In anticipation of this long weekend we got our sides ready to go...we went back and forth about stain or not and finally decided to go with a light coat of golden oak to bring out the grain.
Next we masked off the bottom 3" of the interior (where it will set against the trailer) and applied a coat of CPES and a coat of sticky black goo.
Then, we flipped 'em over and applied a couple of coats of CPES to the exterior.
We decided to wait & apply a final coat of CPES just prior to applying the varnish because we read here:
http://www.smithandcompany.org/varnishpriming.html this:
The final coat of CPES is the adhesion-promoting primer, and the first coat of varnish must be applied after the solvents have evaporated, but before the CPES resins have fully cured. If you apply that last coat of CPES in the afternoon, then apply the first coat of varnish the next day. The reason CPES works this way as an adhesion-promoting primer is that it is designed to be VERY slow-curing. It actually takes several days, so it finishes curing after the first varnish coat has cured, and thus glues down the varnish with a flexible epoxy glue.
Anyway, we were very happy with the color so far, with the stain and the CPES.
Yesterday, we planned out the rest of our weekly TD time...cuz today, Labor Day, was supposed to be out on the lake with friends. We woke up to a very gusty, windy day (tho not as bad as our Gulf friends and Gustav!) and decided to forego our lake trip. Leo and I looked at each other at the same time & went "Teardrop time!"
So we set up on the lawn, in the shade, where despite the gusty winds it was rather pleasant...and marked out our spar locations for predrilling. We used a little wooden guide to trace the spar locations and then used same for drilling guide holes on the spars. I think we stole the idea from tinksdad...
GEN BEN PLans ROCK!!
Drilling both sides at once
Profile in front of tow vehicle, with Leo making some kind of sawdust at the front.
We also got all of our spars cut & predrilled guide holes using our little guide. We glued together all the double spars and preframed the vent space. (I ordered our Fantastic Vent!!)
Made an appt at the DMV for Thursday, so hope to have it licenced so we can pull off existing taillights next weekend and mount the sides. Next weekend...galley construction begins!