Never mind The Donald and Hillary and Bernie, etc. Over here we’re focused on finishing up the Primer work and starting the final paint!

As expected, laying on the primer paint exposed a number of little surface imperfections, so that’s led to quiet (non-posting) days of more filling and sanding. See the colored fairing compound ‘fixes’ above the primer paint layer:

The good news for us is that’s the last of it, and the second coat of primer, where needed, goes on this evening. Then we’ll sand it all down to 220grit and begin final painting the deck with Interlux Perfection two-part LPU. Off white for the deck (same as the floats) and Platinum for the topsides (same as the mast and beams). I just ordered some West Systems roller covers, as everything sold locally disintegrates with the solvents in these paints, leaving roller residue in the surface. We can sand that away at the primer stage, but it would be a disaster in the final paint. If anyone has an actual roller cover brand name personally proven to withstand marine two part paints, please let me know!

There was no boat building last weekend because of the opportunity for a coveted crew position in the Doublehanded Farallons race. Skipper Andrew Scott had F27 #277 Papillon ready for battle, and we pulled off a 4th overall, 3rd multihull result. We were faster and corrected out over all under-30′ boats. It was a day to prove ‘waterline is king’ as the F31R had enough length and mass over the F27 to handle 25-30kts and really ugly square wave seas still sailing fast. The two F27s that finished the course were at their limits. Hats off to the F31 crew, and I have no problem with 2nd and 3rd going to a $2mil+ Gunboat and an expensive carbon-rig 40′ J120. Surfing 25 miles home on the ocean, getting overpowered downwind even with double reefed main and jib, meant a tired crew needing recuperation, not boat painting for a few days :)
Maybe next year we tackle the course with 39′ in the water…

Boat parts in the driveway!

Just before thanksgiving we lost the shop neighbor’s storage space for this little trailer holding the finished beams. It’s been crowding the shop and now that we’re serious about painting, the trailer had to move. Seeing the beams in the driveway is rather motivating to keep working!

Three weeks of business travel caused a gap in boat work (and updates here), but we have a bit of catch up for you. Doing a solvent wipe down for the primer, we found a bunch of pinholes in the fairing along the hull topsides. So much for painting before the flight. Better to catch them now, under the primer. Look closely…

And the blue tape is the treasure map

They were fixed with a thin slurry of red-balloons putty; nice and runny with plenty of pressure filled the little holes.

And finally, we’re starting to imagine a painted boat. This primer is similar (but darker) to the platinum grey final color of the topsides. It’ll go up to the net lashing tubes.

This is probably about the fifth time I’ve said “one last little external build piece to go…” We had assumed the bow pulpit would be build in steel post-launch. But since we’ve been on the roll of eliminating metal, why not here? Now I want to get this done and glassed in before painting the deck. Here’s a mockup of thin glass that was wrapped around PVC.

Thinking we’ll carve this shape from styrofoam, glass that, then dissolve out the foam to form hollow tubes. If anyone has tips on this, or a better way to form the curves, we’re all ears.
Thanks!