Worth it

So today's weather was amazing, and so of course I was down at the boat.  A lot of sawing and gutting.  I had intended to wait until I had power tools to finish removing the cabin sole, but I couldn't take having half of it missing so I went to work with a hand saw.  It was back breaking work, but I loved every minute of it.  Every man needs a project I think.
So I was down in the bilge trying to figure out a way to rip out the plywood more efficiently.  There is a long metal rod left over from something.  Not sure what it is, but it worked very well as a crow bar.
I still have some cleaning up to do, but now at least it's all dry and ready to be rebuilt.  I was thinking about  putting in a wooden floor, but those tend to soak up so much moisture that years from now it'd all have to be redone.  Also I want to make sure it's level.  So what I think I am going to do is pour a whole lot of epoxy resin down there to make a level, solid, dry floor, and then maybe carpet over it.  We'll see.
I had fun clamboring all over sanding down the wood work.  I oiled the bow pulpit today, and introduced the boat to my younger brother and sister for the first time.  I can't wait to get her in the water.  But there's another $100 worth of cosmetics that need to go into it, then about $1800 for the right sails.  We'll see how far I get before summer.

Cutting out small portions of flooring

My "crow bar"

The nasty stuff under the floor

Just about gone

all the wood I removed

Now I just have to put a floor in there

A good day's work.

Today was my day off of work at the dealership, so I slept in a little bit.  I had a few delays in the morning (being called in to sell a car when they didn't end up buying it, voting, eating etc.)   After I was finally all squared away and ready to work I stopped by Home Depot to see what kind of painting supplies they had. I could see all sorts of tools I'd like to have, and that I would put to good use but I had to limit the amount of money I spent today.  They didn't have the right kind of paint, so I went to a local boat repair shop to get  some.  The stuff I was looking for was $41.00 per quart!  I can't wait till I have to buy the anti-fouling paint for the hull.  I was able to find some green paint that I thought would match the hull pretty well for $31.00/quart.  I bought that and headed over to the boat.  After a quick sample on the transom I decided that it didn't match properly, and that I wanted to have a white transom after all to contrast the dark green hull.  After returning the paint to the marine shop I headed to the north side of town to Menards to see what they had there.  I found the people in the paint department very helpful.  Obviously they didn't carry marine grade stuff either, but I was able to find a hardcore primer that bonds well to fiberglass, and some hard wearing paint to put over that.  I know it might now be the kosher way to do it, but for right now I just want to get the old patched up stern looking good again.
A quick pit stop at Subway, and a few minutes later and i was back on my boat.  I sanded, taped, primed, waited, sanded, primed, waited some more, and then got one coat of paint on the transom today.  Tomorrow morning I want to go clean up the lines a bit, and put on two more coats of paint.  Instead of being bored sitting around I decided to go to work ripping out the cabin sole.  I did as much as I could with the hand saw that I bought, and a piece of bar stock steel as a makeshift crow-bar.  Now the starboard half of the floor in the cabin is out; which is good cause it was squishy plywood not strong enough to support me.  The fiberglass underneath is solid.  I need a circular saw to get the port side floor out so I can level the fiberglass, and build a new sole.  One nice thing about this project is that I can make the floor a couple of inches lower so I have better headroom inside.
On board someone had left some WestMarine Teak Oil.  I went to work oiling up some of the woodwork.  I was planning on varnishing all the wood, but in Blue Water the author says he oiled all of his wood cause it's less maintenance, and repels water just as good.  The pieces I did are a bit darker than I would like, but it's ways easier to just dump some oil on wood and wait for it to soak in, than it is to varnish, sand, varnish, sand, varnish, and then know that I'll have to do it all again next season.
All in all I'd say it was a pretty good day.  Things are coming together on the restoration part of the boat, soon it will be the outfitting of it all.
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