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Larry's LogI got up early the next morning and did a backup to a CD of all the data files on the PC. I also needed to back up all the pictures, but those would take a while. After breakfast, as with yesterday, I started out to do one thing and wound up doing another. I was going to continue with the sanding on the port side of the keel but as I was coming back from the bathroom, I looked at some small bubbles in the paint. I saw them when we first hauled but thought that they were just under the paint. To test that, I went and got a scraper and punctured one. The liquid that came out was, unfortunately, not just water but the acidic liquid that forms by the combination of warm salt water and fiberglass resin. They were osmotic blisters; some polyester mites had infested my boat! As I looked around the boat, I saw more and started puncturing them and smelling the liquid that came out; where I could smell it, they had that slightly acidic smell that tells you what it is. I looked over the entire hull and then had Diane look also in case I missed some. I got my Dremel tool out and drilled out each little blister carefully so it would dry. There were only about 70 to 80 and they were all less than the size of a nickel and very shallow so there were no serious problems. Interestingly, they were almost all on the forward part of the hull and mostly 2-3 feet below the waterline. I would let them dry a bit and then fill them with epoxy and sand the filled holes before painting. The boat had a barrier coat applied by a Brewer's Yard in Connecticut by the last owner but during the pre-purchase survey, we had found some blisters in 3 localized spots. The yard that the boat was stored in, also a Brewer's, honored the warranty but only redid the 3 spots (about 2 feet square each) and left it at that. I had to sand the epoxy barrier paint and repaint the bottom; I suppose I shouldn't be too upset since the boat has been in the Caribbean for 3 years and in the water now for 18 months. I ran some errands in the afternoon, but first Diane and I took measurements of the dodger where I wanted the new stainless steel handrails. I lined up the rails and showed Diane how it would work and then I marked the dodger with chalk. We took off the dodger and I walked over to Alpha Canvas to ask Carlos to put in the holes and reinforce them. While I was gone, Diane washed the deck from all the accumulated dirt while we were at CrewsInn and the 'new' dirt we had just picked up. She didn't want to get black streaks running down the boat once she had compounded and waxed the topsides. The boat was starting to look better but there was still a long way to go. Friday was more hard work. I couldn't sleep last night so I got up around 4:30 and did some backups on the PC but then after the net and breakfast, I started in again on sanding/grinding the keel. I went over some spots I missed and got down on my back to get as far under the keel as possible. The paint bits, dust and lead were flying around and I was glad I had on a good respirator. Diane had gone grocery shopping and got back around 11. I helped her with the groceries and then we had lunch and I just about collapsed. After lunch though, I continued and I believed the keel was just about ready to apply the metal etch primer. I'll need to sand each area again lightly to get rid of the oxidation, clean it well and then do the etch primer application. I also found and drilled some more blisters I missed yesterday. Once I had gotten the keel in shape for further work, and helped Diane move the scaffolding so she could reach the bow to compound it, I started to work on removing the old zincs. The one on the shaft and prop cam off easily but the one on the strut wouldn't budge and I had to use the Dremel tool to cut the stainless nut holding the bolt to the strut. Then I removed the Spurs line cutters and cleaned them from the accumulated crud and growth. Diane had compounded about half of the port side and it was starting to look pretty good. She had stopped at Mima earlier and did some other errands as well and found some vinyl tape that we could use to patch up the boot stripe, since it was looking pretty ragged. It was almost an exact match and she had found it at the vinyl lettering place at Tardieu. The alternative was to use either a one-part polyurethane or maybe just blue bottom paint. Around 5, I started cleaning up, took a shower, washing the bottom paint and lead dust off. Diane went shopping early on Saturday and when I got up, I got out the materials we had bought to do the keel; the etch primer, epoxy primer, bottom paint and the associated expendables. We had originally planned to haul the boat in Venezuela and were advised to buy these supplies in Trinidad. Since we came back to Trinidad earlier than expected and didn't pull the boat in Venezuela, we had carried all the stuff around since we left last July. Diane got back around 9:30 and after helping her get all the groceries in the boat, I took apart the dodger frame, cleaned everything with metal polish, and put the new bimini fittings in place that would hold the new handrails. Then I got out the drill and attachments and started to clean the prop, shaft, strut and engine intake grate. I took the grate off so I could clean the through hull. Luckily it came off easily. On the prop, I had scraped all of the barnacles off but the little calcium bases were still firmly glued in place. I didn't want to use a wire wheel on the drill since that was a little too rough so I tied a less aggressive nylon wheel. That was also pretty rough but made quick work on the worst of the crud and I scraped them carefully afterward to get the really stuck pieces off before I use a relatively mild fiberglass wheel to really clean it. I did the same thing to the strut, shaft and the grating. That took most of the afternoon and I spent the last hour or so finishing the backup CDs. I now had all my documents, files and pictures backed up. If the system crashed, at least I had everything to restore (hopefully). Sunday found us both working on the boat. I continued grinding the keel since I decided that the old paint failed for some reason and I figured that new etch primer and epoxy primer would help, although the blue paint under the red seemed ok. The problem was that there wasn't any biocide left in the blue. Anyway, I took more off and then stripped the bottom of the skeg also, as it was bronze and also had a bit of a problem with paint flaking off. Diane continued waxing the port side where she had compounded already. In the afternoon, while Diane prepared dinner and made some other dishes for later in the week, I took the MaxProp apart. It hadn't been disassembled in over 3 years and although it seemed to be working fine, I felt it should be cleaned and inspected. It came apart very easily and since I already had the marks where it needed to be reassembled, I just took the pieces off. They are very finely machined and I was careful not to ding anything. I cleaned most of the old grease off with a wood stick and then used a rag with mineral spirits to get the remainder. The gears looked OK except for some small chips in a few of the smaller teeth. The larger teeth were also fine except for some wear along the edges. Overall, I didn't think there was a problem although when we get a chance, I will send it back to get rebuilt. On Monday, as usual when we're on the hard, we were pretty busy. In the morning, I put the prop back on. That took some time, as it must be installed exactly as it was taken off and although I had the right settings written down, I double-checked everything before I put the pieces back together. When it was done, everything seemed fine and it turned very easily. I cleaned the excess grease off and would have to clean it with solvent before painting it. Tom and Steph walked over a little before lunch and we talked for a while and they went off to the West Mall to get lunch - it was Steph's birthday and they were coming over later for dinner. I did some errands in the afternoon, walking over to CrewsInn, while Diane continued compounding the boat, starting on the starboard bow. Around 6, Tom and Steph came over with Clem and we had a nice birthday dinner for Steph; one that was on our diet since they were also on the Atkins' diet now. Diane made some chocolate truffles (low carbohydrate) for dessert that were pretty good. We enjoyed the evening a lot. The next day was very full and pretty productive. It started out with my net controller 'job' and then while Diane did some more waxing, I started getting everything prepared for the etch primer. That entailed doing another quick sanding of one side of the keel with the electric drill and a fiberglass wheel that got the slight oxidation off the bare lead from where I sanded it in the past day or so. I also did the same to the prop, shaft, strut, skeg heel and engine intake grate, but thought I would do the other side of the keel tomorrow. Once that was done, I washed the lead off with a clean rag and denatured alcohol to make sure the sanding dust was gone and there were no impurities on the surface. Naturally, I washed off the other bare metal as well. After all that, I prepared the etch primer for application. I had 2 quarts of the stuff and I figured I would see how far one quart went. I mixed in the activator slowly while stirring the mixture, as the instructions state, and brushed it on one side of the keel. Then I put the shaft and strut zincs on the bare metal before priming. The primer instructions said I had six hours to apply the mixture so there was plenty of time to do the little miscellaneous items. It went on very thinly and less than one pint coated all the underwater metal I prepared. I had most of the quart left so I prepared the other side of the keel (sanding and washing) and applied the etch primer there also. I hadn't put back on the Spurs cutters so I got those, cleaned them and replaced the little zinc on that also. They went back on fairly easily and then I coated them with the etch primer. All the underwater metal that needed to be redone had been done in one day. I was pleased so far. In the meanwhile, Diane went to Customs and did some other errands. We had been in the country for 3 months and our time limit was up. There was no problem there and she came back after visiting Lady J at CrewsInn. I finished up and got everything back on the boat and figured that tomorrow I could do the epoxy primer - one step closer to finishing. Wednesday was also a very busy one (seems like every day is like that when you're on the hard). Diane continued doing the compounding and waxing and I applied the epoxy primer to all the previously etched underwater metal. The epoxy primer needed time, once mixed, to sit in the pot so it took all day to apply two coats. I also needed to wait about 4 hours between coats so I worked on the dodger handrails between coating time. Diane had brought back the dodger to Alpha Canvas since the reinforced holes he made initially were just a little too small. This time they were fine and everything seemed to fit OK. I took the rails I had, drilled the rivet out on one side to remove the end cap, cut them to the right length and then put the end cap back on and test fit them. They fit fine and now I just needed to tighten everything and make it permanent. I stopped before finishing that since I needed to mix the next batch of epoxy primer at 3:30 so it would be ready to apply at 4:30. I wanted to apply two coats in one day to avoid having to sand the primer before applying a second coat. We had made arrangements to meet Mima and Lady J for dinner at Joe's Pizza for Steph's birthday. So I mixed the primer, went back to work on the dodger, and started doing the second coat at 4:30. Diane finished waxing before I finished so she went over just ahead of me. I finished up at 5:30, took a quick shower and got to the restaurant at a little after 6. During dinner, I talked to Tom about a problem I had noticed while doing the bronze shoe on the skeg, that holds the bottom of the rudder. After I had sanded off the paint and some filler, a little water started weeping past a bolt holding the shoe to the skeg. I knew that it couldn't be good and certainly wasn't normal. There were no blisters on the skeg but I didn't know what was inside either and although I was originally going to just paint over it, Tom convinced me to do the right thing and at least drill a test hole to see if the core (foam or whatever) was wet. If it were very wet, it would mean a fairly large job of taking off the shoe and cleaning up what ever was there and then putting it back. Of course, the rudder would have to be supported in some way during that time. We would see in the morning. |