The roof is on! Unfortunately I think it lost some of the "good looks" since the roof has these slanted rain gutters at the sides, but I think I'll just have to live with it. Or modify the roof a bit. Not sure if I should...
Both look OK (ok they look bada**) - which one works for you? One will give you more room in back, the other a bit more bow room if you need/want it. Any concerns on the handling? I guess moot point since already on.
We are planning a July summer trip. The city has a summer party early July. Her new man is a boater, my step dad is a blow boater so we should be able to get on the water easy and have a beverage or two. I'll PM you contact info
Thanks for all the opinions, I'm currently leaning towards the version I posted last. Will wait a few days and see how it grows on me. Now I'll start building the aft deck.
Well, the deck-work had to wait, I've spent the last days scraping off old carpet glue. This must be the most horrid work I've ever done. Now I've got some oven cleaner working on it overnight, hoping it's at least softer tomorrow.
One brand of oven cleaner worked, and another didn't. Go figure. Anyhow, after +30h of scraping, grinding and drilling all the glue is gone. Tomorrow some grinding, then deck rebuild.
Yeah, I'm happy that's over and done with. The glue was kind of hard to reach and on a vertical surface underneath the coaming/boat top. Then again, today I grinded for ten hours. And in this heat (+32c) it was quite a chore as well, at least the worst parts are soon done.
One question to the more seasoned builders though: if I'm re-gelcoating some parts of the boat, then how much of the old one will I need to remove? Now there are some blotches of glass showing, but there's still quite a bit of old gelcoat there. My plan is to roll and tip two/three layers of new gelcoat and grind it even?
The only thing I hate more than grinding is.............oh wait, there's nothing I hate more than grinding :laugh:. I don't get too awfully itchy either, although I have worn coveralls for every grinding session. Just make sure you wear your respirator, which I'm sure you're doing, you don't want to mess with your lungs. Sorry I can't answer your gelcoat questions, I just don't know.
Gel-coat scares me, I'm not the guy to answer your questions about prep or laying it down, but I know it needs to be rather thick, and orange peel is quite common meaning you will be sanding quite a bite to get her smooth. I think sanding and grinding go in the same bucket, except the itching is rather nasty with glass. What color you thinking to finish her off?
Yeah the respirator is on all the time, I really don't want to mess with this stuff with either my eyes or lungs. Gelcoat is a bit scary, but at the same time quite forgiving. You get what you see kind of deal, takes a lot of work but the end result is quite good. Especially if you don't care for a mirror finish. The deck and cabin will be Ral 9010 white, and the hull will be dark blue (almost black) with a white stripe near the waterline and the antifouling will be red. Really classic colors, I think they go well with the overall feel of the boat.
The grinding is going real slow. Still got the outer walkway of the cabin left. So I'm going a bit ahead of myself and thinking about insulation and condensation in the cabin while sweating with the grinder. I'd rather avoid gluing anything anywhere after the massive chore of removing the old glue. Do you guys have any ideas how insulation could be done without the glue? Would it work to just compress insulating material against the hull with the typical wooden slats from sailboat v-berths? I'm also a bit confused if the insulation material is supposed to have a air gap behind it in between the hull or not?
Better yet if I could avoid most of the insulation, maybe add something to the roofs and some side walls. There will be three vents and the Webasto working against condensation anyway.
In my V-berth there is carpeting glued directly to the inside of the fiberglass. In the cabin area there is no insulation at all, but there is a space between the hull sides and the 1/2" plywood interior walls. The back wall between the cabin and the cockpit is solid plywood with fiberglass on the outside. I do get condensation inside the windows when we wake up to those cool fall or spring mornings, but I don't think insulation would prevent that unless I changed my windows to double pane sealed units, and that ain't gonna happen. Are you planning on double pane windows? If not, I don't think you need to worry about insulation. Just my opinion, maybe others with more boat construction knowledge will suggest otherwise.
Sounds logical, and no, my windows won't be double paned. So it's going to be unisolated for the most part anyway. I'll add something to the v-berth and leave the same air gaps in parts of the cabin and the roofs.
The roof is on! Unfortunately I think it lost some of the "good looks" since the roof has these slanted rain gutters at the sides, but I think I'll just have to live with it. Or modify the roof a bit. Not sure if I should...
