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Website started 24th February 2000

Sanding inside, Making Workbenches, Cutting templates and plywood for decking.

19/01/08

Visited the boat, and gave the staging, and boat, a thorough brush down inside and out. Also by afternoon had put the main hatch and drop boards back on (These had been at home since we moved the boat last). Needed to put these back on to prevent the feathered friends from gaining access, and so no nests etc. Oh boy, the main hatch was heavy, but tackfully it was got on board, and in place. Hoovered up in side the boat.

20/01/08

Sanded the main saloon inside, to try eradicate the water stains etc, and bring back a good surface to the wood. Inside the boat had had no real attention since the boat was last under cover. Fitted a new tarpaulin at the front of the boat shed, the other had worn through.

26/01/08

Because the field entrance is waterlogged at this time of year, it is quite a walk from the van parked in the yard, to the boat. Continued with sanding inside and undid the mast step bolts so the underside (inside) could be tackled, and also start cutting back the surplus mastic from the ply inserts – a job long outstanding. Gave the land owner a hand to erect three large asbestos type corrugated sheets, where there was gaps in the shed wall between the workshop and the boat. Quite a task as one piece has to be lifted up 8’. We were both stood on old oil barrels, once each, having pre-sourced a length of timber to prop up this sheet against the wall, whilst it was drilled and bolts put into place. Good job done.

02/02/08

Spent six hours down at the boat. With daylight bulb in the lead light, set to further work on underneath the mast step area removing the mastic around the edges of the ply inserts. Very tedious work, as the mastic really does what is intended, it sticks to wood. It was testing, working at various angles, with head tilted backwards, watching footing at the same time. Flask of coffee kept me going. Decided must this week (i.e. tomorrow Sun) to get a fluorescent light to hang in the boat itself, with just one daylight tube.

03/02/08

Travelled to get the fluorescent light. 12:30 down at the boat, and continued removing mastic on the ply insert pieces into the heads area – which I managed to get half way completed. Really needing a detail (corner) sander with a narrow pad, and palm held. Need to check what the supercut does. At the moment need to have cleared up by 16:00pm as it gets very dark in the shed with no light on. Good weekend had.

09/02/08

Having wired up the new fluorescent light during the week, and took a spare daylight tube, fitted the light together and wired it up with a plug. First thing on Saturday fitted the light in the boat. Reversed the mast step eye bolt, temporarily so the eye was in the boat, to clip the light to. This made a huge difference inside, heaps better than just the lead light. Started approx 09:30am, and worked through until 15:30pm. Tackled the forward cabin removing the mastic (Sikaflex) from around the joints and set to sanding all the wood. Used the circular random/orbital plus the fern-delta sander, which was prooving to be not such a good tool. Had been looking at the Black & Decker Mouse, so when got home had a proper look at the Fein Supercut which we had, and wow that was the best thing ever – well done Lance again, for an excellent choice. The sander pad can be positioned at any angle needed. It was tedious working up forward, not to stand on cables, & keep moving the light, and with a bit of hand sanding forward, got most of the sanding done.

10/02/08

Armed with the Fein Supercut, today set to complete the forward cabin hatch area, and plywood, which went sell, so continued to sand the bulkhead in the forward cabin with the palm sander, Then did the main cabin bulkhead ply. The water stains were coming out very well, and the plywood was starting to look as good as when it was fitted. Cleaned inside of the forward hatch spigot with astonish to bring back some of the brass shine. Used masking tape to try protect the wood. This will need more work later. What a lot of dust made today. Have been using face masks, and will need some good old Optrex when I get home. There is still working going on in the workshop area to be. So far things working out good. Really missing Lance, he was to have been in his element in this workshop etc. It is a tragic loss of life, he meant so much, knew so much and was so skilled. Life seems to cruel at times.  Finished about 15:30pm another good day had.

16/02/08

9:20ish arrived at the boat. Setup the electric cable and switched on the lights for the boat. Today with orbital and Fein supercut just sanded, sanded and sanded in the heads area. All the ply and timber is coming up well, and the water stains are coming out. So far so good, and it is uplifting to see the inside coming back to life. Although wearing mask over nose and mouth, my eyes were streaming with sawdust. Trying to wear goggles, and they steam up too much to be able to see clearly what one is doing. Had a mirror on board, plus wipes to keep cleaning myself down. Over coffee, I realised there was some long lengths of timber on board, for the eventual toe rail sections, but as they were 20’ in length and went full length of the main cabin through to the anchor locker, there was only one way they could be got out – and that was aft through the main hatch. Now the boat was undercover, this could be slightly awkward. However, golly gosh, there was one small hole in the asbestos corrugated wall sheeting just aft of the boat – and blow me it is perfectly linged up to allow these timbers to be got out of the boat now, before this hole is blocked up. This was done without any hesitation or 2^nd thoughts. This will go in the workshop eventually, once it is completed. The pieces of timber, are at moment now safe on deck. Having done this, more space down below, and now got a better picture of what we had put in the forward locker area. It was fibreglass block sheets and some matting. Most of the plastic bags had deteriorated !!, so ended up doing a tidy, and clean up job. Also today cleaned the glass of the brass hatch, both inside and outside. Another six hours of sanding today, with coffee, and mackerel sandwiches on home made bread. – it is now the meal of the week. Cleared up at 16:00pm.

17/02/08

Sanded down the bulk heads inside the wet-locker to be. Then set about the tedious job of cutting away the remaining sikaflex from the plywood pieces. Took good four hours to do the smallest two ply areas – working above head, stretched out, neither stood or sitting, with striplight and myself squeezed into the locker area. It has felt considerably colder today, so by 15:00pm was ready to call it a day.

23/01/08

9:30am start. Another good day sanding – yes more in the wet-locker to be area. This is the smallest area to sand and clean up in terms of space for manoeuvre. By the time I got in, with the striplight and sander, my eyes were so close to the job I was seeing double. What a carry on, trying to get into a position where I could actually see what I was sanding. Four hours today it took on two areas on ply and the adjoining beam. The bonus is that it is all looking really good. Even the birds agree, I can hear them chirping away merrily outside. I don’t know what the weather is doing whilst I am working away on board. It is a basic tool kit at the moment, adjustable stanley knife, supercut sander, orbital sander, a chisel and hammer for epoxy drips, plus some hand sand paper and block. A first aid kit is now on board – hopefully never to be needed. Completed the wet locker to be area. What a relief. All these areas now need finer sanding ready for varnishing, once all glue and tooling work has been completed. Decided next to tackle more thoroughly the main cabin sides. I can sand stood up and it is a nice large area – so this will give me a real ego booster. You would not think spiders would survive down here, but there is evidence they pop out when I have gone. Completed the starboard side, and also the aft of the main cabin. Knocking on 16:00pm now so called it a day. Need to judge time and weather because it gets dark under the shed without lights switched on. Maybe when the workshop is completed, need to adjust lighting to it is the last thing switched off before leaving.

24/01/08

Got off to a good early start today at 09:15am. Plugged in electric and setup shop and opened the hatch. Opening the hatch had been a routine thing to help the air flow in the boat over all the weeks I have been sanding away. Getting into a routine now of starting up, including the flask of coffee and the sandwiches on home made bread. Set to sanding the ply inserts in the main saloon area. This is a tough job, standing straggled across the boat, working over head and depending on where the strip light is the grain shows up different – sometimes for the best but then sometimes for the worse. This was toying with my patience a lot. Persevered and did two ply inserts with the grain going port to starboard. The direction of the grain adds another dimension of complexity when sanding and removing the excess sikaflex. The plywood inserts were set into the deck beams, but with grain going alternate ways. Grain forward to aft is the hardest.. After couple or so hours at this, had lunch then set to sanding on the portside main cabin side, a nice large area to work on and less strain on the neck. Contemplating over last week how to make up the needed workbenches. By 13:30pm had had enough of sanding, needed a break, so decided to select out some timber from under the boat and take it home. This was timber left over from making the platform/staging last year. The same principle of how the staging was made was to be used for the workbenches. Packed up about 14:00pm and headed home, and setup shop in the lounge to make up the two 4’ long workbenches. The top sections would be decking lengths, and exterior plywood, Needed extra clamps and some ingenuity now I was working alone – only one pair of hands not two. Making workbenches like this is ideal for me to build up confidence in the actual use of tools – which normally Lance would do. About 20:00pm had completed two workbench top sections. Most of the sawing could be done in the garden until it went dark. Used 10 x 2” screws for the main structure, and 8 x 40mm gold top screws – no pre-drilling needed – to affix the plywood to the structure. All together a good day.

	One of the work benches made

01/03/08

Every evening this week cracked on with constructing the workbenches, cutting wood outside, and assembly in the lounge. By Friday night had completed the first of the two workbenches. Re-arranged the van to get the workbench in, and then hoovered up the lounge of dust !. Down at the boat next, retrieved further wood lattes needed for the 2^nd work bench. Loaded onto the van the rest of the decking off cuts not now needed at the boat. Set up the tools in the boat, and carried on doing more sanding in the main saloon. Need to design some racking for timber and plywood to keep it in the workshop area – to keep it all tidy, flat and off the floor.

02/03/08

Cracked on assembling the 2^nd workbench in the lounge, on Saturday night, completed it by lunchtime Sunday - with a sleep in between. Visited the boat in the afternoon, but was too tired to work on it, so , swept up all the area of the workshop to be. Back home by 16:00pm. Also contemplating on how to build racking for wood storage in the workshop. Still have some fence posts left.

08/03/08

Offloaded into the workshop the 1^st workbench all on my own. Then set to sweeping and hoovering out the boat, to remove the mahogany layer of dust. Quite a lot when swept up. It took a good 2½ hours by time I’d done, and then put stuff back into the saloon area. It is good to clean up now and again, to see better the state of play and plan ahead. Time now for coffee and sandwiches. Measured up for two more timber lengths to continue better the flooring for stepping up forward inside. Cannot afford a twisted ankle, another long outstanding job to be done (flooring that is). Next job for me was to clean down the hull topsides 1^st off, using astonish. We used this before and it worked very well. Gone 15:00pm by now, so called it a day. Ones back does ache when working bent over etc for long periods of time.

	For'd floor sections made up

09/03/08

Very sunny and pleasant despite gale warnings today. Offloaded the 2^nd workbench into the workshop area, and also several large boxes I’d collected for storing wood offcuts eventually. Then set to washing down the portside of the hull below the waterline. But more tedious now staging in place, but the whole boat inside and out, is now restored to its original splendour of the woodwork under construction. Very fortunate that water damage to the wood has been very minimal, and nothing which cannot be rectified. So far so good.

15/03/08

Good early start at 9:30am. Made up two boards to fit in place across the floor bearers up forward between the locker areas, and into the forward cabin. This was tedious, up and down, in and out of the boat measuring up and fitting in place, but the end result is a good job done, and much safer walking is that area on foot. It rained heavy and being there I noted that no water was getting in onto the boat nor the workshop area. I had got the power into the workshop temporarily through the remaining hole in the corrugated shed sheeting. Four hours had gone quickly, so packed up the tools into the van when the rain had stopped, and then set to cleaning the hull starboard below waterline. Got halfway, then it was too dull and overcast, so could not see properly down below, so left about 15:00pm.

16/03/08

Extremely heavy rain last night, had left a river running down into the yard itself, but the boat etc was safe and dry around the back. There had been some real stormy winds this week, but the boat and workshop were all intact. Completed cleaning down the starboard hull area below waterline. It really transforms the hull, and much more pleasing to the eye. Good job. Next contemplated the situation on deck area. Decided best to put plywood down then the flexiteek, it will level out the deck area again, provide a better key for the flexiteek, plus need to avoid cutting down and into, and reducing the thickness further, of the covering boards. This next plywood and flexiteek will probably weight just as much as real teak would have done. This decided, the next job on the list, is  to complete removal of the top veneer of the current weathered deck plywood, where it meets the covering board, so that the plywood and flexiteek will come level with the top of the covering boards. Tedious, but a job I can comfortably get stuck into. By 14:30pm though the chill factor was setting in – so decided to call it a day – I’d done about 5 hours. Next weekend was Easter 2008 – which was the earliest for many years. We had bitter winds, sleet, hailstone, snow and rain, with intermittent sunny spells. A real cold spell, so made use of the break to catch up on this diary to get the website updated.

	Forward deck covering board edge. The MDF is the same thickness as the plywood, with a piece of flexiteek on top, which will have black caulking.

29/03/08

8:30am start at the boat, and continued to complete sanding down the deckply to covering board joint to ensure ply and flexiteek would sit flush. Portside needed more cleaning off the deckply top layer laminate. Finished by 14:30pm.

     Contemplating:-

a)     How to sand this covering board edge on the inside ? Decided to use Aluminium Hand Sander.

b)     Sand the deck ply once more. Yes.

c)     Re mark out the deck beams on ply wood – for ply screws positioning. ? How?

d)     Make hardboard patterns for ply layer of decking. Yes.

e)     How to fix plywood down – epoxy & 16mm screws which originally were destined for the real teak decking. Yes.

f)     Get epoxy gear out into house – warm up and test out. Yes.

g)     Digout burgess woodsealer etc and assess stock. Yes.

h)     Deck Edgings, Cabin edgings and cockpit back edgings etc. can I make them ? or visit Howells @ Poole. This is a good question ?

i)     Work on starboard cockpit corner joint to repair and epoxy. Yes.

j)     ……

30/03/08

Clocks went forward last night, but still managed to get to the boat for 9:00am. 1^st, out of a piece of 4” x 4” post, cut two wedges, each to be cut into two pieces at home, to proceed to make the much needed replacement wooden ramps. This helps moving machines between the workshop and the lounge, which is the extension of the workshop. Then with the new aluminium hand sander, sanded down the inner edge of the covering boards. Went around twice. Epoxy will need to stick, and then the flexiteek adhesive. Made a start on chiselling out the starboard cockpit corner where U.V. rays have cracked the epoxy in the main join. Once cleaned out as best as can be, will fill with fresh epoxy, eventually the corner will be capped with combing.

The starboard cockpit corner. notice the crack, because epoxy not U.V. protected. This needs cleaning out and refilling with epoxy. This whole area will be capped eventually.

Then cut the first hardboard pattern piece for the most forpeak plywood deck section. Time was getting on by now, so then with paper, assessed the angles of edging strip wood needed for around the cabin sides on the deck. Made up paper patterns. It has been a pleasant sunny day today, no wind, and lots of thinking about the deck ply, as the deck beam markings have washed away. Contemplated how best to redraw these beams, then studied the feasibility of utilising the 16mm stainless steel screws originally bought for the real wood teak decking. We had 1000’s of these screws, these might just do the job without poking through below, plus I could get away with, as we did for the previous layer of deck ply, just using screws on the covering board edge, and the cabin side edge. Only on the forward deck would screws be needed in the centre, and there, there is a king plank underneath. This could work perfectly. Swept up on deck and all the staging before leaving today. Had all the boat magazines out last night, the last two years anyway, flipping through them for photographs of wooden decks and cabin sides, to get better idea of the edgings used.

05/04/08

During the week had a good reorganise in the workshop at home, to allow ease of access to the 6mm plywood destined for the last layer of deck plywood, plus the oil based hardboard we’d already bought for the job. During the week also, I had tested the epoxy resin and hardener and it is still usable. Will use what is left on sticking down the deckply, and pick up some fresh epoxy for later jobs. This stuff is not cheap at £100 per 5kg pack of resin and hardener. Loaded the van with one sheet of each of hardboard and plywood (i.e. 8’ x 4’), all the epoxy gear, and down at the boat set to cutting the 2^nd hardboard pattern piece for the forward deck. This was the widest piece at 5’. Luckily the height of the shed roof above deck, gave me just enough clearance to carry the pieces above my head whilst getting up and down the steps etc. 1^st it was cut to fit up to the forward cabin frontage, then the tricky bit was to cut it to fit inside the covering boards on both sides of the deck. I took my time to get it all perfect with this piece of pattern and in a couple of hours it was done. The field entrance to the boat is still too water logged to drive the van right up to the boat, so all my ‘kit’ I have to fetch from the van in the yard and walk through couple of buildings. Could not have asked for better weather today, and all going well. Next cut the pattern template for the 1^st ply section along the portside – which is a mirror of the starboard side, which helps reduce number of patterns needed. Left the ends of the template overlapping the adjoining template, until the plywood is cut and then it can be scribed in to perfect fit. The 16mm screws are going to work, and should get away with screws just down covering board edge, and cabin edges except for some centre ones on the forward deck. All good so far. During the week located out of the workshop, now I had tidied it up, all the hardboard patterns we had kept for the boat included important templates of the propeller aperture and stern post etc. I used to be the camera person on this project, so today I practised taking photos of myself with the camera on a tripod, which was fun, and the remote is in one of my hands. It is very hard on this project without Lance, and to realise he is not coming back, I’ve got to crack on and achieve our dream, and do Lance proud.

Scribing the hardboard to shape, my compass is just out of sight	Carrying the pieces above my head, best way to get up and down

06/04/08

Had snow overnight which was frozen first thing this morning, but it did not take long to thaw out, and the day was then perfect weather wise. Plans this morning was to offload the 8’ x 4’ sheet of Sapelle marine plywood, and cut both forward deck pieces, using the templates I had made, and then screw them into place. Handling an 8’ x 4’ sheet single handed called for some different manoeuvres. Some lifting straps are real handy for carrying any distance. When cutting the plywood, three old chairs helped out to stop the cut-off piece of ply from dropping on the floor, as the two tressles where holding up the plywood piece I was cutting out. Progress went really well, and just needed the block plane to apply fine trims on the edges and both boards went downl, with a snug fit, using the 16mm screws, but not yet countersunk, and of course the boards are not being glued down at this stage. Going to need to re-assess the gap up to the covering board top, to ensure when flexiteek down it will be flush with covering board, at at most 1mm proud. Could do with a pedometer to see just how far I do walk in a day on the boat, up and down the steps etc, and back and forth to the van. Having assembled the strip lighting using chain and shackles, means I can move the light around to where I do need the light, by just having cords from the shed beams, and it works well hanging one of the lights over the forward deck. Not to mention my conversing better with the use of the jigsaw for 2^nd fixing work, as up until now my work has been 1^st fixing type work. I’m taking my time making hardboard templates, then cutting the final plywood carefully, it took me ¾ hour to cut the piece of plywood which was overall 5’ x 3’. Just before tidying up, made up pattern for the one piece of missing plywood just in front of the forward hatch on the forward cabin coach roof. Need to get the plywood piece made up and epoxied in place, so work can start on the cabin edgings. Started about 9:30am and left about 17:00pm.

Cutting the hardboard template to shape	Marking up the plywood from the template

Cutting the plywood piece - note the 'chair' helpers	Screwing the plywood in place

Block planing the edges of forward ply, for a snug fit

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