More rain

The weather is killing me.

I have a whole month before the boat goes in the shop for painting and all I really need to do is to put another coat of primer on the hull and sand it smooth. The ways things are going however I am actually getting a bit nervous.

This week, I managed to sand the inside cabin liner that I had primed months ago and put the first coat of Interlux Premium Yacht Enamel Semi-gloss white on. I thought it was thinned appropriately but I have some light brush marks so I guess I better up the thinner. The liner needs at least another coat and probably two anyway. I feel like all I do is paint and then sand it off, and then paint, and then sand it off...

The semi-gloss white is going to be a hit though. I thought the primer made a big difference but the real paint really looks good. It was a nice hint of things to come.

I also continued with my struggle to paint Interlux Brightsides on some aluminum panels. Of the two panels, one came out okay.



I am thinking I really should have used black plastic for the instrument panels. As a matter of fact, if I can find the money I am going to order some. I am sick and tired of trying to get a professional looking paint job with my skills. Or maybe I will live with it for a year and add it to my 'someday' list. It isn't really THAT bad. I just know I can do better. The Stewart Warner guages are nice, I had forgotten I had them in a box on the shelf. Lucky for me I forgot how much those little buggers cost too. The five guages are: Tachometer in the center with built in hobbs meter. The tach is actually a Datcom product. Stewart Warner didn't offer a tach in the same style as the other guages strangely. Oil pressure on the upper left, Water temp on the lower left, Ammmeter on the upper right, and Voltmeter on the lower right. All the guages are lighted and (except for the tach) come from the Stewart Warner 'Heavy Duty' line of guages. There is room for expansion on either side if the mechanic in me decides to add some cool stuff later. I really don't need the voltmeter but I wanted to balance the panel (it was pretty cheap) and it can help interpret problems I see on the ammeter

The panel is going to go in the original hole at the back of the cockpit. There was a teak access door there and I am filling it with this panel. I am also planning on picking up some teak to frame the panel and set it in a little. The framing will probably cost over $50 with the price of teak today so I am going to wait until next week to face that dilemma. I suppose I could cut down some of the teak trimmings from the original interior and re-use it. I was going to put the trim back in but I could just as easily use new cherry trimmings that will match the planned cherry panels anyway.

Sorry for the continued delays. I really try to get out to the boat more often but there was only one day this week without rain or the imminent threat of rain and the humidity has been wicked. On the one sunny day this week, I had an all day job interview. It took all day to drive, fill out paperwork, take tests, and be told in the first ten seconds of the interview that I was way over-qualified. Grrr...