The transom, the rear end of the boat, is a fiberglass sandwich with a thin core of wood. The outer fiberglass layer is thicker than the inner. It took thirty-two layers of fiberglass, each sheet progressively larger, to build up the surface over the old holes. Now comes the filler. Piet's applied three coats of filler with two more to follow. Then primer, then paint. And then, of course, the new engine and drive train will be mounted at the boat's centerline. Finally, that looks plausible!
At the same time, I've been scraping the antifouling coat on the hull below the waterline. That's the toxic red-orange stuff in the upper photo. It keeps alga et al. from eating into the hull and has to be renewed every couple of years. I did this in 2013 and vowed not to repeat the nasty experience but the ethos here in Tholen is that owners scrape. At least that's the vibe I'm getting. It seems a ritual of some sort. All I know is, it remains a miserable task but Piet certainly had a devilish giggle mimicking my scraping motions today and Dirk also chuckled as he said, 'You mean you think you've scraped enough?' Turns out I did, by the way. I might have a future as a hull scraper though not one I'd want!
