[strick]

Time for an up date. I've managed to get a little done on the boat over the last couple weeks. I had a couple quarts
of awlgrip left over from my 23 project so I decided to go ahead and paint with that rather then Imron. This boat
will sit on a trailer most of it's life. The bottom is painted with a 50/50 combo Mattahorn white and Off white.




I got a nice hatch from TH marine. Cast aluminum and the lid comes completely off for easy access to the bilge were the seacock and one of the bilge pumps will be.




Cut outs for deck hardware:




Some of the hardware that will be going on the boat. The Accon LED bow light is really slick:



I used the gantry crane to slide the blocks and supports around so I could finish painting the bottom of the boat:




I was able to get the boat on the trailer by myself using the gantry crane:




It fits in the shop nicely:




My son caught this 13 pound catfish in the canal behind our house the other day:



He caught it plugging for stripers using a 1/2 ounce rattle trap on a ultralight pole with 4 pound test. Dad had to help him a little.



since I was able to get the boat in the shop I felt like I was on a roll so I decided to finish painting the outside
of the boat. The 545 awlgrip primer was sanded with 220 using a DA sander and hand blocked as well.

Masking it off:




tack coat applied:




Successive coats applied:




As you can see I was painting late in the day. Not a good idea. The bugs were not a problem but visibility was. I
could not use too many lights or my breaker would kick off because of the voltage drop with all my cords strung out from the house. At any rate I got it painted.

After Looking at the paint job in the sunlight the next day I decided that I could not live with the way it looked.

There were some areas that needed to be sanded more. Everything was nice and smooth however some of the areas were I added filler were too high and needed to be sanded down more. So I broke out the sander once again.




Then Re-sanded the entire boat and primed the areas that needed it:



Then back in the shop for re-painting:




It looks better now. Something I think I can live with.





strick