There's No Place Like Home....





It was a bit dismaying to not be working physically on the boat. After all, that is where all the projects that needed to be done could be found. I decided I would work on sanding all that teak I had removed from the boat earlier.This included all the berth and head sliding doors, clapboards, galley stairs, mouldings, storage cabinet doors, drawers, bulkheads, engine panels, helm cupholder and table and the bildge cover. I would sand them, clean the solid brass hinges and add solid brass cabinet fasteners to keep food stuffs and dishes from spilling out into the galley when heeling 30 degrees. (I have always been a dreamer!)

Figure 17 - Reworking a bulkhead on ye ole workbench 

I have worked with wood in the past and I was hoping that most of the pieces were solid teak, but I forget that boats like this were built for families at the right price.  I found that all the cabinets doors, sliding doors and storage doors were made of teak veneer.  Using a belt sander on such pieces would be risky as you can go right through the veneer and then you are stuck with blotches of the real wood.  Taking off the veneer would not help because the quality of the wood's patina surface would not premit it.  So I degreased each piece using Murphy's Oil Soap.  On the tough spots, I used that handy dandy steamer aforementioned.

Figure 18
Bilge cover and more.

 In removing these teak pieces, there was a lot of hardware to keep track of.  As I examined each piece of brass and stainless, I placed them in different plastic tupperware containers to be cleaned at a later date.

There was the need to continuously remember the guiding principal behind the purchase of the Constance Marie.  The overall intent of working these projects was to learn how a  boat is constructed and how things on that boat work.  This is not a restoration but rather more of a resurrection effort realizing that what I take away in knowledge from these efforts, will serve me well on my next boat. So in working these projects, functionality, not appearance was the driver.  I know that this may not be aligned with the thinking of many, but I have only been a sailor for a couple of years and its the performance I am interested in.  The wooden template with all the circles in it in Figure 19 below, is a shelf inlay in the Key Switch cabinet designed to hold jars or cans of all kinds.  I would place food stuffs like nuts, oatmeal, peanut butter, etc in it.

Figure 19 - CETOL is to Teak like like
honey to a bear's tongue! 

You might notice in Figure 19 also, the difference in the dark and deep maroon unfinished appearance of the drawer faces and a CETOL finished "washboard slat" used to secure the boat's entrance into the galley.  The slat was solid teak wood and a sander worked great.  I tend to like the lighter interior colors on an all fiberglass hulled boat like the Hunter 27, however Mr. Cherubini and the 1980's favored that rich boardroom look.  I guess we will see what we can do over time.  Ecletic might win out.  Hey! It's my boat!