Back in the boat yard

We've been back in New Zealand for a month working on our boat. It is sitting at the same boatyard in the exact location where it was last year. We are close to finishing the projects that must be done here in the yard. When it's sunny we work on outside projects and when it rains there's plenty to do inside. Here's a few of those we've finished:

Removing the old length markings 

When we put down our anchor it's important to let a length of chain appropriate for the depth and conditions. Our anchor chain had colored rope inter-weaved in the links to mark the length at 50 foot increments. Several of these came off towards the end of last season and, since we needed to swap the chain end-for-end to even-out the wear, we decided to mark it every 25 feet with various paint colors. The paint wears off the outside of the links quite rapidly - but enough remains inside the links to remain visible. Rich laid the chain out in 25' lengths and looked it over very carefully then painted the depths in different colors.

Painting is complete

A makeshift paint booth 

Our original marine stove was in sad shape and getting worse. The burner elements were falling apart and wouldn't stay lit. Pieces of the grate were broken off right where we needed to put our little stove-top espresso maker. We considered replacing it since repair parts were 1/3 the cost of a new stove. We decided to save ourselves almost $1000 by overhauling the old beast. I don’t know which was more disgusting: when Rich pulled out one of the holding tanks to replace all the leaking pipe penetrations or when he lifted the stove out of it's cradle. Years of grease had been running down the back and side of the walls. It was pretty bad.

On the first rainy day after the parts arrived he replaced the thermocouples, burner elements and the electronic ignition. It seems so luxurious to light burners without getting out the Bic lighter! The new burners were a beautiful shiny stainless steel. I didn't want to use it and discolor them!

So pretty

Ahhhhhhh

Then it was time to repaint the boot stripe. Which turned out to be much more difficult and time consuming than planned...like every project! The boot stripes run the length of the boat on the inside and the outside of both hulls. A total of about 200 feet. First we taped it so the old paint could be sanded to prep for a new coat. But...sanding it smooth revealed serious pock marks from a prior contaminated paint job. They looked like acne scars. Rich thinks the charter company re-painted them with the boat in the water.

Rich tried to find a lightweight body putty to skim coat over the small holes - but all the products available here were too thick and dried too quickly. During all the patching, filling and sanding we re-taped the stripes....I don't want to think about how many times we re-taped those stripes! After the prep was finally done we taped with a special thin rice paper tape to get a sharp line. Rich put on 3 coats of cobalt blue paint and it looks really sharp.

We paid the yard to power-sand our bottom paint so we can renew it before we leave the yard. It was wonderful never having to scrape the hulls last year and we want to repeat that experience.

This photo shows the pock marks that needed to be filled. The red is the auto body putty.

Mixing the paint

New paint! 

Old boot stripe taped and ready to be sanded.

Pulling off the last tape. Yeah!! 

And the big project in process now is replacing the 6 large windows on the salon. More about that later...