Stripping follow up...

The next day’s thicker application came with little success but created a lot of extra work. I came back and applied a coat to the cabin ceiling on the port side only and let it sit for about 12 hours. When I started to scrape off the remaining finish I noticed that it was coming with the fairing filler that was used to make the cabin ceiling presentable. Basically the stripper had softened this up enough so that a putty knife would dig right in. However there were parts where the paint refused to budge making the whole job a big mess. I cleaned up as much as possible and then washed down the surfaces with water to remove the residue left from the stripper.
At this point I figured that I would try to scrape the port side and see if the outcome was any better. The answer: definitely. After about an hour of difficult scraping I had removed the loose paint and this included the head ceiling as well. I did not take off as much material and although I left some of the old finish behind, the result was a much smoother base on which to start the repairs. You can easily see the difference in the photos.
From here I applied a coat of Interlux Pre-Coat. And called it quits for the weekend.

Day three...

Today I tried some paint stripper on the ceiling of the vee berth. I figured that lying on my back and scraping would really be a terrible job and anything that would ease that pain is worth a shot. A quick web search led me to a water based stripper named Aqua Strip that people seemed to be having good luck with. I swung by West Marine and was soon painting the paste on the ceiling of the cabin. It turns out that putting it on with a paint brush is not the best way to go as I would soon find out.

While I was waiting for this to work its magic I turned my attention to the holes in the cabin top. All of them seemed to work out OK and none pushed past the tape into the cabin. I sanded them flush and applied a coat of epoxy with a faring filler today that should make it a bit easier to sand, although that is a relative term as sanding any WEST SYSTEM product is not easy.

That finished I went back to scrape some of the stripper off and found that there either wasn't enough time allowed or enough material applied. I decided to call it quits for the day and try another thicker application tomorrow.

Day one...

Weather broke in grand style this year and it was 80 degrees on April 3rd. After emptying the boat of all the things I could carry off (boats hold an unbelievable amount of stuff) I got to work. By this time I had pared the list down to a few key jobs; address the old diesel in the tank and change the lines and filters, put in a fresh water system with a new toilet and associated plumbing, change the cracked rigging and paint the ceiling inside the cabin.

I started the day by doing none of these. There were leaks in the cabin top around one of the outside grab rails and I figured that would be a good place to start. I pulled the grab rail off and started to drill out the holes to see if the core would be rotten between the skins. I got lucky; while the core was wet, it was not rotten and after drying out would be OK.

Encouraged by this, I removed all the cabin top hardware and drilled more holes in suspect areas. Again the findings were good. With the exception of a few spots, the core was in great shape and would not require rebuilding. Drilling and filling these holes took up the greater part of the first two days.

The plan

Lets see... Needed: rig, diesel check and tank, fuel hoses, fresh water, toilet and holding tank, paint paint paint, and of course, varnish.

In starting this years list I drew the line at at the rub rail. All things below were off limits. Needless to say that leaves a pile of available work. I started writing it into Excel and split it into the areas of work. From here I assigned hours and weather required for the work. Soon I came to realize that I had about 200+ hours of work on the list. This was not going to work out.

The last boat I brought back from the brink was done during a time when I didn't have a family or even furniture in my house. It seemed perfectly reasonable to make the living room into the teak refinishing room. It also was not a problem to make my once clean and clutter free car into a rolling tool box filled with epoxy, grinders, coveralls and the like. Things are happily different now and I didn't buy the boat to get away from my family, quite the opposite is true, and this is where the realization set in that I couldn't get it all done and still have time to sail this year. Now I know how how those projects just keep getting put off 'just one more season'.

An introduction

I often read the articles in sailing magazines and wondered why someone who had a boat, wrote articles for magazines, and seemed to have owned the boat for many years, would only now be getting around to rebedding deck hardware or replacing the electrical panel or whatever they happened to be writing about. I figured out why this weekend.

I bought this 1968 Hinterhoeller Redwing 30 in Connecticut this spring from Central Connecticut Marine Sales. The brokers name was Gary Torello and he was great to work with (if you need a broker, I can't recommend him enough). I had always admired the lines of these boats and found this on Yachtworld and decided to take the ride form western NY to Ct and have a look. The outcome is obvious.

The boat needs all things cosmetic and after I purchased it there were many weeks between the "I'll take it" and when it showed up here. During that time, I devised a plan to do only the necessary things to get it sailing this year and then do the decks next year, hull after that...etc. That sound bit of thinking went right out the window as soon as it arrived in my marina.