This blog is devoted to my John Welsford designed 15' Navigator yawl Ellie. I built her in my garage over a period of 18 months and launched her in 2011. She sports a sliding gunter main, roller furled jib and sprit-boomed mizzen. Her construction is glued-lapstrake over permanent bulkheads and stringers. This blog is a record of her construction and her voyages here in the Puget Sound area and (hopefully) a useful resource for fellow Navigator builders.

Monday, May 2, 2011

Deck paint and Quarter Badges

I've got three coats of paint on the decks and coaming so far.  The color is called "natural wheat" which is just a fancy name for "tan". The rubrails will be painted hunter green which hopefully will provide a pleasing accent.

Originally I wanted to varnish the coamings, but I had to paint them due to having to use 3mm ply in order to make the tight bend at the front.  In retrospect, now I'm glad I painted them. I think if I had gone with varnished mahogany coamings with oiled mahogany seats, they would not have looked well together, or would have resulted in Mahogany Overdose.

With only 3 coats so far, I've still got a fair bit of grain showing through the paint. Many light coats thoroughly sanded between each coat takes care of that.

I also got the "Quarter Badges" glued on with one coat of paint so far. These are purely decorative on Navigator.  On fishing vessels these were used to protect the ends of the planking from chafing of fishing nets and other lines.


The rest of this week will be devoted to the "painting grind" and putting some thought into rigging. Hopefully by this weekend I will be able to make some more sawdust, in the form of the bowsprit and boomkin.
Cheers