Baby It's Cold Outside

The weather has turned on us and Winter was pretty much here by mid-November.  Temperatures have been in the 30's and 40's during the day and we've had some nights into the 20's.  It's also been raining more often and all of this makes working outside kinda unpleasant.  We've managed to get a few more coats of varnish on the teak and now have the toe rail and eye brow trim up to four coats and two coats on the cockpit coaming.  My goal now is five all around but I need a few days of really nice weather back-to-back for that.  We'll be putting the cockpit enclosure up this weekend so I can continue to work on the coaming through the Winter.  Next March we'll get the final three or four coats of varnish on everything else and should be ready to take it South with no worries.

This past weekend, 12-5-14, we had several days of rain and it was clear but cold on Sunday.  Once things dried out we managed to get the rest of the stanchions installed before we turned to solid ice.  It was chilly out there!  I had masked off the area where the bases sat on the teak so they were bare wood.  We then had to mask off around that to protect the varnish from the 5200 sealant.  Once that was done I went down the toe rail with my cordless drill and recessed all the bolt holes to help force the sealant in around the bolts.  I used generous portions of 5200 on the base, about a 1/4" thick bead around all the holes and around the perimeter then filled the tube of the stanchion about an inch or so in.  As I screwed down the bolts I got a nice bead of sealant oozing out evenly around the base plate.  After 24 hours it'll be cured enough to trim with a razor blade and the extra will come right up with the masking tape.  The next coat of varnish will then seal it all in.  Just an observation on this little project with the stanchions.  These are through-bolted to backing plates underneath the deck.  They're accessed from inside by reaching through a narrow gap at the side of the overhead liner where it meets the hull.  Some places are wider than others and some are partially blocked by cabinetry.  The only way to see where the bolts come through the plates is with a mirror.  All the stanchions except two on each side have threaded backing plates so this is a one-man job.  For those other four stanchions it's pure frustration.  My hand barely fits through the gap so I enlisted Cheri to work on the inside while I manned the wrenches out in the cold.  Chivalry and all that.  Each stanchion has four bolts and they use 7/16" lock nuts.  You need to hold a combination wrench up in there at just the right angle for the ones closest to the hull and the inboard ones can be reached using a socket on a flex-extension.  Anything that gets dropped is lost forever.  Apparently these nuts also require a special vocabulary to get them started but Cheri quickly had it mastered.  I gotta admit I've never heard a 7/16" lock nut defamed so eloquently.

Last weekend I had new lifelines made up with all new fittings and turnbuckles.  We're going with bare stainless wire this time.  Our old lines had the white PVC coating on and had developed cracks and rust spots.  I think the plastic jacket holds dirt and water inside and this is what's rusting, not the lifeline itself.  Aside from looking nasty you can't tell what condition the lifeline is really in so that's why we went with the bare wire.  The stanchions are all freshly polished and re-bedded so once the new lines are on things should look pretty schnazzy.  We're only running the bare wire from the gates forward to the bow pulpit because we're doing hard railings all the way around the cockpit starting at the gates and wrapping around the stern.  We picked up the new lines on Friday but haven't gotten them installed yet.

Right now I'm making up some backing plates for the line locks and pad eyes we'll be installing for the Main Boom Preventer.  Once those are in place I'll be able to cross that project off the list.  I'm using some scrap 1/4" aluminum plate for the backing plates.  I first traced the pattern on the surface and center punched the holes to make sure I got them correctly centered.  I'm using 1/4" thick plate because I want to thread the holes and not have to use nuts on the bolts when I install them.  The bolts are 1/4-20 SS and I'll be using a #7 drill bit on the backing plates to leave enough metal to allow for tapping some good threads.  I'll be using 5200 to bed the line locks and pad eyes on the toe rail so there's no need for lock washers.  The 5200 puts a firm grip on the bolts and even after ten years you need some serious leverage to remove them.

My cabinet faces were delivered to the marina on Monday (woohoo!) so that'll be a project for next weekend.  These are made of solid maple and stained "cinnamon".  Hopefully it'll be close enough to the look of the teak but they'll be stuck back in a dark corner and shouldn't be too noticeable anyway.  I've made templates out of heavy corrugated cardboard for the cabinet sides to help get a good fit against the inner surface of the hull.  I'll be using 1/2" Baltic Birch plywood for the cabinet sides, top and shelf and any exposed ends will have a matching maple veneer.  The hull will serve as the back of the cabinet and it's overall dimensions will be 18" high x 45" long x 15" deep.  A friend of mine has offered the use of his table saw so if it's clear weather I'll get everything cut and ready to go in one shot.  I plan to completely assemble the cabinet before installing it, then tear it down and reassemble it in place, piece by piece.  The shelf where the one cabinet goes has a nice teak lip on it that sticks up 1.5".  I'm thinking the doors will just clear this so I'm planning to leave the lip in place and build the cabinet behind it.  That way there will be less demolition.  The milling on the lip matches the rest of the Island Packet woodwork so I'm hoping it'll help tie it all together.  Since I'm not removing the lip it makes installing the cabinet a bit more complicated and that's why I'm assembling it in place.  Just aft and perpendicular to this cabinet is a second cabinet that'll be mounted lower on the bunk and against the aft bulkhead.  This one will measure out to 36" high x 27" wide x 9" deep.  It'll be dedicated to tools and have storage inside the 6" tall base to maximize space.

This cabinet project will open up some space needed for the water maker and get all our tools located in one place.  Sounds almost organized, eh?

Oh yeah, one more thing.  When we had the galley remodeled we had the lid for the freezer and fridge split in two so we could open one side independently from the other.   We left the struts off the lids because they got in the way and without them the lids could open wider for better access.  The only problem here is that there's a cabinet directly behind the lids which prevents them from laying back far enough to stay open on their own.  I've been pondering this in my subconscious for about eighteen months now.  Tell me something, do you do this......whenever I go into a hardware store for something I could spend an hour wandering around looking for inspiration for other unfinished projects.  We have a great locally owned hardware store in our area and I was in there for wood glue or sand paper or something and came across these nice brass slide latches that would work great for our freezer lids.  When I got home I cut up some scrap pieces of wood for a base to get the latches to the right height and installed them so they just catch the edge of the lid.  This works great!  You simply lean the lids back against the cabinet and slide the latch in from the side to hold it in place.  Of course, I still need to stain the bases to match the cabinet so this is another unfinished project right now.  That means I'll hafta go back to that hardware store again.  Maybe I'll find another project solution while I'm in there.  Hardware stores are like toy stores for growed ups.