More on the winter boat projects

With last week's snow beginning to melt, we were off to the boat on Saturday to see how long it would take to get of cabin up to an at least not painful temperature. The answer is about an hour, during which time we walk around making notes of things we want to do before spring.

Our "patch the triangles" project, which has now consumed much of the winter, is slowly drawing to a close. We've fitted a couple of plywood patches and pieces of 1/8" plywood veneer that bring the patch piece up to a full 3/4" thickness.

We've coated all the pieces with epoxy and once they are in, we'll bed them in marine caulk and fair the edge between the patch and the old wood. Once we've painted it, we assume that no one will ever notice what we're repaired.

With the triangle project out of the way, we need to concentrate on the sliding door that separates the cockpit from the cabin. The wheels that run along the bottom need to be replaced.

We've located the right replacement wheels and we can remove the door quite easily but we don't know how to open the bottom of the door to gain access to the two sets of wheels that support the door. We've also learned that there's nothing "marine" about this sliding door. It's the same door that is used in household applications, which explains why the wheels are readily available.

We suppose we could take the door off the boat and take it to a sliding door expert but that wouldn't be in the spirit of do-it-yourself boating. No, this is one that we have to figure out.

We also have to mount the new LED light that Frances bought at Defender a couple of weeks ago. Finding the right mounting location of a light on our boat isn't a trivial decision. Frances likes things mounted, in the case, exactly on center and we both agree that we hate things just screwed into place anywhere. This has to be done just right.

We made some video of this thrilling day on the boat. OK, not exactly thrilling, but fun to make. It's only five minutes long.