Sanding. Mini circular saw.
I drove to my remote workshop, to pick more material for cabin ladder. Weather forecast is threatening with heavy wind so I reinforced walls, to withstand gusts better.
Back in the shipyard I started with tests of my new tool: mini circular saw. I bought it specifically for one job: gluing back planks on whale-deck. My boat, when she was built, had all planks glued edge-to-edge with Cascofen glue. After 60 years of service this glue is just powder, with no holding power. Whale-decks are heavily exposed to sun and weather so during summer heat they started opening, letting in rain water, splitting varnish and discolouring the wood. During the season I was trying to protect the wood with linseed oil or rubbing in thin Ettan “sausages”. That helped in a way that the wood has not darkened but since two seasons whale-deck opens so it is high time to repair it properly.
On Lars’ Laurinkoster the shipyard has squeezed in Sikaflex into seams and varnished above it. Apparently it works and is easy to do but it scarifies the strength of deck. I’ve decided to do it according to book so I will cut alongside seams, to remove old glue and get just enough space for gluing thin mahogany strip between planks. On my boat whale-deck opens only by 250um during hot weather so I’ve decided to not use conical blades as they come in 5-6mm thickness. It is enough to cut 1,5mm and then I can use ready-made mahogany faner instead of milling my own lists.
Originally I planned to use my big plunge saw for this job but it would be awkward and difficult. I needed something smaller and less powerful. Something like Bosch GKS 12V-26 which is a very light and beautiful machine for such job. But it is also expensive and I cannot justify the cost for just one job. Instead I bought Chinese machine for 1/4 of this price. It came with 3 blades and I purchased additional few Proxon’s mini-blades to pick the one which fits the best. Quality seems good, it is quite heavy (copper-wired engine, brushed motor) so hopefully it survives the job and if it breaks after that - no big deal.
I’ve tried all blades and to my content two of them fit the bill - I can squeeze in mahogany strip, it gives reasonable resistance so is not loose but there should be still some space for epoxy to give a reliable bond.
I will need to get accustomed to this tool first, before using it on the intended job, but the first impression is very good.
I moved on with cabin sole. I took all components onto the boat, to check if all has been glued properly and if they still fit spaces between frames. They do!
I took them to my bench and started vanishing different plank levels with hand planes. Once all was more or less even I switched to power sander with 40 grid, followed by 80 grid sandpaper.
Sanding cured epoxy and hard mahogany takes lots of time but view of freshly exposed wood, with it’s beautiful colour, is very rewarding.
After sanding I took all pieces again onto Meritaten, to check if boards’ edges meet their neighbours at the same level. Few didn’t.
I knocked these proud edges with block plane, followed by hand sanding of all edges. I gave them small radius so that they hold epoxy and varnish better and are less prone to damages.
This work took me several hours and pretty much exhausted me. As the last task before leaving I started removing old sound isolation from cabin ladder. Nasty job…
I will renovate the ladder so there will also be new, modern sound isolation.
Hopefully my small Yanmar-san’s growling can be then contained into engine room.