Knowing your limits

"I used to rock and roll all night and party ev-er-y day. Then it was every other day. Now I'm lucky if I can find half an hour a week in which to get funky." - Homer Simpson

That's 'bout right. I'm an old fart. Don't have much stamina anymore. Seems 4 hrs in the boat shed is about all I got. That means breaking a lot of big jobs down into much smaller components. Result is a lot more work in the long run peel plying or sanding. The price I pay for not doing this 20 yrs ago.

Anywho I managed to get a few minor things done while waiting on supplies to arrive. The depth sounder hole got two more layers of fiberglass.

Depth Sounder Hole

I cut out a plywood circle and covered it with plastic and peel ply. That provided the clamping pressure. A bead of thickened epoxy went around the outside of the hole and the glass was laid in and wetted out.

Weight added to hold the glass down till it cures

That seemed to work pretty well. Pulled it off the next day and it's perfect. There'll be three more layers of glass go over top of the hole.

So given my physical limits in the shed I started glassing the starboard side of the keel with the first layer of glass (1808).

Starboard side getting glassed

I know there's no way I can work wet on wet with multiple layers on a boat this size so I set out to do 18' of it. It took almost exactly 4 hours and just a little over a gallon of epoxy. The peel ply doesn't like to go around corners or complex curves no matter how subtle so I cut it into narrower strips (2 feet). Started at the stern and worked my way forward. Wetting, squeeging & peel plying as I went. I'll turn around and do the other side tomorrow or the day after. See how I feel. Working pretty much on my hands and knees the whole time my left shoulder took a beating today.

That's it for now I guess. Fiberglass & peel ply order should arrive by Monday.

Standby....