Varnish

Kathy sent me a note on New Year's Eve that showed she's learning. "A few lessons learned...

**  No matter how much or how little epoxy you mix, it will never be the correct amount needed.

**  The difference between pancake batter and peanut butter when making thickened epoxy is exactly 1/2 teaspoon.

**  Sanding. Is. Never. Done!"

I'd say she has a very good handle on things!

We put the first coat of varnish on the repaired deck and hatch covers. We're real pleased with how it has turned out. While you look at the these pictures, a whole bunch of us are on the 9th Annual Friends of Helen trip.

Knot Too Shabby Update

Regular readers know that Kathy's Knot Too Shabby suffered some road rash on our way home from last fall's Green River trip. She had some vacation time prior to Christmas so we got started with the fixes. For some reason, I don't have any pictures of the minor repairs to the hull.

After adding fiberglass reinforcement to the bow, stern, and one area along part of the port chine, we flipped it right side up and started marking spots that would need some attention - anything from light sanding to heavier sanding and fiberglass replacement or reinforcement.

The damage was less than what we originally thought, but there were several places along the port shear line where the fiberglass had been worn away along with a bit of the wood.

We were pleasantly surprised when much of the "damage" disappeared with some sanding.

We ended up adding a single layer of glass on the port shear from the front of the cockpit to the stern, and a second layer near the paddler's hips, simply as some additional wear surface in case someone got sloppy with their paddling. We added a similar doubler layer on the starboard shear in the same place.

With the glass 'wet-out' with epoxy, the raw wood areas disappeared as we anticipated.

The front of the coaming had taken a lot of abuse so we added a couple layers of 17 oz glass to build it back up, and then covered the glass with Saran Wrap to hold it down while it cured.

Since the pictures, we did some sanding of the cured epoxy. Kathy will do a bit more epoxy work and then hand sand the whole deck in preparation for varnishing. When it's done, bystanders won't ever notice the repairs.

That's Not Good!

While the river trip was wonderful, Kathy had just one day before she needed to be on a plane out of Phoenix for a business conference. With BJ staying to launch again with her gal friends, I got a ride with Kathy's 5 am departure headed back to the Valley of the Sun.

Don't ask me why Alan was up that time of morning to take a picture!

The sun was up by the time we got to Monument Valley, so I messed around trying to catch the car & kayak's shadow. Much tougher than I thought it would be! We stopped in Kayenta for a quick bite of breakfast and kept moving.

With a significant cross-wind from the left to the right, we headed out of town, but didn't get far. A very loud BANG and suddenly the Knot Too Shabby was alongside of us. When we stopped, the bow and stern lines were still attached, but the cross bars had bent severely, allowing the cross bars and Malone J-brackets to release from the car.

After surveying our options, we pressed my Therm-a-Rest Z Lite pad into service and then loaded the kayak upside down on the roof.

The hatch covers had internal tethers. Both hatch lids came loose, and one tether broke, leaving us without one of the hatch covers. Kathy walked back along the highway and found the missing cover a couple hundred feet back.

Both hatch covers have scars but are structurally OK. They'll clean up and the fiberglass repairs will hide any repairs, at least to the casual observer.

The boat obviously slid upside down for part of it's E-ticket ride. The cockpit cover was shredded, and a few layers of fiberglass on the front of the cockpit coaming was ground away. The only other damage on the top of the kayak was the stainless U bolts at the bow and the stern for the carry toggles. The crown of the U bolts were both worn to about half the original thickness.

The fiberglass at the deck to hull joint took a lot of abuse. There will be some hours sanding, applying new glass layers, and refinishing, but structurally, the boat is undamaged! Wood boats rock!

It will take a few days effort over a couple months to do the repairs and it will be good as new.

In the meantime, when Kathy got home with the boat, a note was posted on the boat. "Please let me have some quiet time... I have had a hard day."

It Floats!

We started off Saturday morning by tensioning the perimeter line, sealing the through-deck holes around the bungee & perimeter lines, installing the carry toggles, and installing the seat and seat back.

The next step was to clean up the garage and load all of my stuff in the pickup.

The place looked better but now we needed to concentrate on getting the boats to water. I had a couple sets of Malone J-brackets that spend the vast majority of the time collecting dust in the garage. Now we'll store them on Kathy's rig where they'll get more use.

Some black nylon strap was treated to grommet installations

and then installed under one of the fender attach bolts under her hood.

Now when she needs a bowline attach point, it's readily available, but hidden under the hood the rest of the time.

By 11 a.m. the boats were loaded and her garage was neater than it had been for the past 3 months. A quick phone call to BJ confirmed that she was available and wanted to go with us so we might as well get the boat wet - sooner than I'd expected.

Even Turk came along to watch as long as he didn't have to get too excited.

The boat handles well and is very stable as would be expected from the hull form.

It's surprisingly quick but kicks up a fair amount of bow wave.

All in all, a successful project. Paddles nice and looks nice. Built in about 50 days when all the time away was subtracted. We'll see how it does carrying a load when it goes on the Green River in September.

Deck Lines

After the varnish on the deck had cured for a few days, we drilled holes in the stern and the bow for u-bolts. The stainless u-bolts will serve as retention for the perimeter line and attach points for the carry toggles.

The u-bolts were embedded in black thickened epoxy and supported while the epoxy cured.

All ten of the filled holes in the deck were drilled out for installation of the perimeter line and deck bungees.

By the end of the evening we had the last coat of paint on the cockpit coaming, the deck bungees in place, and the perimeter line strung. The perimeter line will be tensioned once the u-bolts cure. One more day and Kathy's "Knot Too Shabby" will be finished.

Finishes But Not Finished

The hull got a coat of primer and two coats of one part poly paint in Hatteras Off-White. We used TotalBoat Wet Edge brand paint from Jamestown Distributors, rolled it on with a foam roller and tipped it with a dry brush. The paint cured quickly but still required 3 days to allow cure time between coats.

The boat was flipped so that we could mask along the deck/hull split line and then did a final hand handing of the deck and coaming ring. We used a "fine line" tape to define the edge - much better than trying to get a sharp edge using blue tape.

Varnishing is always fun. The gloss makes the wood grain and color really pop!

This is what it looks like after the first coat of varnish using my cell phone for the picture. We were working with triple digit daytime temps so the oil based varnish dried much faster than normal allowing us to put the hatch cover back on for the picture.

Three coats of varnish on the deck are enough - it's a boat, not furniture! Love the way the off-white hull looks next to the strip deck. Still one more coat of paint to go on the coaming ring.

There's still stuff to do but we need to let the deck cure for several days before using masking tape during the U-bolt installation.

Keeping It All In Place

We fabricated some fiberglass padeyes and installed d-rings under the deck in the hatches. A bungee will be fabricated to stretch between the d-rings to keep gear in the hatch from shifting and popping the hatch cover off.

Thigh plates were built from extra strips and glassed on both sides. Slots were created as attach points for the Immersion Research back band that will be installed once we're done with the boat. The thigh plates will also locate the seat once the fiberglass cloth retaining the thigh plate cures and is sanded.

The seat was carved from a block of 3" thick closed cell foam. It can be shaped with lots of different tools but is a messy job with black rubber dust flying everywhere. This time I shaped it with a coarse sanding disk in a 4" angle grinder while Kathy kept a vacuum hose close to suck up as much dust as possible.

The finishing touch was to glue a layer of single-sided neoprene to the seat. The smooth side was glued to the foam using 3M 90 high strength spray adhesive. The fabric side of the neoprene gives just enough grip to keep from sliding around in the seat when it is wet.

Putting It All Together

With the deck finished on the inside and the hull finished on the inside, it was time to put the whole thing together. Blue tape and sometimes a bit more force were used to get the two pieces matched up so that 4" wide glass could be installed on the inside seams. Took two days to do the two sides.

After the inside seams cured, we sanded a radius onto the shear of the boat and then glassed the outside seams. We were able to do all of the outside seams in one session.

With the boat in one piece, I took advantage of a calm day to pour some resin with micro balloons into both ends of the kayak. The end pours smooth the very end of the boat and fill the area where the u-bolts will be installed on the deck.

It took two passes with resin and a squeegee to fill the weave on the cloth of the hull,

before we flipped it over and did the same process on the deck. It looks ugly when it is sanded but the resin clears it up. While we were waiting for resin to dry, we found time to carve a seat but I haven't taken any pictures of that yet.

With the fill coats in place, the extra glass around the edge of the hatch covers is barely visible.

Next steps will be to paint the hull and coaming, varnish the deck and hatches, and install the u-bolts, perimeter line, and foot braces.