A butterfly emerges ...

Trevor sanding the filler.

And at last the rusty hulk that had become a battleship grey submarine becomes a pristine white beauty. Well, almost. 

Teamwork conquers all: Merven and Francois sanding

We are dodging forecasts of rain, badly needed in the reigning drought, but still a problem in our painting program. And a short side trip to Cape Town took an important week out of our dry weather, but made up in good foor and wine. 

Is that going to be a submarine? Well, no longer!
The transformation begins.

So three guys from a shelter for homeless people came to help me 'flat' the hull, which means sanding it until it is a matt finish, which is good 'tooth' for the final coat of paint. And we discovered that the Carboguard undercoat is amazingly hard, so hard it blunts the sandpaper within minutes. 

I also took the angle grinder to the offending filler, and re-filled, but very frugally this time. Still a few small blemishes, but we are getting there. 

Then the girl at the paint place suggested we thin the 2K paint to 30 %, which made it much too thin, so we have a number of runs. And some water in the air line did not help, neither did the new spray gun: someone said we should turn the metering needle out, Eric demonstrated that it should be all the way in with the thin paint. The gun should be held away from the work, no, near the work... The learning curve continues. 

Adding a few extra microns where it is needed

Well, this week we should have time to flat it again, spray polyurethane on the decks, a second coat of epoxy on the hull, and make some progress with the mast step and other fittings. 

My thanks to David and Bongani who helped over weekends and did the major painting, Eric from Profection who showed us how it should be done. Merven, Koketso, Robert and Francois helped sanding, Prince cleaned and washed, Trevor sanded and advised. 

David admiring his handiwork.

As the Terminator said: I'll be back!