just a bit of touch-up work to remove a bit of paint from the interior work here or there, and so forth.
I went around the hull sections and lightly sanded away a spilled bit of paint here or there, and cleaned up some places where the various turning and angling of the hulls while working on the interior had slightly scuffed up the surface. After cleanup, I masked off the gunwales, mating bulkheads, and any other areas as required for hull primer and topcoat.
After final preparations, I applied a coat of 2-part primer to the hull sections. The primer was easier to apply on the relatively broad sections of the hull versus the interior. At this early stage the primer, while still glossy from application, highlighted the condition of the hull beneath, which looked good, fair and smooth.
