We were thinking of calling this the weekly grind. Bill’s been working away at the bottom paint. The fun part of that is that it gets harder to sand the longer it’s out of the water. Today he pretty much finished and is now going back around to pick up all the leftover red bits. When that’s done, he gets to start grinding out blisters. Thankfully, we only have about 15 per square foot. It could be MUCH worse.
Meanwhile, in the inside of the boat, Nina’s been learning to use a Makita grinder. Carpet residue and glue is not the best learning medium since it gums up sanding sheets before you turn the thing on. She also discovered what a loose grinder with the lock on can do in a small space. Don’t try this at home. Luckily, a small rip in the suit was the extent of the damage.
Marsden totally escaped grinding or sanding. His particular version of boat purgatory was cutting 720 feet of fiberglass cloth into various widths for Tom to glass onto the hull to deck joint. His other fiberglassing experience was making the backing plates for the remaining thru-hulls. To do this, about an inch thick pile of fiberglass cloth was laminated together and then cut out on a drill press, very slowly.
Pictures for the week:
Filling holes where instruments used to be. We will be moving instruments and adding new ones and cutting new holes for those.The hull ground away around a chainplate. It looks much worse than it is. The wood is dry, the chainplate is solid and not rusty. Hooray for US stainless! We won’t have to replace these.A longer stretch of the hull to deck joint waiting to be glassed. The holes were to allow moisture to evaporate out of the wood.The head floor with the thru-hulls glassed in. The upper hole was for the sink drain and the lower hole was for the sewage discharge. We now have a composting toilet so we no longer need a holding tank and its discharge.A cardboard mockup of the new head vanity. The composting toilet was the cause of the head redesign. We have used the composting toilet for the last 3 years and we like it. It is an Airhead. The green outline is roughly a new oval sink. We have moved the vanity outboard to give more space for the toilet. The old vanity came out to where the whitish paint ends.Glassed in thru-hulls from the bottom. Earlier in the week, with bottom paint to still grind off. We are going from 8 thru-hulls to 5 and the new ones will be flush to make the hull more streamlined.The starboard settee in the cabin carved up to put in a new 30 gallon stainless water tank.Green foam to start the new winch platforms. Bill was hoping for fins with the piece in the back, but not this time around. Chris was relieved, but thought fins would be fun.Filling in deck holes and more of the hull to deck joint ground down for glassing.
GypsyKramer 