Starting the Finish

Last night we began seeing light at the end of the tunnel. For two consecutive sessions, we have performed tasks other than the mind (and hand) numbing tasks of sanding and fairing. As I mentioned in my last post, we mounted the spray rails. Last night we rolled out a coat of pigmented epoxy.

Painting the hull with pigmented epoxy will serve two main purposes. One purpose is to get the hull a uniform color, which will make any remaining flaws more visible, and if the paint gets scratched, the pigmented epoxy will help hide the scratches. (That's the second purpose.)

As you look at the pictures below, you will likely notice a couple of things...

- The area that's painted doesn't cover the entire bottom. This is because the painted area follows the approximate water line of the boat according to the plans. The area that hasn't been painted red will not be in the water.

-The spray rails do not follow the water line. We decided to have the spray rails follow the hull (from the top), not the water line.

-If you look really close, you may be able to see that the spray rails extend past the transoms. This is also intentional. It gave us room for error when mounting the rails to the boat; we will trim to the correct size and shape before we lay pigmented epoxy on the rest of the boat.

Spray Rails

Greg and I had a nice diversion from the seemingly-endless task of sanding and fairing this weekend as we mounted the spray rails to the boat. For those of you who aren't familiar with spray rails, they are designed to reduce the amount of water that sprays you (and your friends and the deck of the boat) as you cruise through the water at higher speeds.

We built the spray rails out of cypress, which Greg chose for its extreme rot resistance. He bought three 10 foot long 1x1 sections, which we scarfed together to form a single, long rail, and then we diagonal-cut the single long piece, forming our two spray rails. After this, we prepped the spray rails by touching up the rough spots and by pre-drilling the holes.

Greg wasn't sure how he wanted to mount the spray rails... whether to follow the water line, the hull from the bottom, the hull from the top, or some hybrid. In the end, we followed the hull from the top, and drew our line using a jig. We epoxied the rails in place, and held them with stainless steel screws. After the epoxy cures and we do more touching up, we will fill in the screw holes (which were counter-sunk) with epoxy, making the seal truly water-tight.

Once again I forgot my camera, but I will try to get a shot or two in the near future.

Entering Orbit

Greg and I both had vacation between Christmas and New Year's day. We had planned on having a couple of long sessions during this period, but that didn't happen. I was occupied with family and friends, but Greg was fortunate enough to get in several small touch-up sessions. In reality, that's what we needed. We're at the point that when we work together, it's usually a short session because all we need to do is a little fairing here and a little sanding there. Of course I've been saying "we're getting close" for several months.

Last night was another minor breakthrough. Greg broke out the orbital sanders, and we started finish-sanding the transoms. What can I say. We're getting close.