For the last few weeks I have been “preparing”. Basically, thinking about, talking about getting the boat ready, spending money in “preparation”, making excuses, doing just about anything but working on the boat. Today I started actual work.
1. Sanding the bottom: This is the first time I have ever painted the bottom and I thought, misguidedly that all I needed to do was sand it up a bit and slap it on. As one of my clubmates, explained to me, I was sorely wrong. Welshman, Mike, a clearly very experienced sailor and fixer of boats, gave me the look a patient physics teacher would give faced with a child who after 3 years still just can’t wrap his head around Newton’s principles. He tried all his best not to be patronizing but my ignorance was too much for him. He recommended that I take the bottom down to the gelcoat. He is of course, correct as my bottom looks like the surface of the moon (OK, OK, you know I mean Messing About’s bottom). The fact is I don’t have enough time till haul-in day. Or the mental fortitude. That said, I bought a rotary sander and spent 2 hours sanding the crap out of the bottom and then used acetone as advised by Mike to remove the dust. Tomorrow, I will start painting.
2. Restoring and Waxing the Hull: I bought this frickin’ amazing 3M product called Restorer and Wax. I applied it, rubbed it in with a buffer and then polished it and hey presto, the hull is shiny. I was staggered by how effective this was. It looks, if not as good as new, pretty damn good. Very satisfying.
3. Prepping to Service the Outboard: The infernal mechanical thing on the stern, aka TFO (That ******* Outboard) needs servicing. I am so mechanically incompetent that when Mike talked me through what I needed to do to it, he seemed pretty horrified at my ignorance. Bless him, he tried not to show it. Anyway, I bought a bunch of stuff and next week, he is going to help me pressure-test it.
I am loving life at the club. The two guys working on the boats either side of me were also incredibly helpful, offering helpful advice and lending me stuff.
Progress not Perfection.
I shouldn’t worry, if you don’t know you don’t know do you. I had much the same experience. I’m going into my third season as an owner and I’ve had to go through a huge learning curve. Just be thankful you’ve got mentors all around you who love to opportunity to demonstrate how much they know. Incidentally, when you’ve got to grips with the outboard service, ahem, you could always post up a tutorial for those, ahem, who could use the knowledge 😀
That’s one of the beautiful things about a sailing club or yacht club. There are always wise sages and old salts around who are willing to help the novices learn. For the salts an sages, it’s almost a sacred mission, to spread the gospel of sailing.
The RGSC is considering having a special “Salts and Lubbers” regatta, which would pair up old salts and relative newcomers to sailing (or at least to sailboat racing) in two-person crews. Based on my experiences with Zorro over the past couple of years, as I have learned racing, I think it’s a fantastic idea.
Meanwhile, on outboard service … there may be something useful coming up soon on Five O’Clock Somewhere.
The thing I have found in any new activity, especially one as complex as this is that To Do The Right Thing Well, you have to start by Doing the Right Thing Badly. You can’t cut corners. The other thing is that doing the work on the boat at the club is a lot more fun than being on my own in a yard. I am loving it!