Companionway Hood | Priming The Interior

One particularly challenging task was priming the interior of the companionway hood.

I could only use a brush to paint the front and the sides of the hood, and used a long handled roller to paint the top and bottom surfaces.

This is the tool set in action.

These activities had to be done on consecutive days to allow the paint to dry, so it took a long time to apply five coats. I thought five would be plenty, since the interior is not visible and does not require a super-smooth finish.

There is not much to look at, but for the record here is the inside of the hood after five coats of primer.

The next step is to abrade it with a fine grit, ready for gloss.

Rudder | Applying More Primer

As mentioned in a recent post the rudder had received five coats each of grey and white primer and was ready to be sanded smooth to prepare for the final two coats and to remove the 'step' between the two colours on the boot top stripe.

Here the whole rudder has been sanded flat with a P220 grit and taped for the next coat of white primer.

I pulled the tape while the paint was still wet to allow the edges to soften. When dry I taped up for grey primer and applied the sixth coat, again pulling the tape after painting.

Somehow when applying the masking tape I had allowed the top of the boot top stripe on the starboard side to bulge upwards very slightly. It was a tiny amount but very obvious to the eye.

I laid a straight edge along the stripe and pencilled in the straight line again, like this.

You can easily see the bulge as it widens toward the middle of the stripe.

So I taped for the seventh coat of white primer, straightening the stripe at the same time. Like this.

This is the seventh and final coat of white primer applied to the rudder sides, and the fourth coat on the underside of the bottom plate, with the tape pulled.

Then came the seventh and final coat of grey primer on the cheeks and stripe, and the fifth coat of white on the bottom plate. Here it is.

In this pic I have sanded the whole rudder smooth with P180 and P220 grits, flattening the stripe at the same time.

Despite lots of care I inevitably sanded through the paint in some places, leaving bare patches. Here are a couple.

Previous experience tells me that the gloss will not hide these patches, so they will have to be touched up and removed.

So I marked the rudder with tape for all the grey and white touch-up areas. Like this.

You certainly need a lot of patience to paint a boat! At least, to do it nicely...

Edges & Joins | Hand Sanding

Still no sander available to continue sanding the hull, so I sanded the edges and joins on the already-sanded port half of the hull to remove brush marks.

I wasn't quite careful enough though, and sanded through in numerous small patches. I marked them all with a piece of tape so I would be able to find them again after touching up with more primer, and then applied the first touch-up coat.

Here is part of the starboard cockpit.

And here is the rub rail near the bow.

I think it will require several coats to hide the patches completely. Oh well...

Rudder | Applying Grey Primer

While waiting for the Festool sander to be repaired I continued painting the rudder.

Five coats of white primer had been applied to the sides and the masking tape had been pulled, so I sanded the edge of the boot top stripe with a P180 grit to remove the 'step', and taped for grey primer.

This is what it looked like.

I then applied the first coat of grey primer to the cheeks and the stripe. Coverage is much  better than the white primer, but it will still need five coats.

Here it is after five coats with masking tape pulled.

The next step will be to sand the whole thing flat and smooth and apply two more coats of each colour, ensuring that the final coat has no step where the colours join.

While the rudder was being painted I remembered to start on the underside of the bottom plate.

This is the second coat.

It feels like we're making slow progress, but it's actually not that bad if I'm finally painting the rudder!

Onwards and upwards...

Sanding Primer & Hiatus

 I left the primer to harden for a few days and then started to sand it flat, using a P180 grit to remove brush marks followed by a P220 grit to polish it smooth.

This went well and I sanded most of the port side before my trusty Festool Rotex 90 abruptly stopped working.

It did this once before a few years ago and it turned out that the brushes had worn out. I suspect that this has happened again.

No choice but to put it in for repair. Luckily there is a Festool dealership in Eynsham, so off it went the following day.

I wasn't too worried because I had the DeWalt palm sander which worked well when I sanded inside the cabin, so I set it up with the vacuum cleaner and carried out a test on the starboard cockpit deck.

Like this.

Unfortunately it was not successful, and sanded through the primer to bare substrate, so that won't work.

The problem is that it is too aggressive. I use a soft interface pad with the Festool, which eliminates this problem.

So it looks like I will have to wait for my go-to sander to come back!

Rudder, Companionway Slide, Tabernacle & Lower Drop Board | More Primer

While painting the upper hull with primer I worked on the remaining components in parallel.

This is the rudder taped for white primer.

This is the first coat of primer on the rudder and lower drop board.

And this is the first coat on the companionway slide.

The tabernacle also got primed. Here it is with the slide.

At this stage only the slide received seven coats. This is it.

I pulled the masking tape on the rudder after five coats.

I will now apply five coats of grey primer and flatten the join before applying the final two coats of both colours.

We're getting there!

Upper Hull | More Primer

The happy and momentous day arrived when I completed the first coat of white primer to the upper hull.

Here it is.

Pretty patchy, as expected.

The undersides had required seven coats thinned with 10% Epifanes thinners to obtain a good finish, so that's what I planned to do with the topsides.

I masked off the tiller slot and the footwell drain holes to prevent paint dribbling onto the varnished transom. Like this.

Then I repositioned the protective sheeting on the transom skirt and masked it off for primer, like this.

It then received its first coat of primer, which was of course very patchy. Like this.

I applied five coats of primer to the upper hull, then pulled the masking from the rails to assess the paint joins.

This is the port rub rail. It looks good.

And this is the port toe rail. It looks good too.

I tidied the joins with some light sanding and applied two more coats of primer, making seven in total.

Here is the upper hull after its final coat.

More primer is still required in the footwell, where the centreboard pendant prevented painting until the cockpit deck was primed.

Some other components also needed more primer.

I made a spreadsheet so I could keep track of how may coats had been applied to what surface. This is it.

It would otherwise be near impossible to remember what was what, for me at least!

I was pretty pleased with progress and awarded myself a G&T to celebrate.

Cheers!