This is a few days late just due to an immensely busy life at the moment...

Anyways, Terry has made great progress and we're going to see a lot more out of him the very near future as he's busy working hard on getting the boat ready to go back in the water. Here are some pics and details of what he had to do recently (from Terry):

I needed to get the damaged area around the three holes in the aft bulkhead cut out more or less square and filled in with a piece of plywood that I can fiberglass against. The first thing I had to do was relocate the wire coming through one of the holes. This wire is supplying all the electrical power to the boat, so I had to disconnect and remove the old breaker box, relocate the wire, put a temporary plug on the end of it, and plug it back in to restore power so I had lights and could use the Sawzall and grinder.

Here I am cutting out the rectangular hole in the bulkhead from the cabin side below the cockpit floor. The rudder post tube is in the foreground with the grease nipple. Had to be careful not to cut that.

The working area appears roomy in the photo, but is actually about the size of a coffin. You can see the old damaged area in the cut out pieces. Very difficult to try and get it more or less rectangular in these conditions. There is a lot of stuff on the other side of the hole I have to avoid cutting into, and the fan on the Sawsall is throwing all the fiberglass dust in my face.

The replacement piece being cut to shape. This took many many trips between the boat and the bandsaw in the shop, up and down the ladder and crawling back under the cockpit each time to try it against the hole again until I had a good fit.

Looks like snow, but it's actually horrible itchy fiberglass dust from grinding the inner hull. Not fun. (from Graeme here, I know exactly what this stuff is like... it's really horrible and gets in everywhere and anything)

Sweeping up the worst of the dust. (from Graeme again, Terry is very brave and careful to do that, I would just get a strong shop vac in there to get it all out instead of sweeping)

The bottom swept out a bit revealing the smoothed over filled in through-hull holes ready for glassing on the inside. I only got about a quarter of the grinding done last night.

Dry fitting the new filler piece of plywood in place.

Epoxied in place. Lots of cleanup to do here when the epoxy sets. I needed to get this done tonight so it could be setting up while I am working in Richmond tomorrow (well, today, actually). Finished up about 5:30 AM; got home about 6. It's coming up on 7 now, and I have to get a few hours shut eye before heading for Steveston, so into the shower and off to bed.

More to report soon!