Into The Osmosis Shed

It's a brilliant sunny day with a deep blue sky, such a change from the pouring rain that we've had so often recently. So where are we, inside the shed at HYC, where they do all the osmosis treatment, with minimal natural light. It's a dusty old place with limited access but will be great when the rain returns.

The little Contessa has been lifted up on chocks and tied up to the roof girder work so that the minimum of props are required giving excellent access to the hull. Just before being moved inside the hull was grit blasted and steam cleaned to get rid of all contaminants leaving a rough surface in contrast to the smooth one left after the peeling. It's now time to dry her out before resurfacing which is accelerated by the "Hot Vac" process. Large red patches connected to a controller  are positioned over the hull, three at a time, and kept in place by vacuum pressure. Inside them are electric elements that warm up the hull to a pre-determined temperature, 80 degrees in our case. Jim, the man how does the osmosis stuff, wants a lower  temperature than usual as the hull is relatively thin. He carefully explained that the first numbers over the hull are the initial moisture readings; as the hull is dried out by the pads these readings are crossed out and replaced by later ones. The objective is to dry the hull from a starting reading of about 20 over most of the surface to under 5 everywhere; it's going to "take as long as it takes"

Not surprisingly, it's quite warm inside, rather nice for a change! With the next few weeks under cover it's time to take advantage of this protection from the weather and take out the cabin port lights for refurbishing and resealing. There are eight in total, two large and two small ones on each side. Most have been re-sealed at some time since Jeremy Rodgers built the yacht and a variety of sealants used ranging from a filthy black one to a clear one that sticks like araldite. Last time I did this job on the Storm 33, the screws were difficult but they came out easily; this time the screws were fairly straightforward to remove but as for removing the lights...  A couple came out easily, a couple "difficult", and couple were a nightmare only giving up after repeated "persuasion" with a 4lb hammer, prising with an old  screwdriver and cutting of sealant with a stanley knife. There's quite a pile of windows and surrounds now, It's not clear how much of the aluminium trim can be refurbished, I fear quite a bit might need replacement. 

So the hull has become even more bare than before with them all out of the way, together with the sliding hatch, which needed replacement. The main saloon hatch, a gebo one, has come out too for re-sealing as it had been badly installed and leaked onto the wood surround. It was also time to strip out the Instrument housing which needed to be altered to accommodate the Garmin instruments to replace the Mariner analogue dials that, although full of character, didn't work.