First Sail

On Sunday morning, I woke up and reassembled the boom, reattaching all the hardware that had been taken off while I varnished it. I then packed it into the car, along with all the sails and some other things needed for the boat before heading out. I brought the boat into the dock, and got the boom attached, and the main bent on. It was a beautiful day, but a bit windy, so I made the decision to go with just a jib, to keep it a little simpler for the day.

I bent one of the jibs on, and motored to the mouth of the harbor, where I raised the jib and set off on a reach. It was a perfect afternoon, and I coasted around Salem Sound for about an hour. Even with just the jib the boat felt good and it was nice to finally just be enjoying the boat, not working on it.
Coming back into the harbor.
And some interior shots: Looking forward.
Looking aft
The cabin sole.

Catching Up

So its been a busy couple of weeks in Marblehead for me. In addition to working on the boat and dealing with renovating our house, I also agreed to fill in as the Program Director at the Pleon Yacht Club, which means that my days have been long. But, as you can see, the boat is in the water, so I can't really complain too much. The terrible weather continued in August up on the North Shore, which meant that in order to have the boat in the water at all this summer, I had to make some sacrifices. Among these, I opted to forgo varnishing the exterior woodwork this year, and also ended up using a tape instead of painting the boottop, and the covestripe is still bare. Also, for the decks, I ended up just putting one coat of paint on them, with no primer, which while not ideal, should hold up for the next couple weeks. Not to mention, that one coat of paint came late in the evening the night before the boat got launched.

So, with that said, the boat finally went into the water on Thursday, August 14th. I couldn't actually be there because of my duties at Pleon, but I am assuming that everything went well. My mom called me shortly after the boat splashed to tell me that it looked fine, but there were "3-4 inches of water in the bilge. " I still couldn't leave work to check on the boat, but assumed that if it was really an issue the yard would call. So, finally I was able to leave Pleon, and when I got to the boat, there was really maybe 1/2" of water in the bilge, which was left from the rain early the day before. Relief. I quickly looked over the boat before running home to grab the engine some other goodies.

As for the engine, I decided to use the Johnson 8 HP engine that I used to use on my inflatable, but had sat dormant in my garage, unserviced, for the last 2 years. A little nerve wracking, but it had always run well in the past, and I just hoped it would continue doing so. It took some wrangling to get it to fit into the engine well, but after unbolting the tiller arm, it was in. And, through some miracle, it started on the second pull.

I took the boat around the harbor, and rinsed it off at the yacht club, before putting her on the mooring for the night. On Friday, the weather was miserable, and I left the boat untouched, but I could see it all day from my desk at Pleon, so I knew it was safe.

Early on Saturday morning I headed out to the boat to begin cleaning and putting everything together. While I might have gotten the boat in the water, it was far from actually assembled. I started by installing the seahood, the moved down to the winch bases, assorted deck hardware, the compass, and finally the cockpit coamings. At this point, I brought the boat into the dock and loaded the shelves for the interior back onto the boat, along with a bunch of other interior stuff. I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning down below, and then headed home to put the final coat of varnish on the boom.

By the way, my camera has been out of commission for a while, so that's why there aren't pictures for any of the work between August 5th and August 17th. My mom did grab some pictures right after the boat went into the water, but they are still on her camera for now.

Here she is at the dock.
The cockpit, looking aft.

The cockpit, looking from the top of the cabin.
The front of the cabin house, looking aft.The boat, at the dock, from the top of the pier.After I have put the main on the boom, with the old blue sail cover.
Also showing the mast. The mast, as it turns out, wasn't in as good shape as I thought, it really needs to be stripped and refinished. Next winter...
Cockpit, with the mainsheet, back on the mooring.
View from the after quarter at the dock.So while I obviously didn't update exactly everything that happened in the last two weeks, hopefully it shows most of the major projects that took place to get her in the water.

And a week behind schedule...

So after a successful day last Tuesday, things were looking good for the boat. Friday I was back out in Marblehead, and went to the Marblehead Trading Company first thing in the morning to locate the mast (it's been stored inside there for the last several years), and while I was there I scheduled the launching for Friday, August 8th. The mast was in surprisingly good condition, having new spreader made for the last season it was in use, and looked to be O.K. for the summer, which was good since I really don't have the time right now to deal with that. Really exciting. The weather looked good for the rest of the day, so I made my way over to the boat to apply what I hoped would be the second and final coat of paint on the hull and cabin. Sanding dragged a little longer than I hoped, and I ended up painting a little later in the afternoon than I would have liked, but I didn't think too much of it. However, when I returned the following morning, it turns out the evening dew had caused the paint to dry flat in most places. Pretty bummed about it, but I had enough paint left to do another coat, and the weather looked for Sunday, so I stayed up-beat and planned to paint then, while I spend the remainder of Saturday giving everything another sanding with 320 grit paper, and some other projects down below (including finally un-freezing the head seacock), and working on the woodwork that was inside my garage.

So Sunday rolled around, and I was able to start painting around 11. I checked the radar on my crackberry right before painting and it was all clear, as I had decided I was not going to let any weather ruin this paint job. A couple minutes after finishing up, however, I began to hear thunder rumbling. Not in the forecast, I began to worry a little. Looked at the radar again, and it looked like the storms would stay to north of me. A couple of raindrops fell, but I was able to fend them off, and it looked like everything would work out. I stayed at the boat, as if I could actually do anything to save it if it started to rain again, but in reality I knew that there really is no way to cover a boat that is covered in wet paint if it really rains. about thirty minutes later, my mom called to tell me she was in Beverly, in the middle of a major downpour. I began to strategize, and covered the cabin top, which was just tacky, with a piece of Shrink Wrap I had on the boat to protect that. But, shortly thereafter, it was pouring. In a futile effort, I grabbed a tarp laying on the ground and tried to cover the boat, but it was too late. The tarp stuck to parts of the topsides, and didn't really stop the damage. And the third coat of paint was ruined.

After a profanity-laced rant, I swore to never step foot on the boat again.

I took the rest of the day off to recharge my batteries, and Monday too, but I did decide to order more paint Monday morning and had it overnighted to me. I was back at the boat at 9AM Tuesday, and since there were now 3 coats of paint on the hull, I decided to give it an aggressive sanding to even it all out. Not worried about sanding through to the primer, I hit it with 220 Grit paper, and my orbital sander was kind enough to wait until I was with a few square feet of finishing to crap out. As much as it was a hassle to sand everything so thoroughly, it was totally worth it to completely erase any sags from the previous coats, not to mention the bitter memories and bad luck.

So I am hoping that when I get back to the boat, the paint won't be flat nor will it have been ruined by the rain; I am hoping it will be perfect. I spent about four hours after finishing painting removing tape and cleaning up around the boat, and it still looked great, so it should be fine, although I was petrified that I might be jinxing myself by removing the tape.

I think the results speak for themselves, as you can see below. I used Interlux Perfection paints, Mediterranean White for the Cabinhouse/cockpit/etc and Rochelle Red for the hull, four coats...

Pictures are a little dark, by the time I got my camera working it was sunset, but in daylight it really looks stunning. It will be even more apparent once the deck is painted in the contrasting beige, and the hull has the white boot top and cove stripe painted in. There are some areas around the toe rails and the ports that still need bits of tape removed, but I decided to let that paint completely cure before I removed it. Also, I started painting the first coat of black bottom paint, but not all the way up to the topsides, that is why there is a strip of faded red bottom paint.

Cockpit, looking aft.

Cockpit, looking forward.

Front end of cockpit.

Cabinhouse side, port.

Starboard side of cabin house.

Front of cabin, looking aft.

Looking aft.

Bow on.

Port side view.

Starboard side.

I painted the interior forward Dorade vent to match the red of the hull. Don't know if you noticed above, but I also painted the jack stands to match the boat with some extra paint.

Aft quarter looking forward.

Obviously, I'm a little behind schedule now, so the launching will probably be a week later than I hoped, but I realized its not really worth rushing it now after spending so much time getting everything ready.