Aft cabin repairs

The time has come to say goodbye to the last fiberglass on the boat - hurray!

It held on pretty good, so it took a fair amount of hard work to get it off. But now it's gone, and then I need to repair the wood that is underneath. There are three soft spots in the sides and stern edge, but it is only minor damage. I need to replace a lot of the wood in the roof because of rot, and the roof will get covered with a piece of oil-hardened Masonite and will of course get new round edgings.

May 6, 2009:
I have been busy at work the last few weeks, but in spite of that, I have managed to get a lot done on the boat. I have finished repairing the wood in the sides and aft of the cabin, but it was necessary to saturate a few spots here and there with epoxy, especially in the corners, but I think it's better to do it this way than to replace everything. I also replaced some pieces of rotten wood in the aft end of the roof.

The rails for the hatch were in poor condition, and it was impossible to get them off without destroying them, so I had to make new ones out of oak. It was no big deal, the profiles were easy to make on the table saw. I discovered that the roof was 10 mm too low in the fore-end on the starboard side which caused the rails to not align. I corrected it by replacing the thinner wood on the starboard side, but this caused the little hatch in the fore-end of the aft cabin to be too tall, so it had to be corrected.

I have also glued the Masonite in place in the same way as on the fore roof. It is glued 5 cm in from all edges with thickened epoxy, the rest is glued with Tec 7. I tacked it with stainless steel staples to keep it in place.

May 14, 2009:
I have now finished the hatch rails and am in the process of fitting the moldings around the aft ruff. This takes time. but I expect to finish the aft cabin this weekend.

May 17, 2009:
There is not much left to do, the moldings are fitted and sanded, handrails and Dorade valve are mounted, and I have just mounted the 2 pieces of wood that sit at the front on top of the roof. Tomorrow I will cut off the plugs and sand the rest - then the aft cabin is finished.