What next

Focus now needs to move to completing all other welding on the deck. Until this is done, I can't do the final coats of paint on the inside, under the deck. And until that's done I can't put in the insulation. Without the insulation is in there is often a condensation problem.

A lot of what's now left to be welded on are stainless steel fittings, but there are also a number of old deck welds that need to be ground back and cleaned up, as the final finish on the deck is going to be a non-slip paint finish. There are also old stantion bases, deck fillers (for fuel & water tanks) and tank vents that have to cut out and replaced. All this cutting & grinding ideally needs to be finished before the stainless fittings go on because the iron filings (from grinding) can "contaminate" the surface of the stainless, leading to rusty pitting. Not looking forward to all that grinding, but it's now pretty much the next "must do" in the overall scheme of things.

The stainless that is to go on includes, chain plates, deck step, bollards, hand rails, bow rollers (for anchors), and a 19mm round bar to all of the top edge of the gunwale.

After Hatches

At last ! All hatch frames have had several coats of paint including top coats of 2-pot polyurethane. Each of the six Maxwell hatches are in place in a bed of Sikaflex 291 (Adhesive/sealant/bedding compound) and held in place with lots of 316 stainless steel bolts & nuts.

The large forward hatch is also back on after having several more coats of paint, and insulation, in the form of marine carpet glued to the underside, and a rubber sealing strip.

That front edge of the cockpit coaming has been completely rebuilt, and also has it's first few coats of paint.

I also built four dorade boxes for the foredeck vents and these are welded to the deck. These are designed to allow air into the boat but any water that enters the vents drains away at the base. I've put one of the teak tops, with cowl vent on top, onto the dorade box, for show, for this photo. The boxes still need several coats of paint before the tops all go on permanently.

So hopefully, this winter, I have more air, more light, and less condensation.

During Hatches

I had a lucky break in that hatches by Maxwell, 450mm square (exactly what I was looking for) came up on sale at Burnsco Marime. These hatches normally retail for $NZ499 each and are very rarely discounted much. These came up on sale at $349 each, so I bought 6 identical hatches and "saved a fortune".

First I made up steel frames, with rounded corners, a few millimeters larger than the Maxwell hatch frame. These were to be welded into the deck to give a perfectly flat surface to mount the hatches on, and also raises the hatch about 15mm off the deck. Hopefully this will contribute to them being water-tight.

In the photo you can see that I have made the cut-outs in the deck, and welded the frames in place. The aft cabin frame has also now been set up for two hatches instead of one large one.

While I had cutting and welding gear on deck I also started repairs to the front of the cockpit coaming. I don't think that this ever had an adequate coat of paint, in the hard to get to places, and rotted from underneath.

Before hatches

No permanent hatches were in place and the original framing of some were too small to be of much use. The original layout had one huge aft cabin with one central hatch in the deck. There were no hatches at all in the main cabin ,i.e. at the bottom of the companionway.

Until I got some permanent hatches in place it was difficult to get enough air and light into her and this contributed to her getting very hot on Summer days. The temperature inside regularly exceeded 40 degrees C by mid afternoon.

I took this photo before I got to work on cutting and framing up ready for hatch installation. Click on the photo to enlarge it and you'll see one large hole in the aft deck, and a couple of small frames forward of the main cabin.

You can also see the steel hatch I made for the forward cabin. This just has a coat of primer, and has no interior insulation or rubber seal, and needs several addition coat of paint.