Improving the Nocturne

Adam is progressing in his boat work. He's restricted by weather, of course. We've had lots of rain, and besides that he needs nice warm days for doing epoxy work. That was today!

We get up into the boat via this ladder, and I admit it still makes me nervous to step off the ladder onto the boat's edge. I know it's stable; I know it won't tip over with my weight. Still ... I doubt.

What a glorious day we had! After a successful morning at the farmers' market, I came home zippy and ready to do something. So while Adam epoxied the boat, I cleaned out the garage and prepared JUNK for a trip to the landfill on Monday.

The last time I showed you the boat, Adam was polishing the back deck after recoring it. It's looking good. He put fiberglass filler in, with epoxy resin and a hardener. Then he sanded it smooth.

This section from the front of the boat (at the mast) was recored as well.

Adam also worked on the hull. Here, he's begun scraping off the old paint, catching it in a tarp for disposal. You don't want that bottom paint in your grass -- it's full of copper. You remove as much loose paint as possible with scraping before you start with an electric sander.

When he scraped, he found blisters from the gel coat, the stuff on the hull that helped release it from its original mold. He's been working on those bubbles.

Yesterday he got some real sanding done on the bottom. It's looking pretty. Somehow he'll find a way to move those boat stands (I guess), to access the hull under them.

This is a portion where the separating gel coat and the blisters are evident. He's spoken with various boat guys in Oriental, inquiring about how worrisome this is -- how much repair does he really need to do for this situation? It is so incredibly helpful to live in Oriental and have access to so many experienced sailors and people who've done years of boat repair.

One sailor we met said that the front porch of The Bean (our local coffee shop) is the best place on the east coast to get a full education about anything regarding sailing and boats, and it's absolutely free. Day after day, week after week, men with loads of experience will give you free advice, loan you their tools, and offer to come help.
Today was nearly 70º, so Adam did the fiberglass filling in the front deck around the mast area, where he'd recored the deck. He pats fiberglass into all the crevasses first.

He uses a blend of epoxy resin and hardener, patting it into the fiberglass, working out any air bubbles. It's very tedious, careful work, and takes concentration. This section of the deck will be much more solid and safe than it was before.

He went through a lot of gloves. The epoxy melts them after a while.

It's tricky, because the epoxy needs four hours to harden fully, and temperatures must remain above 50º for the hardening to occur. Today was warm enough, long enough. He just checked at 8:00, and the epoxy was nice and hard! Yay -- one step closer to sailing again!
The weather was so fine today; about ten boats were sailing on the river. I rode my bike around the village, feeling exhilarated and joyful, greeting friends and neighbors with a "Good afternoon," and receiving, "Merry Christmas!" in return. The river sparkled in delight. I'm so thankful to live here.
Update: That was yesterday. Today the weather offered a couple of warm hours, and Adam added filler to those grooves after sanding off the excess fiberglass. He's making good progress!