February 20, 2019

Scupper 84

Wednesday

As usual, I got started with sanding duty, just a light round in the forward cabin to sand the first skim coat on the ends of the berth and liner area.  The goal in the lower sections would be to eventually create a smooth surface, fairing in the various tabbing at the hull and inboard ends with the plywood faces of the ends of the berth.  This would require an additional round or two of fairing compound, but the basics of the contour was now in place.  For the moment, I left the area as is, as I wanted to work on the nearby bulkhead paneling during the day.

At the small bulkhead dividing the chainlocker from the forward cabin, I created a paper pattern (sorry for the blurry photo) and cut out the new beadboard facing to fit, then installed it with clamps and polyurethane adhesive.

I continued with the port side of the forward cabin bulkhead face.  I created a pattern over the entire bulkhead, leading to the edge of the hull, though I knew I’d have to create the panel in two pieces in order to fit through the 33″ maximum dimension of the companionway.  Once I had the pattern laid out on the fresh panel down on the bench, I chose the exact seam location based on the bead locations.

After dry-fitting the panel sections, I went ahead with final installation with the adhesive, clamps, and screws.  I ended the new paneling about one inch away from the hull side; this area would later be covered with the wooden ceiling strips.

I made the small section above the doorway without a pattern, simply starting with a rough-cut piece of the beadboard and scribing the top edge to fit as required.

I finished up the day’s paneling work with the last piece on the port side.

The last paneling required in the boat was the after bulkhead in the head, which I’d finish soon, but to wrap up the work in the boat for the day, I prepared the ends of the v-berth platform and applied a second round of fairing filler, this time concentrating on the inboard and outboard edges, which required the most substantial work.  A wide trowel helped clean up and fair in the tabbing on these two sides, and I used a smaller trowel to fill in some lows in the center portion.

Total time billed on this job today:  8 hours

0600 Weather Observation:  -5°, clear.  Forecast for the day:  Sunny but increasing clouds, about 24°.  Snow tonight.