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9610 Commonwealth Ave., Jacksonville, FL 32220
Sanding Aft Deck and Bilges, Plus Bilge Paint (1-18-25)
Jan 18, 2025
Arriving at Biscuit, my first order of business was to sanding the fairing filler applied the day before on the aft deck repair, as well as a couple other spot-faired areas on the decks. With the larger 6" DA, I brought the area down to fair with the balance of the aft deck - as well as those two additional spot-faired areas. I could see a few additional areas requiring another round of fairing compound, but these were few and the fairing required only minimal. The vast majority of my time was spent hand-sanding the bilges with 80 and 60-grit paper, reaching as far up into the bilges as feasible.
This is always a task low on the I'm-Looking-Forward-To-It scale, but with the right music or podcast this too can be suffered through. I was able to wrangle the 5" palm sander and small Makita belt sander into a few lockers to removed some messy lamination work from the factory - something I could not have done by hand. Calling things "good", I thoroughly vacuumed the surfaces, followed by a liberal solvent-wash to remove any remaining contaminates.
The paint I chose to apply to the bilges is TotalBoat's TotalBilge - a one-part epoxy-based paint that is durable for this harsh boat environment. I applied the paint with a 4-inch roller and brush. This is most likely one of two coats to be applied.
Total Hrs: 3.75
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