Boat Repair, Restoration, Building
This week I had the opportunity to meet one of the more attractive boats in the Charleston area. “Stella” is a 2014 Chris Craft Launch 25, and she came in for some varnish on her brightwork. Here you can see a detail of the port toe rail after the first of two refresher coats. Continue reading “Varnishing Stella”
It’s not too early to start thinking about the finishing program for this boat. I know, it seems ridiculous to be thinking about this at such an early stage, but I want to test several different options for varnishes and urethane clear coats for durability. Considering the effort that goes into finishing, it’s worth gathering a little empirical data to help make the decision. Continue reading “Picking a Color for the Boat”
We talked about patching some rotten wood in the dashboard of a 1949 Chris Craft 17 ft. Deluxe Runabout in an earlier post here. Once we got the staining done, the next step was to lay on a bunch of varnish. In our case, it took about 5 coats of Interlux Schooner 96 to seal in the stain. Then we added about 8 coats of AwlWood MA urethane on top of that to get a really nice, deep gloss. This is the scheme I plan to use for finishing the topsides of the boat as well. The AwlWood is a new product for the U.S. It’s been available in New Zealand for a few seasons, and has held up well there. Continue reading “Finishing the Dashboard”