Twas the night before Christmas and all through the yard.

December 24, 2014

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the yard.
Not a single boat floated as they sat on the hard;

Bottoms were painted and hulls polished with care
All the boats yearned for a flat seas and fresh air;

Slowly then faster, projects ticked off the list,

Preparing to sell what they most surely will miss;

Yes, LightSpeed is for sale. 

LIGHTSPEED SOLD IN 2018

We've spent the last many weeks in Napa Valley Marina attempting to work on projects as California's 'Storm of the decade' brought an average of 1/2" per day for a total of 10 inches since we've been hauled out!    Then once we were ready to launch the boat yard lift trailer went down delaying our launch further.

Despite it all LightSpeed is looking good with here paint touched up and polished.  

Paint repairs on the port bow went really really well.  Rolling and tipping the Awlgrip 'Materhorn white' paint took time and many coats, but the results are superb.

 Gori propellers and freshly painted bottom looking good.

 Water beading up on the freshly touched up paint on the sterns.  All those little 'dinghy bites' are long gone.

 Another look at the port bow paint repair.

 Outside of port bow after a polish, but not yet waxed when this photo was taken.

Gori propeller looking pretty shinny.

Wishing everyone a happy holiday break.  

LightSpeed raft up with Fast Company

Both of these Atlantic 42cats are currently for sale.

 Fast Company and LightSpeed  at a chance meeting near near Friday Harbor, San Juan Islands, Washington State circa 2011.

LightSpeed is a Lombardi built in the USA and Fast Company a Bongers built in South Africa.

This is passage making on LightSpeed.  Near Midway island in the Central Pacific and halfway from the Marshall Islands to the Aleutian islands.

Stormy weather at the Napa Valley Marina

December 12, 2014

Despite the awful weather of late and a few rain delays last week, our haul out projects are progressing nicely.  Now that LightSpeed is for sale, we want to ensure she is as close to perfect for the new owners as possible.... we take lots of pride in having owned LightSpeed and want her to sparkle.

We've posted in the past about some of the equipment upgrades along the way; engines, transmissions, propellers, standing rigging, radar, instruments, autopilot, etc.

What we haven't mentioned is the small details, like replacing the PERKO cabinet hinges, varnishing cabinet pulls, replacing sink faucets with high end quality Grohe fixtures.

Here's what we're working on at this haulout:

Antifouling Paint:
Pressure wash bottom
Sand bottom with 80 grit paper
Paint with Interlux Ultra with Biolux







Topsides paint repair at port bow:












Yep, no small projects...
Sand
Fair
Prime
Fair
Prime
Sand
Paint with first coat of Awlgrip
Sand
Paint with second coat of Awlgrip
Sand
Paint with third coat of Awlgrip
Sand
Roll and Tip with fourth coat of Awlgrip.

Boot Stripe and sterns:
As is often the case, we had a little project creep. After the first coat of paint went on the bow, we thought wow that looks nice, so we decided to expand the scope of our project and repaint the shadow like waterline boot stripe.  While we were at it, the sterns looked like they could use a  repaint after years of dinghies bumping into the them.  So, in the end the sterns got 4 coats of paint and the boot stripe 2 coats. Painting is the fun part, it all the sanding and masking between coats that takes so much time!

Saildrive service:
Replace sail drive oil with Marine grade 80/90 weight API 4.5 oil

Paint Saildrives:
Interlux Tri-lux a special paint for marine alloy.

Gori Propeller Service:
Disassemble propellers
Clean
Polish

Zincs:
Replace Gori propeller zincs
Note:  Zincs on Yanmar saildrive look perfect.




Yesterday we had 3.2" of rain and winds to 40mph.


When the rain lets up, we still have a few days of work ahead, but with the major painting projects behind us it just simple stuff now.

Polish the top sides paint and wax.

Mask and cut in paint at waterline.

That's it for now.

Haul out at Napa Valley Marina

Guiding on to the bunks at Napa Valley Marina, Napa California.  Yep, we're hauling out in wine country.

Ready to come out of the water.

This trailer is pretty cool.

Pressure washing.  Bottom paint still looks great.  Just blowing off the slime.   We'll sand and prep and paint with International Ultra with Biolux

Prepping for paint on the port bow.  Paint failed just above waterline as a result of a well intentioned helper at our last haulout in Fiji.  Our helper used some unknown 'cleaner' on the hull on this section,  I noticed the strange smell and stopped him.  Later the hull paint failed, then thousands of miles of rushing water peeled off some more paint.

 This photo shows the pristine condition of LightSpeeds Baltec core and epoxy construction.   What I love is the perfectly fair hull, there is zero bog on the hull... just paint.    Bog is fairing filler that it is used to smooth things out.  Zero bog is a great indicator of true craftsmanship by the builder Lombardi Yachts in Virgina, USA and makes for a light high performance boat.