Our 1947 Chris-Craft cedar-planked U22 blew past a major milestone today. Her deck, gunwales and transom have been sanded fair, stained with Lake Oswego Boat Co. J’eld stain – Post-War Chris-Craft, and sealed with multiple coats of Smith’s CPES.
Next we will scuff sand these surfaces using medium Scotch Brite pads, clean them with Acetone-dampened shop towels and begin applying Pettit Flagship High-Build varnish.
After applying about 15 coats, and because they will be painted white, we will fill the deck seams using mahogany Sikaflex, paint them white Interlux Boottop and Striping Enamel and then apply the final five or so coats using Pettit Z-Spar Captain’s Ultra Clear varnish, thereby adding UV protection to the paint.
Our 1956 19’ Chris-Craft Capri Runabout is upright again! Joe has focused on repairing damaged deck and engine hatch framing, after which he fabricated the new deck planking made necessary by the previous “restorer’s” butchery.
Happily, Joe resawed a 5/4 FAS grade Philippine mahogany plank that was long and wide enough to saw out and replace all the offending deck and hatch planks. The result is book-matched planking from bow to transom.
Several of the retained foredeck planks’ edges had been severely beaten up by the previous folks, so he fashioned 1/8” thick strips, which he wrapped in wax paper and inserted into the seams temporarily. Using TotalBoat ThixoWood from Jamestown, he was able to fill the gouges and leave a dead straight knife edge behind.
He is now having way too much fun sanding the decks, covering boards and engine hatch fair, after which we will bleach with Daly’s A & B Wood Bleach and stain using Loboat J’eld stain – Chris-Craft Post War.
Four full coats of CPES will be followed by launching varnishing, which will continue until we’ve built 20+ coats.
Having emptied her innards and flipped her, we are hard at removing decades of paint, some sort of Bondo-like material, West epoxy and more from our 1959 16.5’ Lyman runabout hull’s exterior. The image is anything but pretty, as you should have noticed by the thumbnail at the front end of this clip.
Much of what is on the hull is over 3/16” thick with some sort of West Epoxy layers between layers of paint. As of shooting this clip, we have consumed six gallons of industrial paint stripper. She is severely hogged. Her failed keel, keelson and multiple ribs must be replaced. Multiple strakes’ aft tails are rotted through and through. Her keel is gone and must be replaced. The spray rails are gone, having been poorly repaired and partially replaced at some time. Her strakes are fastened with an array of screws and clench nails.
We will aim at de-hogging her, if that is a word, and repairing/replacing much more. In my world, this little runabout is among Lyman’s most iconic family models. We must save her, but the hill we must climb doing so will be steep and long.
What a great milestone to have disappearing in our wake.
Once the wood dried down to 5%-10% moisture content, which required applying Dalys A & B Wood Bleach, mixed 3B:2A, twice, the uniformity we sought was achieved.
Now that we have scuff-sanded the entire surface with medium grit Scotch Brite pads, it is time for bleaching her with Mike Mayer’s Lake Oswego Boat Co. Post-War Chris-Craft J’eld stain.
We are now standardized on J’eld stain, whether it is sourced directly from Wood Kote, or most often from Mike. The advantage of using Mike’s products is that he offers a wide array of stains formulated to match original company stains exactly.
Let’s give credit where credit is due. Credit for this excellent Dutchman repair of the 1956 19’ Chris-Craft Capri’s bullnose goes happily and totally to Joe.
The fix is in and the glue is curing. Tomorrow he can execute the final sanding in after he’s addressed the tiniest of voids with his no not-so-secret sauce: TotalBoat Thixo Wood 2:1 Epoxy can be stained!
Joe will mix up a batch using the same Jel’d stain we will use on the hull and pay it. Once it’s cured and sanded, the seam will disappear.
With the battens and planks repaired, one of which will receive another Dutchman from the hands and mind of Joe, they will be installed and sanded fair, and it will be time to bleach. Her topsides will be stained, sealed and varnish will begin soon!
As is so often the case with antique and classic wooden boat preservation, vessels tend to keep secrets. Our 1956 19′ Chris-Craft Capri Runabout gave no hint of what previous butchers had done to her and the horrific water trap they created in the process.
She let us in on this secret yesterday as Joe was finishing sanding her topsides fair. “We are almost to bleaching! I have only the last four or so feet to do on each side and I will be at the bow.” Right. Then his inline sanded started throwing up chunks, and suddenly, he had broken through a plank just aft of the bullnose bow.
Careful probing told the story. Our Capri’s bullnose is severely rotted along its starboard margin, as are the forward ends of the top three planks. One plank on port is rotted through as well. All of it is because the butchers were too lazy to address foredeck framing issues properly, by releasing planks rather than reaching for a circular saw and simply making an athwart cut through them all the way across the deck.
A sloppy athwart seam butt joint “repair” failed, of course. The seam opened at some point, allowing water to infiltrate and keep the planks and bow wet. Talk about a perfect storm for rot! As I explain in the clip, Joe will address the bullnose rot using a Dutchman repair. Then the offending planks will be replaced, which is both best for the boat and likely also best for her owner as it’s a least-cost path relative to trying to scab new planking onto the ends of the existing and rotted planks.
Now that I have released the damaged planks, I am tooth-picking, filling each and every screw hole in the frames and battens with three white ash toothpicks and Gorilla Glue. It is a tedious, gooey task, but is the only right way to go. (Toothpick source: https://cibowares.com/products/plain-round-toothpicks)
Replacing the #8 with #10 screws is absolutely the wrong way to go. The holding power of that aged wood is compromised, and, since the #10’s have larger heads than the #8’s, larger countersinks must be driven, which, in turn requires inserting larger bungs, if you can find them. Go the lazy way and you “earn” weak fastening and wood bungs that are noticeably larger than all the others on your boat. UGHHHHH!
How I wish that wood boat enthusiasts and self-styled restorers never discovered orbital or random orbit sanders! Why? There is no better way to transform reasonably fair planking into a moonscape. Sadly the guys who butchered this 1956 19’ Chris-Craft Capri Runabout were not satisfied with destroying her foredeck, her engine bay hatch cover and so much more. Nope. They also felt a need to have their way with her using orbitals.
We have her topsides stripped, and I began doing some sanding while we were closed, but Joe is our go-to guy for fairing hullsides, decks, transoms and more. Now that we are open and working behind locked doors, Joe can turn his attention to fairing her hullsides to perfection.
Doing so, however, is hugely time consuming. Using only an inline sander, Joe begins by drawing slanted pencil lines every few inches along the hull. If the surface is fair, the sander follows the surface and the line evaporate uniformly. However, the damage the butchers wrought was immediately evident when we began sanding and only bits and pieces of lines sanded away. He will sand across the grains, guided by the lines until he reaches the stern and has the entire hullside absolutely fair. But now he must sand with the grain until all the deep 40 grit scratches are gone.
(We would normally reach for our Hutchins 16” longboard pneumatic sanders for this task, but, thanks to Mr. Murphy, all three of ours decided to fail today. A new one is on its way and it will be used for the next stage of Joe’s fairing process.)
That will be accomplished by first sanding with the grain using 60 grit, followed by doing so one more time with 80 grit.
Then it will be bleaching time, and bringing out the Daly’s A & B Bleach, which we mix 3:1 B:A, which achieves an absolutely white snow field once the wood dries after being kept wet continuously for at least six hours.
Staining is just peaking its head over the horizon. Soon ………..
Here is a bit of fun – My first attempt at a time lapse video as I apply the third coat of Interlux 2000E Barrier Coat to the bottom of the 1956 19′ Chris-Craft Capri.
Tools:
Disposable roller tray
Seven-inch yellow foam roller cover
West System Epoxy roller covers are not required as I can apply a coat to the entire bottom using one low rent cover
Three-inch chip brush
Long sleeves for me and good rubber or latex gloves
Here is what is involved when we do bottom work to repair or replace a traditional bottom. No, I am not asserting that our way is the only or the best way. What follows below is what currently works for us today. However, preserving wood vessels is an evolving journey along which best practices and best materials evolve continually. Remember that there was a day when paying 5200 into bottom plank seams was dogma! But flexible marine epoxy products were not even a glimmer on the researcher’s bench then.
No well-informed restorer would ever, ever, ever pay 3M5200 into bottom planking seams today.
Piston-driven pneumatic or battery-powered caulking gun
Flexible putty knife
Vice grips for changing mixing tube
Sand bottom and chines –
Sixty grit followed by 80 grit paper.
Using either an inline or random orbit sander is fine, since you need not worry about cross-grain scratches beneath paint. If you use the random orbit sander, do take special care to keep it moving constantly, less you create a moonscape that you truly do not want.
Seal – Apply FOUR full coats on Smith’s Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer – CPES. Apply the first two coats immediately one after the other. (Use the inexpensive alternatives on the market at your peril.)
Our 1956 19-ft. Chris-Craft Capri has had a tough life, what with being assaulted by inept and worse “restorers” a decade or so ago.
We have recently reported on the travesties visited upon her decks, stem and engine hatch. Now that she’s been flipped, are we surprised to discover additional assaults perpetrated against her bottom?
The good news is that, save for needing refastening and a few minor repairs, her bottom planking is in excellent condition.
That said, and other things equal, she still needs a True 5200 bottom. However, as so often happens in life, other things are not equal. While her owner agrees that there is a True 5200 bottom in her future, given all we must preserve elsewhere on her hull and engine, it will not happen now, a decision we agree with based on our detailed and extensive examination of her bilge and its inner bottom planking.
The real issue in the bilge is lots of grease, oil and grime. Yes, that layer is pretty much gone directly beneath the engine, so we will release and execute repairs there. After we remove endless strings of useless cotton roving in some seams, roving that was not sealed with any sort of caulking compound, and yards and yards and yards of failed 5200 in others, we will refasten large parts of the bottom and then apply four coasts of Clear Penetrating Epoxy Sealer – CPES. We will then pay the seams with Jamestown Distributors’ TotalBoat ThixoFlex and sand the bottom fair.
Following applying three more coats of CPES we will prime with Pettit Tie Coat Primer and then apply three coats of Pettit Copper Bronze Hard Racing Bottom Paint.
Now that Methyl Chloride has been banned, and we can no longer source “good” paint stripper, we have turned to TotalBoat TotalStrip Paint Stripper. No, it is not what Circa 1850 was, but it is user friendly and we are adjusting to applying it and then coming back 24 – 48 hours later. It is still wet and has liquefied many layers of paint, even bottom paint, by then.
Finally, we’ve all faced challenges stripping concave hullsides. Using a standard, straight-bladed scraper risks leaving skid marks at each end of the blade while the center floats above the wood. A good friend suggested we try an Allway Tools 2-1/2-Inch 4-Edge Metal Tubular Wood Scraper, the blade edges of which are slightly convex. At only about $8 for a handle and 4-edge blade, why not? Bingo! It works beautifully … nary a skid mark appears behind each stroke.
