Last week and this weekend we worked on the gunnels. Daddy had already sanded and put a first coat of epoxy on the starboard side during the week, so we sanded that again and put a second coat on while we did the port side, too.
First we drilled out the holes for oarlocks in a block of maple on each side. Used the old fashioned drill - which I was pretty useless at because with the height of the boat I couldn't put enough downward pressure on the drill for it to bite. We finished off the hole with the modern drill, and drilled holes for screws, too. Later these were filled with epoxy glue, then we'll re-drill so no wood is exposed.
The most intense part of Sunday was the sanding. I sanded the maple blocks and gunnels flush. Then we went along and sanded every corner of each maple block so they aren't sharp edges. This worked well using a strip of sand paper from an old belt.
Besides this, we also had to do more sanding on the inside of the boat - removing drips from past coats of epoxy that we missed when cleaning up, some uneven globs around fillets and in corners, etc. Basically everywhere that will be visible (not covered with a seat or deck) has to be sanded perfectly smooth because any old drips show up really well under a new coat of epoxy, and apparently they'll show up under paint!
Once we were sick of sanding and decided we didn't mind having minor flaws in the finish of the boat (really who is going to notice, or mind?) we went ahead and epoxied the whole thing again - gunnels and inside panels. I think this was the last coat for inside the seat compartments, so now we'll be working on putting the seats in, soon-ish.
Then, with warm February weather, we put the mast together - see next post!
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