And the Sanding Never Stops....

This will be a quick update as there isn't' much in the way of pictures to share with you since I've just been doing tear down and fabrication work.

For the past two weeks I've been doing lots of different projects for BeBop. I've been working on the shelves during the week after work. They have their first coat of primer on them and with luck, will be ready for installation when the interior is ready for them in a couple of weeks

The main project this weekend was to tear out the old headliner and sand anything inside that needs it before I paint and put in the new headliner, hopefully in about two weeks. I'll say this was about the 2nd worse thing I've had to do since I started the refit, only beat by sanding the bottom. The headliner was put up with some sort of superhero adhesive. The foam under the cloth did NOT want to come off easy, so Rich and I ended up taking paint scrapers to get most of it off then sand the rest. Well, here is where the world of hurt comes in because your also sanding fiberglass off too.....over your head in a very enclosed space. Have I mentioned that I am SO sick of sanding recently? ;-) By the end of Saturday I was itching like crazy and it drove Rich off the boat totally to take a shower. It should however be prepped enough to receive the new headliner (indoor/outdoor carpet) I purchased at Home Depot last week. Oh btw, use rubbing alcohol before you get in the shower and then once again afterwards to help with the itching if you ever have to do this sorta work. (thanks Rich) Follow this up with liberal doses of the real stuff and you should be ok lol.

Here are the pictures of the old headliner and with it taken off and partially sanded....****be warned**** it looks totally messed up but give me a couple of weeks and it will be like new again. ^_^


It's hard to see what's wrong with the old headliner in the first picture but you can see a little of brown around the edges and water stains. The camera hides the rest of the flaws...but rest assured it really needed to be replaced. There are also a couple pieces of deck hardware that I'm going to rebed while the headliner is down since water is leaking just a tiny bit in two places. The cam cleat on starboard side hatch is seized up too so while I have easy access to it (the nuts) while the headliner is out, I'm gong to replace it, probably with a jam cleat for the main halyard. I've also used 404 to fill in the screw holes where the old shelves used to be.

While I spent the better part of today cleaning out all the debris from tearing the headliner out and sanding it Rich fabricated the wooden pieces that go inbetween the mast and the mast mount on the deck. Like all things on a sailboat, there is probably a better name for it but eh...wooden pieces works for me. He'll probably have them coated in resin and painted ready for installation by the end of the week.


So as you can see there are lots of projects going on right now and none of them really photograph well. I'm in that inbetween projects stage just like when we worked on the outside. Give me a couple weeks and I can do before and after's of the interior with the new headliner in, paint, head, v-berth etc. I really hate the tear down phase off a project because it looks worse than what you started with. It's the same feeling I had when I stripped the outside of BeBop...sorta like putting a knife in your gut ya know? But I know it's required and in the end it will look better. Just give me some time.

The goals for next weekend are going to be to fabricate the base for the new chemical head I'm putting in because the old one is too small, finish lightly sanding the areas that I filled in with 404, rebed any hardware that needs it before the headliner goes back in and install the V-berth locker.

Well that turned out to be longer that I thought, but still a rather flat blog entry I think. Have to forgive me guys, sometimes the refit is just tedious and boring work, but it all has to be done. Doesn't make writing about it very easy or exciting but I try and keep you all informed about what's going on. Until next time....Fair Winds....