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Refit of “Retzina”

Compis 28

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Short summary of this report

There are many pleasure crafts, both powerboats and Sailing yachts built during the 70´s and 80´s that starts to look a bit weather worn. Most often there are no problems with the structural parts of the boats, they just don´t look nice any longer. I own a 28 feet sailing yacht built 1972 that were in great need of a “refit” and I did this huge job during a year.

I refurbished most parts of the boat, the engine, the hydraulic system, the interior, the rig and what this report will deal with.

My report will cover following steps;

Background of the restoration

Materials and products I used

How the work was done

Show plenty of pictures of my dear Retzina

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Background

I bought my COMPIS 28 in April 1998, I found an ad in the paper, I just couldn´t resist it. The former owner didn´t exaggerate… but we agreed about a price and suddenly I was the owner of a boat called BEDA.

The main errors on the boat can be described as follows; the white hull was very matt and full of small blisters at the freeboard, the hydraulic system had a tiny leakage, the sails were as old as the boat that is 1972. The fact that it was a Farymann diesel engine installed didn´t bother me, I had heard it was a terrific engine. (Apart from the fact that the hydraulic system could leak)

According to a boatyard that the former owner had talked to, the blisters at the freeboard were Osmosis and it would be very expansive to get it repaired. I thought it was strange that there were no blisters below the waterline. At this time I didn´t know that much about Osmosis but I decided to use the boat one summer and see how it looked when the boat came ashore next autumn.

In the autumn, when the boat was put ashore I immediately examined the underwater body, but I could not find any blisters. But I found out that the hull was painted… under the matt white surface I found blue gel coat. The supposed Osmosis could be explained with two possible scenarios;

Before the paintjob, they had not managed to remove silicone from wax that had been used on the hull?

The base paint layer wasn´t water-resistant?

I decided to wait with this huge project until I had better time and space. After all, there was no hurry, the hull just didn´t look as nice as I would like.

During the years 1999 – 2004 I had to fix some issues that could not wait. I made some rewiring and marking of old cables, the most common colors at the cables were red and blue. The hydraulic system were leaking and I didn´t get it completely done before the big restoration, more about that later.

The ad that sold the boat

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The sails were really old so I bought some at different occasions and I replaced the old rolling boom with a modern reef able boom.

The charging was a disaster; there was a TWC-regulator and a 90 Amp generator mounted but I wasn´t aware about that at the premiere tour. The result came after a few hours; the start battery steamed the acid in the fore cabin. The battery got as hot, that the lids melted and fell in to the cells.

The worst was when the propeller suddenly stopped turning; it showed that a connection between the engine-axle and the propeller axle had broken. This happened when we backed out from our pier at the first day of our vacation and we didn´t get it fixed until the holiday was over.

Project RETZINA

We didn´t have a name for the boat, the old name; BEDA didn´t suit us. I had an idea that when the boat was in good shape, her name should be “RETZINA”. For the ones that don´t know what it is; It´s a Greek wine that has a taste of Pine resin. Some love it and some hate it, no one´s neutral to the taste.

Materials and products

I started this huge renovation by finding out what products to use. There were many different procedures to keep in mind; therefore I decided to use one brand for all “chemical” products. I believed that could save me some troubles with non-compatible products.

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I choose “International Yachtpaint”, they had almost everything I needed and it was easy to find the products in many stores and the datasheets at the internet. I read carefully about all the different practical stuff that were urgent to know, to plan how, when and in what order everything was supposed to be done. As a rookie, it was lots of new terminology to learn and safety precautions to think of.

I decided to give some dealers the possibility to give me a nice price; after all, there was some money to save. The best price and service came from a shop in Uddevalla, they offered the following prices:

Detaljnr Kulör Namn Mängd

YHF991 Mauritius Blue F991 Perfection 3lit 4x0,75 4x388 1552

YRA302 Blå 302 Perfection Undercoating 3lit 4x0,75 4x319 1276

YAA900 YAA900-Klar Epiglass HT 9000 Standard 3,75 1x3,75 1000

YAA222-Grön Gelshield Plus 4,5 2x2,25 2x1055 2100

YAA222-Blå Gelshield Plus 4,5 2x2,25 2x1056 2100

YPA212-Grön Gelshield 200 5 lit 2x2,5 2x600 1200

YPA403-Grå Interprotect 2,5 lit 1x2,5 800

Interfill 833 Standard 5lit 2000

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I saved about 4000 Sek compared to listed price, but there were some things they didn´t have that I

had to buy at other places

Many products from International Yachtpaint

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Hard work

What is the best way to remove the paint from the freeboards and under-water body?

I tested some methods, scraping, grinding with different machines and sandpapers with different grain sizes.

At the freeboards, only the paint should be removed, without damaging the gel coat. I found a Metabo oscillating grinder to be the best I could use. It´s important to have a powerful and stabile machine that not give you “white fingers”. Then I started the time-consuming work, finding that the sand-papers I bought were really bad. I tested several brands but none of them last many minutes.

Lucky enough, a friend recommended a professional store and they had really nice sandpapers. They were much more expensive but they lasted much longer so I earned both money and time by using them.

At the underwater body I had to grind down to the glass fiber, in other words, I had to remove the entire gel coat, which forced me to use a rougher and faster method than for the freeboard. I decided to use a disc grinder and really rough fiber discs. Once again, the fiber discs I started with only last for about 0,25 m² and they were time-consuming to change. At the professional store they had the right stuff, they were twice the price but last for more than 1 m².

Metabo SXE 450 Turbo Tec Diameter backing pad 150mm Idle speed 4200-11000 / min Rated input power 350 W Power output 180 W Speed at nominal load 8500 / min Slewing Circle 2.8 / 6.2 mm

Bosch disc grinder GWS 10-125 Diameter disc 125 mm Idle speed 11000rpm / min Rated input power 1020 W Dust shield with possibility to connect a Hoover®

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Difficult times

Finally I could get a flow in the work but the strange blisters at the free-boards made me curious, why had they occurred? Now I could for sure see they were only in the paint, not the gelcoat as the yard had told the former owner.

The freeboards were soon blue instead of the ugly white color and I could get a glimpse of how the boat should look in its new/old blue color, nice! Now the really hard job started, to remove all the gelcoat below the waterline and 3 cm above. It showed to be a work that demanded precision, to be efficient I had to use fiber discs with grain size 24 to start with. If I relaxed for a second I made deep “holes” in the laminate that should need lots of filler.

When most of the gelcoat was gone, I could use grain 36 and even 80 to do the last bits. Before I came that far in the work, I detected an old damage in the hull as someone had repaired really badly.

Sandpaper to the Metabo grinder, grain size 80, 120, 240, 420 and 800

Fiber discs to the disc grinder, grain size 24, 36 and 80 plus the support disc. The three at top of picture didn´t work well. (Waste of money)

Blisters in the paint, not the gelcoat

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Darkness

I understood that the summer had to be a non-boating summer. The laminate was soaked with water and the more I grinded, the more water came up. I read in my book “Plastbåtsvård” to find out what to do and I decided to take away the most damaged areas, to have some solid laminate to build from.

When the most damaged laminate was removed, I realized I had to let the time and summer do the drying. But when the autumn came, it wasn´t dry! Then I had to put a heater inside to dry the last of the water, it took the whole winter before it was completely dry.

From left, reinforcement made of Divinycell covered with fiberglass, Inner liner Bb berth, bulkhead between pantry and berth, inner liner pantry.

The second biggest damage, the edge you see is aft of the pantry

The third and smallest damage

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During the winter I overhauled the engine and interior, sometimes it felt overwhelming with all that had to be done. The pictures show how it looked when it was as worst.

Finally I could get on with building the laminate; the spring came with the temperatures that were needed. I had decided to use Epoxy and it need to be at least 10 degrees C to work with it. I used cloth of glass fiber; I had heard and read that epoxy couldn´t wet the normal mat you use with polyester. The cloth I got was very thin/light and that forced me to put very many layers to build the same thickness as the old laminate. I used a lot of filler in the end to get it done.

The engine and hydraulic pump Engine room and fore cabin

The holes has got the first layers of glass fiber

Several layers with epoxy and glassfiber covered with filler

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Finish(ing) The holes were repaired, now I could start with the job I had planned, put epoxy primer at the underwater body and paint the freeboards. How many layers were to be done?

Freeboard

2 layers Perfection 2 comp Polyurethane undercoat

1 layer Interfill between undercoat layers

3 layers Perfection 2 comp Polyurethane varnish

Grinding between all layers with 320 or 420 grain and before the last layer of varnish I used grain 800

Use “tack rag” before every layer paint, to remove any dust

To get the best finish at every layer I used a roller to get the paint really well attached to the hull. I rolled in four directions as the picture shows.

After the roller I used a really fine brush to take every little air bubble away. Best and easiest is to stroke vertical.

I made stripes about 40 cm wide and every new stripe you go in to the former, wet in wet to avoid any joints in the surface.

Almost nothing left that shows the damages

No trace of the holes

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Underwater body

1 layer Epiglass, pure epoxy primer

1 layer Gelshield+, blue epoxy primer that I had to putty

1 layer Gelshield 200, green epoxy primer

1 layer Interfill, filler to make the hull plain

4 additional layers Gelshield with “200” as last layer

2 layers antifouling

Two layer undercoat, before grinding

Gelcoat grinded before the first layer of undercoat

The third and last layer of varnish applied Mirror picture from the hull

Two layers of undercoat before grinding

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The epoxy primer can be painted without any grinding in between if you follow the specified timetables in the data sheets. For me the temperature made it possible to paint two layers per day and it saved a lot of time and work. If the surface is a bit sticky, it´s ok to put on the next layer.

Keel

2 layers Interprotect, metal Epoxy primer

1 layer Interfill

2 layers Interprotect, metal Epoxy primer

1 layer Gelshield 200

2 layers antifouling

Pure epoxy at the raw laminate Eight layers of epoxy products done, just two layers of antifouling to apply

The keel with undercoat and filler The 3M brush I used to grind the keel free from rust and paint

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Sources

Internet

http://www.yachtpaint.com

Books

PLASTBÅTSVÅRD BY BJÖRN PETER BEHRENS

ISBN: 9789197009461

Lars Sjöström

Klockaregården

668 95 Ödskölt

Tel: +46(0)706 04 77 77

LOSjostrom@gmail.com

Klockaregarden.wordpress.com

LarsSjostrom.com

2011-11-28