Does the prep work never end?

July 31, 2017

I will admit to being frustrated. More than a tad frustrated. This weekend was a rainy weekend on Friday and Saturday. Monsoon rains. Saturday late afternoon there was a tiny break, so we jumped in the truck to go check on our YellowBird (mainly to ensure the tarps kept the flybridge deck dry). We could not get to her because the road was blocked due to a tree and power line being down.

We subsequently learned of a back way to get to the boatyard which we will know for the future! So no work done at all on Saturday. (Although we did make a trip to Home Depot to get a belt sander and some random supplies).

Sunday we headed back to Jennings prepared for a day of work. It was nice and cool, so we determined we would NOT pack a cooler of snacks and drinks. We do keep some snacks on the YB. For some reason, everytime we do not pack a lunch, we want one! Note to self: ALWAYS pack a cooler.

So armed with energy and good intentions, we uncovered her and found the some of the flybridge decking had gotten wet (mainly section #2) so we left her open to dry out. 

Then we turned our attention to the cockpit bulkhead. Shawn cut pieces of wood to replace the rotten wood we had taken out when we redid the door way.  He then left to work for a bit leaving me to sand and prep the cockpit bulkhead for painting. I also sealed the wood he cut with epoxy to ensure it would not rot. 

When Shawn returned, he installed the wood while I prepped the flybridge for painting. I filled holes with some sort of marine filler and then wet sanded the entire flybridge with 220 grit wet/dry paper. I then "roughed" the flybridge with a red scruffy thing Shawn gave me. It worked better than the wet/dry because I could get it into all the nooks and crannies.

And that took from 9 until 4! Unbelievable! Soon frustrating because when you look at her, she looks no different even though we spent a whole day on her. *sigh* 

As August approaches and the school year resumes, I am just so disheartened. We have worked steadily on her TOGETHER, BOTH OF US all summer long. I do not mind the work and I have learned so much and there is this wonderful sense of accomplishment when I look at what we did that day...and yet.... she is not ready. 

Heat Wave

July 23

We are having a heat wave!!! Love love this song from There's No Business Like Show Business (https://youtu.be/Krl_pXXfKEI) and it has been running through my head all weekend!

The heat wave continues and with high humidity, sometimes I think we are completely insane. We are just SO very determined to complete this overhaul of our YellowBird and be able to ENJOY her. Shawn continually reminds me of how thankful he is that I work alongside and with him on this project…and it is that which keeps me going! 💛

Thursday July 20

Another early morning boat ride to rejuvenate us. I love looking at this man!

Hot hot afternoon afterwork .  It rained yesterday evening.

Shawn uncovered the YB to let her dry out some and set one section of coring down without me!!! (the aft section or section #8). Working in the heat alone was exhausting (this is why he needs and appreciates me so much!).

I hurried to the boat after work JUST in time to admire his work and help cover her again! J

Friday July 21

We met at the boatyard at 11 and decided to work on the coring. The sections around the hatch look good, so we decided to adhere the two forward pieces (section #1) which is nidacore. We found the cinderblocks leave quite a bit of debris, so we hauled our wet/dry vac to the flybridge and I cleaned the flybridge AGAIN (this is an ongoing repetitive task!) while Shawn mixed up the magic concoction. We adhered the forward pieces (section #1) and then adhered the section aft of the hatch (section #7), another nidacore piece. 

Shawn was determined to insert the freshly painted door frame and door even though I was more than ready to call it a day! So we spent an hour (maybe 2!) getting the doors put back in. Love love love how the white paint looks! (and it will need some touching up from where we scratched it putting it in).

Saturday July 22

I am tired of saying beastly hot! But it truly was beastly hot! 100 in the shade and who knows what the temperature was on the flybridge!

We tackled the remaining coring! The reason we labeled the sections when cutting the pieces was to be able to place them in the correct spot. It was also helpful for us to be able to "name" them as we determined the order in which we adhered them. As I mentioned, we did the hatch section first because  those were the most difficult as they had to go UNDER the lip around the hatch. Then we did the two extremity sections (aft and forward). Then the large section to the side of the hatch. 

Now we determined to begin with the section directly forward of the hatch (section #5) which is comprised of 2 plywood and 1 nidacore. We got a bit carried away and placed all three of them down at the same time and promptly realized we did not have enough weight to ensure they adhered with the proper crown. So...we hoisted the 5 gallon buckets of chemicals up (to sit in the brutal sunshine) and Shawn and I added our weight to the corners and we sat and sat and sat while we waited for the compound to "kick".  Not the best method!

Then we determined that we would adhere section #2 (the plywood directly behind the two nidacore that we adhered on Friday). We had a discussion and determined that we would complete section 2, then section 4  (both plywood) and leave section 3 (which is nidacore) for last. Our (My) reasoning was that the goop fills gaps and if we needed to trim the last section for a perfect fit, it is easier to trim the nidacore (Shawn can use a pocketknife) than the plywood. As it turns out, it was great reasoning because we did indeed have to trim the last section! We also got smarter and to help the sections conform to the crown, Shawn used screws to anchor the coring.

So our process was this:  Shawn would grind any rough edges or spots, I would then vacuum the debris. Shawn would mix the resin with the catalyst and then we would both apply a thin layer of goop as fast as we could and then adhere the core section.

And Calamity Jane strikes again! I try so hard and SOMEHOW...I ended up with the goop mixture all over the back of my shorts on the fringes. So it got all of the back of my legs and let me tell you, it burns like crazy! Like a million fire ants and I had little welts. So I descended the ladder quickly and stripped off my shorts to get it OFF of me! Shawn had no clue what I was doing, but he sure did get a good laugh out of me walking around with no shorts on!

So we ended the day hot, tired and drenched with sweat and missing a pair of shorts!

Sunday July 23

We headed to the boatyard excited to take off the tarp and see our progress. We had no sooner uncovered her than it started to rain so we promptly recovered her and decided to put our name on her. Remember we had removed the name way way back in May!

I had to take a pair of Shawn's jeans and make new cut-offs, so I made "pirate pants". Shawn is not a fan!

She is looking good!! Fiberglassing, painting, and probably a WHOLE lot more stuff I know nothing about is all that is left to do!!! Anchors away? Maybe?

Dog Days of Summer

The dog days of summer are here! With temperatures in the 90s and 100s, I cannot believe we actually work 5-8 hours a day on theYellowBird. While we have a strong work ethic, I would be less than honest if I said our patience and tempers are long. As we work and get overheated, dripping with sweat soaked clothes, we become more impatient with the task and each other. Luckily, we "mostly" mesh rather than clash so we take hydration breaks periodically and sometimes just flat out walk away from the task (and each other 😀).

July 14, 2017

Friday evening on an oppressively hot day. We have quite a to-do list for the weekend, so we headed over to the boatyard to make preparations for tomorrow. We stopped at Walmart on the way to pick up paint for the cockpit door. We had decided to repaint the doors an off-white, but changed our minds in the store and decided to go with true white. It seems cleaner and more nautical.

We borrowed a canopy shelter from Shawn’s brother Ian and set it up next to the YellowBird over the pile of supplies, ready for tomorrow.  Under it, we plan to construct a protective covering for the flybridge floor to protect the new floor from the direct sun.

We brought down the cockpit doors ready to paint tomorrow. We plan to get an early start so as to beat the heat. It was 106 in the saloon at 5:15pm! With no doors and the windows open. Hoping for cooler temperatures tomorrow.

No sooner had we gotten home than a thunderstorm blew up. We are hoping all of our preparations are still there in the morning. L

Saturday

We returned to the YB and found that the shade canopy had NOT blown over! It was a cool morning with a nice breeze. We took off the cover and found the storm had completely soaked the bridge. So we laid all the dry fitted coring out in the sun so the water would evaporate from the flooring.

We then headed to Lowe’s to get materials (1) cinderblocks to weigh the coring so that it would achieve the correct arc and (2) to build a shelter to cover the YB for when we fiberglass OVER the coring we put down. We bought 20 cinderblocks; 4 2*4*12 and 4 2*4*10 and a large tarp. We returned to Jennings and unloaded our newly acquired materials. It looks like we are building a shanty-town!

We then tackled the doors. We took apart the doors (which we had previously removed from the frame) and painted each section. We had quite a discussion (Shawn prevailed) on the “correct” way to spray paint a door frame. We (mostly me) painted the doors a pretty bright white.

While I painted the doors, Shawn was prepping the doorframe support (remember the rotten wood and supports he replaced?) for fiberglassing tomorrow.

Sunday

A long hot workday.  Today is the day we began the recoring process in earnest. I am amazed at how many steps there have been to this process. I thought we had begun “recoring” a couple of weeks ago.

I think I missed explaining a crucial step in this process. Last week, we took the PLYWOOD core sections we cut and on the plain side (without cuts) we sealed them with epoxy so that they we adhere better to the goop mixture we made today that is spread on the flybridge flooring.  As I have mentioned, I am not a “native nautical” so I may not use the correct terminology (although Shawn does correct me) but MY understanding (in layman’s terms) is that there are actually 3 layers to our flybridge decking. The bottom layer which we have now (the floor), the core layer (which we are replacing) and the fiberglass layer (which we will create OVER the core layer once we have it completed).

So the BIG task we completed today was adhering the new core to the flooring. We made a “goop” mixture of resin (it is a green globby mess) and a catalyst (methyl ethyl ketone? MEK). A quart of the green stuff needs 10 cc of catalyst  to “kick” or harden. So we mixed 1 or 2 quarts at a time depending on the size of the core to be fitted. We decided to start at the hatch (Section 7) even though it is the middle of the flybridge because those pieces are the most difficult to fit. (Remember we have dry fitted these pieces multiple times).

Dry fitted core

In order to weigh the coring and ensure that it adapts to the curvature, we placed the cinderblocks on top of the plywood coring. And...oh yeah...we had to GET the cinderblocks UP to the flybridge. We used a rope pulley...Shawn on the flybridge and me on the ground. I am going to start a plank challenge this week so that in the future I can lift those darn cinderblocks! My husband is STRONG!

So while we waited for the glop to harden, we turned our attention to the doorframe that Shawn prepped yesterday. Today I got my first experience with fiberglassing. So Shawn put more of the glop down the length of the doorframe and I placed what looked like heavy gauze bandages down the length on top of the glob. Turns out those "bandages" are actually fiberglass. Who knew? And more glop on top of the bandages. So now we wait for this to harden.

And of course there are NO BREAKS!!! Too much to be done! I am just kidding. We actually do take breaks and drink water, gatorade, sometimes sweet tea and we have snacks like pretzels and trail mix and granola bars. And we usually split a sandwich for lunch while we sit in the shade and talk about "what's next" to be done.

We painted the vents white and replaced them. It actually did make a noticeable difference in her look. (I painted and Shawn replaced).

We covered our YellowBird and went home hot, dripping with sweat, exhausted AND so very pumped because we are actually PUTTING HER BACK TOGETHER NOW!!!