Memorial Day Weekend

Yesterday after work, I went to the storage place and moved the boat to another part and strapped it down for transport. I got a strap and wrapped it up over the boat attaching it to the trailer.

Today, I got up early, hitched up the boat to the truck and got on the road to the marina. The marina is called Green Turtle Bay which also has some cabins/houses for rental and lots of large motor boats, house boats and some sail boats. The marina opens up to Lake Barkley in Kentucky. The marina is about an hour away from where I live. I arrived there around 8am.

I had to wait for the overall manager to come by to talk to then they got it strapped up on the travel lift and lifted it off the trailer.

My boat is dwarfed in comparison to the other boats they had in the yard. This one is called a Sea Ray 52 Sundancer.

anyway, once it was sitting in the travel lift, it was moved out of the way and then the workers got the mast off the trailer and set it up on stands for setup.

By then, it was lunch time. I walked to the other side of the marina to the little restaurant and got a burger. I went to the dock where my boat will soon be and found a guy working on his boat that he got together with his dad and looking at going through the rivers down to the Gulf. We talked for a while then I walked back to the yard just in time to see one of the guys spraying down the bottom getting the old layers off and getting it ready for paint.

It was a beautiful day today and I spent most of it there at the marina. My arms, face and neck are not just red, they're glowing. Still, I enjoyed my time and it's exciting to see the boat getting closer to the water. The yard is also going to setup the mast and check a couple other things for me and it may be in the water in a week or two.

This will be the first time it's been in fresh water and possibly the first time it's been off the trailer in maybe a couple years.

I got to see lots of turtles floating around in the water or others, like these two, that were sun bathing. Usually, they would dive quickly when I walked nearby.

REFIT Plan: Mast & Paint Project

This is a post to show what I plan to do with a mast refit. I have some worn areas on my mast that are worn enough to show the aluminum and old manufacturer stickers that are faded and cracked. I'm looking at refinishing the mast similar to how Drake did in this video below.

Basically, the steps he used (mentioned in the video) were:

• removed all hardware
• Sanded down to bare aluminum
• scrubbed it with Ajax and scotchbrite
• bathed it in alumiprep
• bathed it in alodine
• painted with zinc chromate primer
• painted 5 coats of Awl-Grip 501 primer (alternative currently available: 545)
• sanded
• painted 3 coats of Awl-Grip Awl-Craft 2000 paint

While it looks like Drake painted his mast white, I'm looking at doing something different. I'm thinking of painting the mast yellow. Having a yellow mast would definitely allow the boat to stand out if ever at an anchorage. I've seen pictures of other boats (including another Nor'sea) with a yellow mast and I like how it looks. I found this link with info that looks helpful for this process.

I believe there may be rivets that need replacing. I'm also thinking to look over all the mast hardware to see if any need replacing. The ends of the spreaders seem to be degrading and I will look into whether they can be fixed/replaced, which I might look into when I put the boat in the water this year. I wonder if it's possible to have spreader ends with a spring loaded lock to keep the rigging in place. Anyone know?

Here's a picture of one of them, they both look the same.

An addition to the mast I'm considering is to put a mount on the mast for a new radar head. Scanstrut is the main company I found that have mast mounts that would work.

I want to have the hull, waterline and bottom painted differently. For the topsides I'm looking at a dark red like Awl-Grip's "Claret", with a "Federal Yellow" waterline and a black bottom. Then the yellow mast would match the waterline.

This picture I found on an ad on Yacht World show the colors I'm looking at. This burgundy color is my favorite color.

Again, this refit I'm looking to START sometime around 2015. I'll be pretty busy along the way.

Paint idea

I received the trailer tires. I am going to have a busy weekend switching them out with the ones on the trailer.

I was thinking of an idea that I thought about before. Much of the storage spaces are painted a yellow color. I have been thinking that after Rhapsody is in the water, one of my projects would be to repaint the storage compartments to white. Although the spaces are not seen while everything is closed up but I was thinking it could be good to make everything a little brighter. I was thinking of using white Bilgekote or something else. I've read elsewhere that the main hardware stores carry one part polyurethane that could work on boats just as well as "marine brand" or other places might have an epoxy based paint that might work. I will have to look into what else is out there, no hurry on this.

The spaces I am considering painting is, the sail locker, under and behind the forward seating spaces, under the floor boards, the galley cabinets and the space the batteries are stored. This is just an idea I have and may not get to it for quite a while, if I do it at all, but I thought it would look better than the yellow.

Here are some pictures of what I'm talking about.

 

Maybe even painting the seats themselves would brighten things up. Of course, the cusions will be covering everything anyway so, still, not a priority.