With a great start to the many projects around the new shop facility, I finally turned my attention to Biscuit to gain some ground on the restoration this classic small yacht. The Cape Dory Typhoon is known for its sailing qualities, being compared, in terms of her sea kindliness, to yachts in the 30' to 40' range. I am thrilled to be adding to the number of CD Typhoons I have had the opportunity to restore.

Today, I was tackling the topsides - as much as I could get to today. The topsides is not quite Flag Blue in color, more of a Royal Blue, and will likely be the paint color chosen by the owner for refinishing. The topsides paint to be applied will be Alex Seal - an incredibly durable marine coating.
I began at the stern of the boat, and worked my way down the counter and then up along the Starboard side of the hull.
Using 6" 100 grit disks on the Bosch DA, I gradually made my way across the transom, revealing a gray primer and then the boat's original gelcoat. The gelcoat, and substrate in general, is in remarkably great condition for this 50 year-old vessel. I came across only a limited number of filled and faired gouges - the result no doubt of incidents around the dock. I also revealed the molded hull identification: hull #466, laid up in 1973. Making my way around the transom and onto the starboard hull, I continued to work the old paint off of the gelcoat with the help of the DA sander and 100-grit sanding disks. I tucked the edge of the sanding pad just up and under the toe rail, with intention of coming back later to address this tight spot by hand. From what I have seen thus far of the toe rail assembly, I'm inclined to preserve what is there and avoid fabricating new rails for Biscuit. I'll leave this as a possibility for now, and plan for closer inspections going forward. I completed the starboard side of the topsides, removing material from the underside of the toe rail assembly and down to just past the boot stripe. I rounded the stem of the boat after removing the trailer's bow roller, and completed some of the forward port topsides. In the coming weeks, I plan to remove the mast and place it on support brackets fastened to the pole barn's posts. Once this is down, I will remove the trailer's bow roller post to then allow for better access around the forward portion of Biscuit. Having left a bit of the boot stripe at the bow, I measure down from the stem's eye bolt (a bolt to which the winching strap is fastened to and which allows the boat to be pulled onto the trailer) to the top portion of the boot stripe. I then measure from the intersection of the counter and the transom to the top portion of the boot stripe, marking this location. Finally, the boot stripe width itself was identified, allowing for the waterline to be marked in the future. Total Hours: 4