Tuesday

First thing, I applied the second coat of gray nonskid to the decks.

Most of my “known” work list revolved around the deck and reinstalling hardware, and obviously this would have to wait till the paint had cured sufficiently, so in the meantime I reinstalled the rubrail on the hull.  I used butyl tape sealant on the back side of the hollow half-oval trim pieces, and reinstalled all the sections around the boat.  I had to redrill several of the screw holes that had gotten filled during the various hull and deck work.

A few bits of hardware still needed their undersides scraped of old sealant, including the jib tracks and bow and stern pulpits.  I forgot to take a picture of the stern pulpit before I cleaned the bases.

Late in the day, the nonskid had dried enough that I could remove all the masking tape.

Finally, I reinstalled the companionway hatch rails and sliding hatch.

Total time billed on this job today:  5.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  33°, mainly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  Mostly cloudy, chance of showers and drizzle, 41°

Monday

As I got started removing the tape from below the boottop, with the rest of the boat still fully wrapped and covered, I couldn’t pass up the contemporaneous opportunity to quickly and lightly scuff over the bottom with an abrasive pad to remove the light, dry remnants of a season’s marine growth, taking all of 10 minutes.  Even this basic hand process kicked up ample bottom paint dust (ugh), so having everything above the waterline covered meant that none ended up on the fresh work.

Now I could continue removing all the tape, plastic, and paper from the rest of the boat.  I set the staging back to deck height, and otherwise reclaimed the shop in the name of all that is normal.  It’s always nice to see the boat fully revealed after a long painting session.  The red bottom looked horrible with the new topsides, but I’d have to live with it for right now.  Woe is me.

Following the lines of the gloss paint borders around the deck, I remasked the deck to prepare for nonskid application.

After final preparations, I applied the first of two coats of light gray nonskid, the same mixture I’d used during phase 1 in the refinished cockpit.

Total time billed on this job today:  6.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  28°, mainly cloudy.  Forecast for the day:  Sunny, 47°

Saturday

With sufficient cure time now, I masked off the topsides above the boottop, beginning with a layer of vinyl solvent-resistant fine line tape that I applied right at the edge of the new topsides paint, then covered as completely as possible with a layer of regular masking tape, as the vinyl tends to shed paint and cause drips and weird semi-cured flakes of paint during removal.  With the top of the new stripe completely masked, I covered the rest of the hull with plastic, tape, and paper adjacent to the working area.  Afterwards, I cleaned the primered bootop section one final time.

I applied 4 coats of snow white gloss LPU to the boottop to complete the major paint work.  I ended up with four coats since I convinced myself I saw shadows in one place through the third coat (this ended up being a trick of the lighting and shadows in the shop), so since I had enough paint leftover I played it safe with the 4th coat.

Total time billed on this job today:  4.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  8°, mostly clear.  Forecast for the day:  Sunny, with increasing clouds and snow showers likely late in the day, 31°

Friday

The new hull paint cured overnight and was looking pretty good.  I took some additional photos of it as is now that I could spend more time in the shop inspecting the job.

Next, I removed the masking from the lower edge, exposing the boottop area still in gray primer.  The topsides paint was too fresh to mask over, so I’d have to wait a bit longer before I could mask and prepare to spray the boottop.

To make some use of an otherwise idle day while I waited for the paint to cure, I collected all the deck hardware, ports, and deadlights and cleaned off old sealant from the bases and, as needed, some of the fasteners I’d be reusing, preparing everything for reinstallation in the near future.  Never a favorite task, it was nevertheless made more palatable by filling a void when there was nothing else I could do to move the project forward:  A good use of time for a chore that must be done.

Total time billed on this job today:  3 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  50°, rain.   Forecast for the day:  Rain ending, windy, temperature dropping

Thursday

With over 40 hours’ cure time on the white deck paint, it was now well into the “safe” zone for overtaping, so to begin I masked off the toerails just above the hull/deck joint, following the line to which I’d brought the white deck paint earlier.  With one row of tape in place, I followed with a second, then spread plastic sheeting over the entire deck and, after cutting off the excess, masked it thoroughly in place all around, with plenty of extra tape to ensure there were no voids or seams or missed areas.

Next, I tacked off the hull, then mixed up the paint needed for the job and applied three coats of “wine red” gloss topcoat, as called by this paint system (versus the better-known name “claret” by the other paint system) to the hull over the next few hours’ elapsed time:  a stunning transformation.  Note that the paint appears lighter (i.e. more red/less maroon) before it’s fully cured, and with the harsh shop lighting in place.

This video shows the first coat, which by design is a light coat to help the second and third coats stick, but nevertheless it provides quite a contrast with the gray primer as it is applied.

Total time billed on this job today:  4.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  44°, partly cloudy.   Forecast for the day:  Cloudy, windy, rain overnight, 53°

Wednesday

With the deck paint complete, I spent the first part of the day removing all the masking from the deck areas.

To prepare for the hull paint, I couldn’t mask over the fresh deck paint yet and would have to wait another day, but in the meantime there was plenty to keep me busy, starting with laying out and masking the boottop.  I chose 2-1/4″ for the visual height of the new stripe, and to create the end reference marks required I used a square and level to mark the new point stem and stern 2-1/4″ above the waterline (i.e. top of the bottom paint), which I’d marked and masked earlier in the process.

With these two points, I could set up my horizontal beams fore and aft at the correct height, after which I used my string theory to mark the top of the new stripe on both sides of the boat, using the same techniques I always do.  Then, before removing the cross beams, I made a new mark on the stem 1″ above, as I planned to sheer (raise)the boottop through the bow sections later, a step required to make the stripe look right.

With the clutter out of the way, I masked the new line, following my pencil ticks and fairing by eye.  The top edge of the tape represented the top edge of the boottop, and the area above would be covered with the hull paint.

Once I had the line taped to my marks, I measured back from the stem (at the waterline) approximately 1/3 the length of the waterline; in this case, 8′ back looked right to me, and starting from this mark I struck a new tape line by eye forward to the tick mark 1″ above at the stem, creating a new, higher line with a slight sweep that would not be noticeable in and of itself, but would make the boottop look right when complete.

Then I covered the area beneath the tape with masking paper to complete the job.

To round out the day, I set up the staging at hull height, switching out four of the taller supports for some shorter ones amidships to make it easier to walk around, then set up lighting as needed to highlight the hull, and finished up with a final solvent-wash of the topsides.  All that remained before I could spray the hull was to cover the decks, which I’d finish next time.

Total time billed on this job today:   7 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  10°, clear.   Forecast for the day:  Increasing clouds, 38°

Tuesday

After final preparations, I applied three coats of glossy snow white LPU topcoat to the deck areas, beginning with three coats on the coachroof, specifically the companionway and vertical transition between the two sections of the coachroof; then on all the remaining deck areas, including the toerails and channels, cabin trunk, poop deck, and companionway sliding hatch.

Total time billed on this job today:  5.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  5°, fair.   Forecast for the day:  Increasing clouds, 22°

Monday

Starting on the coachroof, then working down to the sidedecks and elsewhere, I laid out the nonskid field pattern and masked it off, leaving the borders and perimeters for the gloss topcoat exposed.  In most areas, I masked for a 1-1/2″ wide border; at the companionway, I left a wider area to accommodate the sea hood when installed, with 1-1/2″ allowance on the three sides.  Elsewhere, the layout was straightforward with radiused corners everywhere, and the 1-1/2″ border width continued as appropriate around the few obstructions.  I left room around the coaming overlap area forward of the cockpit so this part of the wooden coamings would also have white borders.

At the aft ends of the cabin trunk, and the forward edge of the traveler area, where I’d been making incremental preparations for the glossy paint blending, I used foam tape to help blend the transition on these final coats with the existing paint in these areas.

Afterwards, I went around and touched up a few small areas that needed some additional sanding, set up special topcoat lighting around the shop, prepared paint material and spray equipment, then performed the final cleaning with vacuum and solvent wash to prepare all areas for the paint.  In the cockpit, I also added a layer of masking paper on the seats near the coamings to cover up the plastic over the cockpit well, as the previous coats of primer had begun to flake off the plastic (as is wont to happen), and although I already had paper directly adjacent to the areas to be painted for this very reason, the extra paper to cover the flaky bits was minor insurance against contamination.  On the port sidedeck, where I’d need to step during the first phase of the painting (to reach the center areas of the coachroof), I added some sacrificial paper to protect the cleaned and prepared deck edge/toerail when I stepped aboard; I’d remove that extra paper once I finished the three coats amidships.

Total time billed on this job today:  4.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  10°, overcast.   Forecast for the day:  Scattered snow showers, cloudy, 17°

Friday

With a couple days of prepwork ahead before I could spray the gloss topcoats on the deck and hull, I began with a comprehensive cleanup of boat and shop, including vacuuming, compressed air blowdown, rinsing off the staging and floor, and solvent-washing the hull and deck, all to remove dust and clean the surfaces sufficiently to allow me to continue work.

With what little time I had left on this day, I gathered various supplies to prepare for the deck masking ahead, and began by masking off the hull below the toerail with tape and plastic sheeting.

Total time billed on this job today:  3.5 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  27°, clear.   Forecast for the day:  Sunny, 43°

Thursday

Starting with the hull, since the staging was at that height, I sanded the fresh primer with 320 grit paper.  At the hull-deck joint, where the gray hull primer overlapped the white deck primer, I mostly sanded away all the gray primer before exposing and smoothing the white beneath, but in some areas I found I had to leave some of the gray behind rather than oversand and burn through the white beneath.  I’d clean this up more once I got up to deck height anyway.

With the hull complete, I moved the staging back up to deck height, and spent the remainder of the day sanding the deck primer smooth, first the coachroof, then the remainder of the deck from the staging.  There was a mist of gray primer overspray from the hull over much of the deck, which served as a good guide coat for sanding the white primer.  By the end of a long day of sanding, I’d reached the end of the deck, but had neither time nor inclination to clean up the sanding dust before knocking off.  With a major cleanup ahead at this point anyway, I left this for next time.  There was enough dust on deck that I was sure I’d find a few areas that needed a bit more sanding attention once I’d cleaned up.

Total time billed on this job today:  7.25 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  27°, fair.   Forecast for the day:  Cloudy, then scattered rain and snow showers, 42°