I am pleased to report that after seemingly endless weeks of nothing new going on with the boat, I can finally submit a photo with evidence of demonstrable progress.
Below the waterline on the port side is almost finished. There are a few remaining steps, some of which must wait until spring, but in the meantime, we can wash the planking with a 50/50 red led/mineral spirits mix. While we’re secretly hoping this will slow down the spiders, this wash is just to help keep sea creatures at bay. Not the most environmentally friendly of products (it is, indeed, lead, and the gallon weighs twice what the gallons of oil paint weigh), but it is thrilling to get to a step which results in the boat looking more like a boat and less like a project.
My interior work, sadly, doesn’t look at all different, as evidenced by photos below:
The setees look the same, the lockers look the same, and so the photos are all pretty boring. I hope to be done with the white paint within a week, and then will sand all the teak again, and begin the build up of the interior varnish. I already have 3 coats applied, but need at least another 3. Then on to the deck seams and the exterior varnish build up. Fortunately, that brightwork is incredibly satisfying, and even after just 3 coats, she’s looking specatactularly lovely:
Since deck seams are my next big projext, I began counting the seams today, wondering if I should pace myself with one seam a day, and quickly realized that would never do. So I’m returning to the ‘get all the seams done by the end of October in 2 x 2 sections’ plan. Once the deck seams are done, what’s left on my list is adding insulation to the iceboxes, finishing the teak floors, and building up the varnish on the skylight grills and screens. I’m sure there’s probably more, but it is amazing to me that I can even see the end to the list!
Henry’s list, however, is still quite daunting – the topsides remain to be refastened, but today he replaced 89 fastenings, so it is much quicker work than below the waterline. I will follow along behind him with the red lead wash below and the black primer above, which will be very satisfying. We’re both anxious to get to the rub rails – they need to be pulled off, cleaned up, and then the fastenings which lie below them need to be replaced. We will also make the rub rails a bit lower. Right now, the bronze half round sits flush with the edge of the rub rail, which isn’t ideal, so one pass with a planer should make things fit a bit more neatly. We can see light between planks forward in the middle stateroom on the port side, and we’re pretty sure that’s a space under this rub rail, so we’re anxious to find out what’s actually going on there, and deal with it. I know others have been happy with water streaming in with the rail burried on the port tack, but I’m not quite so seaworthy yet.
Henry must also finish the refastening below the water line on the starboard side. Right now, 90% of the fastenings are in and bunged, but the remaining 10% are odd situations, each with their own ‘special needs’. I’m hopeful that these won’t require much time, but on the port side, finishing up these odd ones required weeks. The work was tedious and unsatisfying, so the red lead wash feels like a Christmas present! I hope that the next post will be soon, and will reveal a port side (at least!) with a red bottom and black topsides 🙂
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