As a 2014 Mother’s Day gift, we simultaneously cleared space for Cathrine to garden in her side yard & refurbished Mike’s & Catherine’s Boston Whaler “Trainer” sailing dingy, a Harpoon 4.6 built back in the 1970s. Here are some pictures of the transformation from a mossy backyard boat to a Lake Washington summer surfer.
Ready for scrubbing after a trip through the Ballard Brown Bear car wash (one of Thomas’s tricks).
Removal of the old Oregon registration stickers.
We continued the red stripe across this area because in WA you don’t have to register your boat if it’s less than 20 feet long and has a engine less than 10 hp and won’t be used under motorized power in navigable waters (defined by the Coast Guard as pretty much everywhere).
The centerboard lines were really grimy and slightly chafed but look usable after a good cleaning.
Gel coat is in pretty good shape but does have some crazing the occasional crack.
The teak seats needed extra cleaning and then got a few coats of teak oil. If the planks continue to split at the ends near the screw holes we may need to bind them with some tarred twine lashings.
Mast/boom crutch mounts look perfect.
There were a handful of punctures through the gelcoat and fiberglass.
The base of the rub rail was pretty beaten up, but luckily Mike had already ordered a whole new rub rail kit so we (Annie, Catherine, Mike, Scott, Enso, Francesca, Liam, Cora, Steve, and Lola) installed it with the included pop rivets. A syringe loaded with 5200 helped fill the old pop rivet holes and a large flathead screwdriver was the right tool for pushing the rubrail into the base.
There was one ~3 cm diameter hole on the inboard port side of the cockpit.
This area under the seat planks gives you an idea of what the boat looked like prior to its trip through the car wash!
The half-cleaned boat snapped as Cora and I take a break from scrubbing.
The sanded teak benches before and after a couple coats of teak oil.
The color of the unweathered gel coat beneath the seat plank which is known as “desert tan.”
The 3 cm diameter hole patched with a mixture of system three silvertip epoxy and West Systems fairing compound.
We discovered rot in the plywood edges of the self bailer ports so remove the bailers and removed the rotten wood. The void was filled system three epoxy & microfibers, and then the bailers were screwed back into place.
System three epoxy and fairing compound fills crazing around this round area of the cockpit floor.
The underside of the bailer.
Skim coating an old repair on the forward edge the transom.
Liam and Mazey testing out the camping potential of the harpoon!
Checking out the sales in the front yard.
With the boat up in the slings I was able to check the centerboard trunk and also position the skids on the new trailer.
Close up of the teak bench plank ends fastened w/bronze screws.
Thomas and I removed bailers and cleaned them up as well as rasping flush the bailer ports.
Center board blocks.
New pop rivets and rub rail going on…
A minor asymmetry in the rub rail base was filled with butyl (cora calls it brutal!) rubber caulk.
Cora and I used butyl tape to bed the shroud baseplates. We replaced the stainless steel bolts and locking nuts. The old ones were a bit rusty, though they didn’t show any signs of fatigue (e.g. stress cracks) like Thomas found on his failed tiller/bar bolt…
New ring pins on the rudder’s lower pintel and also the forestay pin.
You can’t see it but there’s epoxy sealing interior areas and filling the old screw holes as well as new lubricant on the axle and sheaves of the centerboard blocks.
New out haul line. The flush blocks on the boom and base of the mast may need to be replaced because they are mostly frozen.
Cora holding up the mast!
Dancing with the main sheet.
New jib sheets too!
Sails need some battens, but the shape looks good and the slightly shortened repaired spreaders seem fine.
On the trailer in the Sail Sandpoint storage yard, almost ready to get wet again!