Saturday afternoon was claimed by the celebration of a good friend's birthday, so I headed out early to Somerledi to complete the fairing work on the "patches" previously obscured by the boat stands. In the previous work session, with my 5" palm sander, I removed the remaining bottom paint and revealed yet more of the numerous cosmetic blisters that have been worked on the balance of the hull - the starboard hull held most of the blisters in those patch areas and similar to what my experience was working the hull in its entirety. The previous work session also included grinding out the blisters, bad fiberglass, and filling and/or glass work. Today, I arrived and water-washed the filling work to remove amine blush, and then set up my work materials as the hull dried.

First task was to sand the first fairing filler work, and this was done with the 5" palm sander and a combination of discs (40-grit for an initial and larger material removal, and then 80-grit for additional work prep). After sanding the areas hidden by the boat stands and the rudder, I water-washed them to remove most of the sanding dust. I then followed that by a good wipe down with acetone to remove any remaining contaminates.

I started with the rudder skim coat. The lower starboard portion of the rudder had a highly-concentrated number of blisters which necessitated a larger amount of fiberglass removal. Subsequently, I laid up 1708 biaxial glass for this repair, and followed that with an initial fairing fill. Today, I set myself up for what I hope to be the final skim coat - using West System epoxy and their 410 micro-light fairing compound. I mixed a pot of epoxy and thickened it to a sufficient viscosity, and with a wide-width blade, skim coated the work area. I was very pleased to see that I had achieved great results thus far in recreating the foil of the rudder. It's likely that a few spot areas will require an additional skim coat, but it's 95%+ there.

With the rudder handled, I turned my attention to the patches - the remaining portion of the hull requiring work prior to the barrier coat completion. The hull was now sanded, water-washed, dry, and cleaned with acetone. I mixed a couple pots of thickened epoxy, 410 micro-light thickened, to work the port and starboard sides of the hull; I used smaller pots to prevent thermal runaway in this Florida heat! With a 4" squeegee, I applied the skim coat to the numerous shallow blisters that had already received their initial filling work, and in one case fiberglass. The skim coat essentially brings to a final faired surface and fills the pinholes that develop often in the curing process of fairing work. The 410 micro-light product mixes to a smoother, dare I say creamier, appearance and is meant for ease of sanding for the work preceding primer paint.

With the final skim coats applied, I rolled up my tools and materials and headed out to celebrate a good friend.

Total Hrs: 2.5