Adagio Cruising

Sunday, November 25, 2012

November 25, 2012 - project update

Well I didn't get through my list for the weekend. I didn't even manage to check off half of the items. But, it is a boat after all. Things always take WAY longer than expected.

The three doors are now sanded and ready to be saturated with penetrating epoxy. Tomorrow I will coat them with penetrating epoxy giving it a coat every hour or so until it won't take any more. Once it hits that point (where the epoxy doesn't soak in anymore) the door needs to sit for a day or two. This will give the two-part epoxy paint was are using for the exterior a good "bite". They say that this paint job on the doors should last 10 years. I sure hope so.

3 doors ready to be painted.

I have the salon door frame at home so I can repair it. It took a long time to get off the boat, but I now have an easy fix that should be much stronger than the original design. I also removed the trim from the inside of the old hatch. It was bedded with some really goopy adhesive that didn't want to let go. I had todestroy the wood getting it removed. But it's gone now.

hatch almost gone. It will soon be a nice clean ceiling.

I've been cleaning up the "boat deck"; removing all of the flaws. I am gringin out the flaws and filling hem with fiberglass which I then sand down until it is flush with the deck. This is the best way to go as it eliminated any potential for a small patched hole to "let go" and cause a leak in the future. I also filled all of the old railing mounts as I want to change the railing to better accept our two kayaks, and perhaps solar panels (for future use in Mexico). Plus, when we re-orient the dinghy our railing will have to change to accept the dinghy.

The LARGE boat deck being repaired. This is a big boat deck.

I continue to work on the new rear navigation light pod. The US Coast Guard has specific requirements for navigation lights (depending on the size of the vessel) and I'm making sure that our boat meets the latest requirements. Actually, I'm meeting the requirements for an even larger boat (66', or 20 meters, and longer). It will make our boat more visible at night, which to me is an important safety factor.

The new light pod ready to be faired

So, if had to guess right now, I don't think we will be painting this week. I still have a lot going on before that can happen. This is turning out to be quite a big project! And the big project hasn't even started yet; our stabilizers. Yikes!

Friday, November 23, 2012

November 23, 2012 - another project

The boat in the paint shop at La Conner Maritime.
I have a nice warm dry place to work, which is great.

I knew I forgot a project on my last post. I'm installing a new LED navigation light on the stern of the boat. Our old one was not very bright, and stuck up enough to be vulnerable to being broken off, or tripping someone. The new one is a 3 mile (visibility) modern LED stern light. The problem is that there is no way to mount a modern light back there without building a custom mount for it. So that is what I started to do today.

Old light and new light housing. There's no good way to attach this
to a curved surface. I have to make a new "pod" for it.

Light pod bonded into place. Ready to start glassing it. It will look factory when I'm done.

The new light "pod" partially built. Outside fiberglassed into place.

Here are a few pictures of the pilothouse door refinishing project. It takes about 5 hours to strip a door down to bare wood. Most of the old paint comes off with a heat gun and putty knife. Then a quick sanding to get it perfectly smooth and flat.

One pilothouse door before stripping.

Closeup showing why we need to refinish these doors. Yuck!

One pilothouse door partially stripped down. Looking good.

Well it's time to head back to the boat now to carry on.....

Thursday, November 22, 2012

November 22, 2012 - projects underway

The boat is now out of the water. The mast and dinghy davit have been removed.

About to be hauled out by the travelift.

About to get the bottom pressure washed. The paint looked GREAT for
being in the water for 1.5 years.

There goes the radar mast.

We are removing the hatch that covered the opening between the cockpit and the boat deck (you can see the opening in hte left side of the boat deck in the above picture). There used to be a ladder there but we removed it. The hatch is partially covered by the dinghy so it cannot be opened with the dinghy up top, so it's mostly useless. The hatch is rotting and looks terrible. But worse, the hatch prevents us from locating the dinghy where we really want it. So, the hatch has got to go. We are having La Conner Maritime fill the hatch opening with fiberglass. When they are done you will never know that hatch was there.

Once we got into this project I decided to remove the cockpit ceiling lights, which were big clunky things that were rusty and looked terrible. The problem is that removing them left two huge cavities in the ceiling. So, La Conner Maritime is going to fill those while they are at it and make them disappear so I can then mount two modern, flush-mounted, LED light fixtures.

The two lights removed, and the hatch that will disappear

The light holes are being filled with fiberglass. Next comes the hatch opening.

While we were doing all these fiberglass repairs I decided this is the best possible time to deal with one known moisture issue in the deck. So, I cut into the spot with the highest moisture content (as indicated by my hi-tech moisture meter). It was indeed wet inside.

Standing water in the end-grain balsa coring. This is BAD news on on a boat!

So, with my moisture meter I marked off the boundary between high moisture and normal/low moisture and then began cutting into the fiberglass deck. Once the fiberglass was removed we could see exactly what was going on. Fortunately, the moisture hadn't traveled too far and it will be a relatively easy fix for La Conner Maritime.

Not what a boat owner wants to see. Water damaged
coring in their decks.

The deck opened up and a new 3/4" thick piece of solid fiberglass installed
where the dinghy davit pole passes through. There will be no chance of a
future leak causing damage, and it will be much stronger than before.

I used my moisture meter to inspect the entire deck and found two other areas with high moisture and we are fixing these also. They are much smaller. Once these repairs are done we should be good for another 20+ years. The guys in the yard commented on how thick the fiberglass deck is on our boat. It's a testament to what a solid boat Hatteras builds!

My buddy Sal working on the big repair. Another one is near the bottom right
of this picture. The other is next to the hatch opening.

Fixing a relatively small area of wet coring. This is easy to do while we are
filling that hatch opening since it right next to it.

Sal working on the hatch removal. Just to the right is the repair of a water soaked
balsa core repair.

Since I've got to paint the boat deck once these repairs are done, I decided to go ahead and deal with the foredeck. It has a bunch of little "battle scars" that needed to be ground out, filled with fiberglass, sanded smooth, and then painted. I will be painting the entire foredeck. I am almost done with these repairs now.

Repairing a bunch of small nicks, dings, and failed past repairs.

But by far the biggest paint project is repainting the flybridge. It was looking bad. I removed all of old antennas, the navigation lights, hte old searchlight, two horns, a PA speaker, and all the old snaps for long-gone canvas. I patched all of the holes and now I am sanding it all in preparation for painting.

Sanding the flybridge. It will be repainted and new antennas installed.

I'm also stripping the pilothouse doors down to bare wood so they can be refinished. I will also repaint the pilothouse door frames. Another much needed project is to repair the salon door jamb (the door that goes to the cockpit). That door frame got damaged on the trip up the coast and badly needs to be fixed.

So, there is a lot going on in the paint shop right now! I may have even forgot to mention a project or two here, as I've got a lot of irons in the fire right now. I hope we can pull it all together within the next week or so and the painting can begin.

Friday, November 9, 2012

November 09, 2012 - Big projects about to begin

As I mentioned, I've been in a US Coast Guard Captain's certification class for two months. I've also been working on a major project; completely wiring a commercial crab boat from scratch. It has been an incredibly busy two months. I have had virtually no free time, not even weekends or evenings for two months. So, we haven't been boating at all since our summer trip to Canada. This is perhaps the longest spell we have had in 10+ years without going boating. And it's going to continue.

Next week we haul the boat out of the water so we can do some major upgrades. We are having a new, bigger swim platform (swimstep) built. We are going to have the flybridge repainted and I will move antennas around so we can get the boat name put on the side of the flybridge (US CG requirement for documented vessels). I am taking down the radar mast to fix the broken hinge at the bottom and to add mounts for a second radar, a satellite TV dome, a remote control spotlight, hailer speakers/horns, deck lighting, and a new weather station sensor. I will also install two new LED navigation lights and new LED anchor light.

I will also install a new Depth sounder transducer, and some new through-hull fittings (for another washdown pump, a sea water spigot at the galley sink, and the sea water intake for our watermaker).

But the big project is the installation of Naiad stabilization fins. These are computer controlled underwater wings that virtually eliminate the side to side motion (roll) of a boat while underway. They are simply amazing. It will totally transform our boat when we get into heavy seas. Most long range power cruisers that venture offshore have stabilizers these days; the difference in comfort level is almost beyond description.

I will be posting pictures as the projects get underway.....

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

August 17 - Sept 3, 2012 - Canada boat trip

Pictures and info coming shortly

10-14-2012: Short update here: I have been so busy the past few months that I haven't gotten around to posting any pictures of our trip. The reason for being so busy? I have been in a US Coast Guard class so I can get my Captain's License. It's been a tough 2 months, but I just passed my last test yesterday. 8 weeks of classes (5:30-9:30 3 nights per week), 4 tests, and a LOT of study time. But I'm not done yet. As soon as I take CPR, First Aid, get a physical, take a drug test, 3 letters of recommendations, and get a TWIC card (Transportation Workers ID card) you can call me Captain Steve (50-ton Masters License). After two months of grueling work, I think I can have my life back! It might take me another 2 months to finish the rest of the requirements, but the hard part is done; passing the tests.

So, in the next week or so I will be posting pictures from our tip.... I promise.

11-08-2012: I have finally gotten around to posting some pictures. Enjoy!