Panel beating on the portside

More cutting than beating really.

I cut the 2nd panel today. Made a pretty good job of it (I thought!). Here it is:

Anyway, it fit almost perfectly, but there was a little high spot at the side where the bulkhead is fibreglassed to the side of the boat. Rather than try and grind down the high spot (which creates dust and may also remove a bit of strength, I decided to trim the panel a bit. Of course I went too far and the section that lines the window now has a big chip out of it!. Fortunately, as I plan to cover the panels in contact type sticky plastic film, I should be able to fix it. Also, there will be the wooden or plastic framing around all the edges, so that should mask any mistakes. I didn't take a picture of it as I was rather annoyed at myself.

However, before all of that I had to remove some screws that were still embedded in the bulkheads and file down screws that had snapped when I tried to remove them (and had jagged edges sticking out). I used a metal file and it took about an hour or so as I could only use an inch or so of the file.

To remove the screws, I borrowed some mole grips. However, even screwed down, I could not get enough purchase on the siezed screws. With necessity being the mother of invention, I came up with this:

It is a fork and spoon nestled together, on one side of the mole grips. On the other side I had a knife. Using the cutlery, I was able to get a really good grip on the screws and eventually ease them out.

I will probably have to wait until next weekend to fix them to the bulkheads. One question I do have is what to use to glue them to the bulkheads? I am thinking a thin layer of some sort of grab adhesive, as there is no structural element to these. Any suggestions appreciated!

I had spent about half an hour scraping the sides with the windows that will be carpeted, to remove all the excess glue still left. This created a load of muck, so I then spent some time cleaning and hoovering the whole boat (yet again!).

One job that has needed doing for a few weeks now is cleaning the bilge.There was some raw epoxy that had spilled into the bilge a while back and although I had removed the bulk of it, I needed to clean it properly with acetone. This involved using (and sacrificing) a load of sponges and clean cloths. Never mind, at least the bilge is not sticky to the touch anymore. I wore industrial rubber gloves when doing this job as I find you can never get you hands clean using soap and water and I believe rinsing with acetone in not really a good thing.

More to follow....