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Geoff Jackaman is a great bloke who sails with our group of friends in the west of Melbourne. His
boat (A Class "Wizzle Wozzle") needs some work and he doesn't have the facilities or room to do it,
so I'm lending a hand. (I enjoy the renovation of model yachts) My garage is set up pretty well and I
have lots of leftovers from other jobs to do it with. I've started by cleaning off the remnants of some
old paint stripes and some filling of small cracks etc. I then made a frame for the foredeck hatch.
It's had a hole cut in the deck to access the front rigging chainplates and needs covering. I'm
making it so it has a flush patch that will be sealed with rubber sealant and can be removed by
taking out a few screws and levering it up.
That's it for now. I'll post more as I do it. I'm also doing my Lugger's broken Bowsprit and finishing
my U-Boat build, so I have lots to do!

I made a base of fiberglass that I plugged off with plasticine (I often use it). I then made a hardwood plug to fit the
keel top and drilled it for the eye bolt. I sunk the nut into the bottom of the plug and fitted a bit of clear hose over
the thread with more plasticine in the end to keep the resin out of the thread until set. I poured some resin in and
packed glass fibres until it left just enough room for the plug. It was tapped in and I glassed around and over it.
The eye bolt was covered with tape on top to keep out resin too.
(When I tapped the plug in, I got resin splatterings all over my face! Lucky I had my glasses on aye?!!! What a dill
I can be at times!!!!

I used a black base coat on the stripes and then a clear coat and then a fine
coat of blue metalic followed by lots more clear. I then finished staining and
sanding the deck and spray cleared all over the lot. It looks OK (I think). The
keel is done too. I made a tent peg handle to lift the boat with using the keel
eye bolt.

8 Feb 06

I decided to re-do the deck finish as the odd colours
and a few rough spots just didn't cut it. The clear I
used might have been crook as it went funny after
about half an hour on the boat and all turned weird
and fish-eye like. It might be too old. I stripped it all
back bare and I'm starting from scratch with the
finishing job.
The boat's worth a bit of extra toil to get it as good as I
can. It unfortunately has a few dark patches and marks
that I can't get out, so I'll need to stain it a bit darker.

I've stained her in mahogany which has done
the trick.
Geoff- I hope you don't hate this stain colour!!!
If you do, I can paint it for you as a last resort.
I think it looks OK but you may not like dark
wood. It's awaiting some final coats of clear
and it will then be ready for the fittings etc.
I'll soon be finished and then it's back to the
sub build.

Once I give her a polish up and remove any missed
over-spray etc, (either tomorrow night or Monday
morning) she'll be ready to go Geoff. The final coats
of clear went on pretty well today. It doesn't look bad
at all! I hope you like it when you pick it up. That's the
main thing. It's been worrying me heaps since the
stuff up with the varnish. Everything else went well.
The deck hatch and lifting eye-bolt etc all look OK.
The balance point is slightly further back than the bolt
but I put it as far back as I thought was safe to keep it
strong. It will tilt the boat back a little bit when you lift
it, but that won't matter. To make it balance perfectly,
it'd need to be aft of the keel top, which isn't practical.