To start the week off, I added a little extra strength to the aft bench area by adding four more supports connecting all the horizontals. I also tied it into the horn timber aft. With this done, it should be sturdy enough. The rest of the week was spent mostly on the deck, besides getting two coats of Bilgekote in the bilge area. Taping it off was easy, and sanding it was fine, but finding a place to kneel down while painting was tough on the knees. But the result is satisfying. When I finished, I decided that I should extend this area forward two frames and get a 3rd coat on overall. I also had to make an extra trip to Rhode Island to see my buddies at St. Angelo's Hardwoods to pick up the Teak for the cabin sole. I went down on Monday thinking I knew how much I needed. I milled out eight 3 inch wide strips at 6 1/2' only to realize I needed twice that. So on thursday, I went down again and picked up some more. Now all my teak is milled out and ready to cut to fit.
On the deck, I needed to fit the top layer of 3/8" okume plywood ontop of the first layer making sure to stagger the joints. I was lucky to find a full sheet of plywood in the shop that I could use, and it was just enough. I traced out where the deck beams where and as best I could any major fasteners and lathered up the plywood and fastened it down with #10 2" SS screws. The next day, I was able to fair out the new deck, on the outboard and inboard sides, finished fairing out the coaming lines and skreet fairing compound over the joint where the new deck meets the old and over the entire foredeck to fair out any lumps. All fasteners were filled with fairing compound also. After this went off, I used a longboard with 40grit then a random orbit sander with 80 to fair it out. Then I finished cutting out the space of old deck where the coaming ends just aft of the mast step with a jig saw and chisel. I added my 4inch wide oak supports inbetween the old deck beams as per usual and faired them to shape. A second coat of fairing compound was skreeted on any low spots I may have missed. This again was faired. With the deck fair, it was time to break out the dynel. I thought it was going to be very difficult to lay out the fabric without creasing it, but it proved to be pretty easy. The hard part was finding a place to walk along the boat in my socks to not scurry up any dust. I had marked out the centerline with a 1 inch overlap and taped the dynel down. Then, using epoxy with laminating resin, I began coating it out with a roller from the middle working out towards the ends. Everything went smoothly and by the end of the day I had the entire surface coated. Now, the deck is complete. It only lacks paint, which will be soon to follow.
