Dogbolter's Deck
 

Pretty obvious, a poor state of affairs.  Garrett admitted he put his knee through the foredeck some years ago and repaired it with fibreglass cloth and polyester resin.  Then more recently, it was punched again.  That is the original spinnaker bag by "Diamond Sails."
 

I used a heat gun and a draw scraper to remove all of the old varinish.  Here Garrett's repair is being peeled away.

Fortunately, all of the pieces are still there.  My plan is to cut out the whole lot and glue the pieces back together, like a puzzle, with a backing glass cloth and then put it all back.

I used a very fine blade on the jigsaw.  Fine big hole in the boat with the added benefit of easy access to both sides of the port bulkhead.

Over enthusiastic sanding by previous owners has left lots of scratches and damaged the top veneer in several places.  The deck is made of 1/8th inch single faced three layer plywood.  That's 3.16 mm, very thin, but very light.
 

On the aft deck, another hole has been covered with a random piece of plywood and lashings of glass cloth and resin.

After the old varnish was removed, I used a cabinet scraper to finish the surface, avoiding the use of sandpaper.  Discoloured and scratched in places, but much of the original veneer still there.  Character.

After an acetone wash, I brushed on two coats of SP Eposeal 300 penetrating epoxy resin -- really soaked into the dry ply.  I also brushed the stuff onto the underside of the deck, wherever I could reach through a hatch cover or hole.

Then I draped 81gsm e-glass cloth over the fore and afterdecks using West Epoxy 105/207 consolidated with peelply.

The Dog has been rolled outside ready for flipping so that I can fair and glass the starboard side.  The cockpit floor has been stripped of horrible blue paint and refinished with a nicer shade of grey:  International Primocon
 

That's the crew of "Goodness Gracious," Fireball 14691 gossiping.  More work needed on the hull.

Finally, the starboard side was glassed and the entire deck received 6 coats of varnish: Hempel Dura-gloss.

A few fittings need to be put in place and the control lines sorted.
 
 
Back to the INTRO page Repairs to the HULL, to the DECK, to the COCKPIT, to the FOILS