Karate Kid 6

Wipe on… wipe off!  Wipe on….wipe off!  You get the idea.

At last we get to see some topcoat gloss on the cabin sides.  But first Darren had to sand back the 2nd undercoat with 320 grit paper before starting on the graphite coloured paint.  Of course Jan and I were there to remove the dust…… Wipe on…. wipe off!

After painting the sides and rear of the cabin with the first coat of graphite he then painted the remaining area with the light grey gloss.

The rear is starting to take shape.

Darren kept on painting all day and completed the 2nd undercoating of the gunwales finishing for the day at 5:20pm.   Late afternoon I heard some awful moaning from Darren’s side of the boat.  I immediately thought he had hurt himself and scurried around calling out “Are you all right Darren?” 

To my relief I found him singing to the radio!  

It was a long day of painting and I suspect his back will be sore tomorrow after all that bending down to dip the brush in the paint pot.  However we suspect; like us; he is rather pleased with the progress. 

Tomorrow he gets to do it all again!  That should mean when he returns on Thursday after his day off he will be removing the masking tape concealing the off-white coachlines and we will see Waiouru’s sides in all their glory!

Walking into the workshop this morning I found Richard with his new toy tool toy.

A Festool Domino jointer

Richard has been wanting one for some time and has eventually weakened!  The top half of the two interlocking containers has the tool for making mortise and tenon joints.

It working in a similar manner to a biscuit joiner.  A plunging circular drill bit which also oscillates horizontally.

The end result is a hole which looks like this

The bottom container holds a selection of different sized “domino’s”

It is possible to create a strong joint by drill opposing holes in the two pieces of timber and then gluing them together with a domino.

After this experiment Richard went on to make the joints in the four sections which form the front doors to Waiouru.  These were then glued and clamped before being set to one side for 24 hours.

Glued and clamped upper door frames

The lower frames

The Festool Domino is a great tool and I would like to own one.  But at £700+ it’s not on the top of our “essentials” list.  Pity I no longer believe in Santa!

After gluing the doors Richard continued with the trim around the rear hatch.

The trim is now all installed.  It proved to be quite a “fiddly” job with Richard having to spend quite some time measuring and modifying the various pieces of timber. 

No… That’s not Harry Potter’s broom hovering above the boat……...  It’s my light sabre on charge!

A pathetic attempt to show some of the detail in the joinery!

Someone has to cut off and sand the heads of all the 100’s of oak plugs that I have glued and hammered into screw holes over the last few weeks.  It’s NOT going to be me!

Late in the afternoon we had a visit from blog reader ‘Boatgirl’ and her partner ‘Skippy’. 

Boatgirl told me she doesn’t particularly like having her photo taken and I’m a poor photographer.  Hence the photo with her eyes shut!!!

It’s always interesting to meet a blog reader. Actually I’m surprised people are prepared to persevere with the poor spelling and grammar (FMiL has given up on me!).  Anyway, Boatgirl is also a blogger (Miss Inexperience writes a blog) and we have been reading her blog for some time.  Actually there is a bit of a twist to the story behind her blog… and I’m not saying anything further on the subject!

So tomorrow should see the final coat of gloss to the cabin sides and the first coat topcoat to the gunwales.  Richard will continue making the front doors.

Jan and I will……….  Karate Kid 7! <yeh I love dusting>