I put another coat of epoxy on the stern seat, the thwarts, and the support pieces for the sliding seat. Yesterday I also started sanding down a set of oars I found in Dad's barn. Although they were not the greatest looking set, they did have leather oar collars that seemed to be in good shape. I looked online to figure how to finish them but I still have not found a definitive answer. Varnishing them seems to be the preferred way to finish them according to online forums, but I was wondering about whether I should put epoxy on the blades. The one area of agreement seemed to be to not put any finish on the handles.
Gudgeon do-over
Ooops. I called CLC because I was concerned about the holes I drilled for the gudgeon. In almost every other place in the manual, it is important that all plywood be protected with epoxy, but it didn't say anything about these holes, and they appeared to be low enough to be wet most of the time. I was advised to drill oversize holes and fill them with epoxy thickened with the wood flour to a peanut butter consistency. The drill holes for the gudgeon through the epoxy which means that the plywood would be protected. So, now I've got a few more steps before assembling the stern seat. I took out the screws, put in epoxy, waited a bit for it to set up, and then rubbed the epoxy with alcohol to smooth everything out. Tomorrow, I'll try drilling the holes for the screws and putting the gudgeon back in place.
I also had a chance to ask about finishing my oars and was told to just put on coats of varnish. They will get banged around a lot and it's easier to fix if it is just varnish instead of an epoxy and varnish finish.
 |
| Oversized holes are drilled and filled with thickened epoxy. |
No comments:
Post a Comment