2nd coat

I put a second coat on the hull, cabin house sides and cockpit sides.






There was some wind yesterday and I think that is why the primer was setting up so quickly. Today was a no-wind day and I had much more time to work with the primer before it set up. The second coat looks much better than the first. Lesson learned.

It looked good when I applied the primer but when I went back this evening to cover the boat (tomorrow is a rainy day) I could see just a hint of the undercoatings, namely the dark spots where the fairing filler was. It was faint and I had to look a bit but it was there. Because of that and the fact that my first coat went on a bit rough I am thinking I am going to order some more materials and put on a third coat. That will give me enough to sand down through to a smooth surface. That is what I think tonight anyway. I might try some sanding first and see how it goes. At $120 for a gallon of each of the two part primer parts I really don't want any more extra sitting on my shelf than I have to.

The sun was out while I was lightly sanding the primer in preparation for the second coat. The sun on the bright white primer was really burning my eyes. That, and applying the shiny second coat made me wish for my tinted safety glasses. Painful.

Different day, different color

First coat of 545 primer is on.

When I got to the boatyard I uncoved the boat and immediately started finding small flaws in the high build primer coat. I was toying with the idea of an additional high build coat since I have about a gallon of material still left. What I decided to do was walk around the boatyard and take a real close look at some other Awl-Grip paint jobs I had admired in the past. What I found is that from a foot or two away those really great paint jobs looked worse than what my boat looks like now -defect wise. That was a good exercise and I canceled any thoughts of an extra high build coat or additional filling and fairing.

This time, I chose not to do the entire deck cabintop and cockpit all at once. I may be a bit clumsy but I found trying to work myself along the cockpit well, decks and cabin top without bumping into wet paint to be quite challenging. With the final primer and hopefully just a little more sanding to do I chose to do the decks and cabin sole separate. That is going to slow down the whole operation in the short term but hopefully it will save me time by not having to fix as much later.

First impression. This stuff is thin. It goes on like water. Within a few seconds though it sets up. Seems like when the right thickness is reached it gets gummy immediately. The instructions call for rolling and tipping but I found the tipping part to be impractical. Once I rolled it out thin enough the stuff kicked off. Even when I tried working with very small 1 foot sections I wasn't quick enough to tip before it started setting up. I did keep a brush handy for when the primer started running which it did frequently when I was painting the cabin top. I only had a 9 inch roller with me and it was really too big for the edges and sides of the cabin top. I kept getting too much on and the primer kept on running. Tomorrow I will have my three inch roller.

Speaking of rollers, I started off by using a relatively clean roller handle I had on the workbench. Seems the solvents in the 545 primer are quite potent and the little bit of paint that was still on the handle started getting into my fresh primer coat. I had to stop and run to the store for a new one.

Finally, with primer as thin as this, when you put a freshly loaded roller on the underside of the counter and press a little too aggresively the primer flies off dramatically in all directions. I hosed myself down a few times until I learned to go very gently until I had worked a lot of the paint off of the roller. Luckily I was wearing safety glasses. I soaked one arm at one point. This stuff is very runny even before thinning. Within ten minutes though it was dry to the touch. Interesting stuff.

The one coat didn't cover everything. I didn't really expect it to. Another coat should about do it.





Now I have to wait 24 hours before a light sanding. The weather outlook is looking pretty good.

Nope. Check back tomorrow.

On a good note I hit my point of 'Good enough' today. It seemed everything I was doing was starting to cause or highlight other problems. Filling in a low spot highlights two slightly less lowspots right next to it. I made use of the long board but it seemed to be doing as much damage as help. The paper is supposedly 120 grit, just like the rest of the paper I have used on the hull to this point, but the longboard was leaving deep scratches. The point was to make sure the areas I filled in weren't too high and identify areas that didn't blend well with the surrounding hull. The board did the job but then was causing more problems. At this point anything I do on the hull is like playing whack-a-mole. Take out one problem and two immediately jump up.

Enough!

I declare the hull fairing done.

Now that would normally mean I would apply the final primer. Unfortunately one of the joys of working out of a boatyard is that I have to manage my jobs around other boat owners. Today, the neighbor next to me was sanding his bottom. Tomorrow, another neighber wants to hose down his boat and do some final cleaning before launching. I am going to have to work around these issues. I was tempted today to just open a can of the Awl-Grip primer and let the toxic smells clear everyone out. It would have worked but it wouldn't have made any friends and I was feeling that I have probably been on this ice with all the dust I have been generating anyway.

The washing highlighted my bottom that I sweated over for nearly a month 3 years go in the middle of the summer and greenhead (big biting flies) season. There used to be a super heavy flaking mess of 40 years worth of bottom paint below the waterline. The black tends to hide my efforts but the wash reminded me of my nice bottom...

>


Maybe tomrrow. Maybe the day after. Very soon.

Thanks for stopping by :-)

Bringing up my mood

Funny, I was still a little bothered today about my imagination.

That and I had several other pressing projects and the weather was a bit iffy so I postponed hull and deck primer until tomorrow.

So today I did a little more varnishing. That always helps.



And here is a closeup up the block that extends the little teak piece on the bow so that the anchor roller has something to mount to. In the background is the forward hatch. Someone spent some time building it. It might not be the perfect forward hatch but it is much better than the chintzy looking all fiberglass standard Triton hatch. That thing is just an embarasment.



Why I chose to varnish the original spice rack / electrical panel is beyond me. What a pain getting into all those nooks and crannies.



Finally, I put some primer on the panel that goes behind the toilet and covers up the (majority) of the head plumbing. This fir beadboard looks okay in houses but its kinda crummy when you start looking closely at it. I am not complaining. I was well warned. This might turn into a pattern for the real panel later. I put two coats of boiled linseed oil on both sides and the interior is painted with bilgekote. The exterior has prime-kote on it now (and will probably get another coat or two to hide some of the heavy fir grain) and I will finish it with Interlux premium yacht enamel. all in the hopes of making it look better than it is. The teak boards and little doors that are in the varnishing picture are installed on this panel. Should be a nice look. Hopefully the varnished teak will lead your eyes away from the questionable beadboard.



Other projects today were to finish up some details on my jeep that I need to sell. Selling the jeep is going to pay off the credit card balance I incurred from the new standing rigging and roller furler I obtained over the winter. Anyone looking for an older jeep? Its lots of fun but every time I see it I want to turn it into a project and I am not allowed to until the boat is declared "done". That won't happen any time soon.



I really need the cash too...

Later Gators.

I can imagine

I am not saying this happened to me today but I can imagine it.

I can imagine in my excitment about putting on a coat of final primer that I would hastily open the truck door. In that haste, a fresh one gallon can of Awl-Grip 3001 545 primer converter might fall out onto the pavement. When this container falls out the lid is sure to pop open disgorging its contents in a microsecond. I can image an empty can of 3001 converter.

I can also imagine the mess on boatyard property and the lengths it would take to clean this up.

I can imagine that it wouldn't be a BIG problem since my local autobody supply shop has a brand new can of 3001 for only $112.83 after taxes.

I can imagine that after such an incident I might be a little fed up and not in the mood to tackle a new skill with an unknown product. I might have found the Awl-Fair I applied yesterday not quite ready to sand either. I might also have used a few minutes to take care of some minor drainage issues that have been highlighted by the scattered rain showers and my boat tarp not always smartly deployed. A few discreet drainage holes in the settee fronts and a hole each in my new battery trays that have been found to gather a little puddle underneath would help make me feel better if I were to have a bad day.

Good thing I am only imagining all this...

Never ending

Its never ending.

Actually, I just can't help myself and the more I look for defects, the more defects I find.

I applied fairing filler today to some very minor blemishes- pinholes, a few slightly low spots, that sort of thing. The threat of rain made me put off finishing the cabin top so I came back this morning and did the cabin and decks. And then before I thought about it I started on a few small spots on the hull I had missed. That is going to make sanding tricky since most of the filler is dry but I am going to find the fresh stuff I put on this morning... I wasn't thinking.

I started to sand after waiting the 24 hours but it wasn't quite ready. On the filler I applied thinly I could hand sand quite easily. Other areas I had built up a little heavier (too heavy undoubtedly - more learning opportunities) and it was gumming up the paper. I will try again this afternoon.

I was a little concerned because I only bought a quart of each of the two parts that make up the Awl-Fair fairing filler. Turns out this is going to be more than enough. I have done 90% of the fairing I need to do and I have over half of the product still left. A little goes a very long ways. When I applied it correctly (thinly) it goes a very, very long ways. Nice stuff to work with too.

(Update)

I went back and hand sanded the hull. Where I applied the fairing filler correctly it sanded very nicely. Where I was a little careless and applied too much (think too thick) it was still a little soft. Another learning experience: apply thin.