Monday, March 30, 2009

Crunch Time.......

The major projects are complete; now that only leaves the 1000's of little chickenshit details. US 111 is in the final phases of completion of this winters' refurbishment. The varnish brushes have been put away, along with the countless rolls of sand paper and masking tape. We have now moved onto drill motors, screwdrivers, and Life Caulk. The tape and paper on the decks has been removed, and we are slowly going over every inch of her to make sure we haven't missed anything. Below are a couple of current pictures.............

As you can tell from these pictures we have a lot of little things left to do, but I keep reminding myself that it is not a beauty pageant crown that we are after......

The boat is scheduled to be splashed on Monday morning, April 6 in Alameda......... We will spend the next week finishing the odds and ends that are left and load her up for transport Sunday afternoon......

Monday, March 16, 2009

Shhhhhh.........

No bottom paint.............Some bottom paint...............
Some more bottom paint....................

Somethings are just better kept a secret...................

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Murphy's Law........

Okay, let's talk about this Murphy.......Who is he? Why does he do what he does? I do not like this Murphy guy.......

Recently here at work, in efforts to reduce our power bill a tad, we have decided that we needed to replace all of our high bay light fixtures. The new fixtures came in, and our electrical department started replacing them one by one. Yesterday they made it into the auto shop (aka: The Hayward boat yard). Towards the end of the day, there were only two fixtures left to change out, and those just happened to be located just above the boat. All involved, including our electrical Super, electrical project manager, and our auto shop foreman explained to our electrician doing the work; that if he does anything to that boat, he might as well just pack up his tools and head back over to the union hall and look for another job.

This is were Murphy comes into play...... Our electrician started changing the fixture over the foredeck, very cautiously might I add. He laid some cardboard over the deck and made sure that he stayed well clear of the boat with the lift that he was using. Just as he was making the final connections, his side cutters slipped from his hands and impaled the deck of the boat. OK, so not really impaled, more or less put a gouge in the teak deck. The story I get, is that he started packing up his tools and figured that he was heading back to the union hall.

Well, we all understand that "Shit Happens" and do not let people go for an honest mistake. On a positive note; the new lights work so good you can really see the gouge in the deck. I will be way ahead if this is the worse that happens. So, back to work on the other projects, and try to get the boat back in the water before too long.........

Monday, March 2, 2009

41 Days And Counting.......

There are 41 days left until the first gun of the 2009 season, and US 111 is still in the Hayward boat yard. We can see the end, but in all reality we only have 32 days left until she HAS to be launched to make the first race. Not much time if you weigh in the fact that Knarr US 103 also needs to be hauled and a bottom job done in the same time frame.

Yesterday we applied the final coat of varnish to the cabin, combing, king planks and margin boards. The phenolic is almost complete, with only the hatch rails and wear strips left to finish. We have a ton of stainless steel hardware and fasteners to polish and install. In the next couple of days we will finish all the final touches and remove all the tape from the decks, only to cover the top half of the boat and start working on refinishing the bottom. Below are some pictures that I snapped before heading home Sunday night..........
So far the work done is looking good, now let's see if we can beat the calender..........