I managed about an hour of work on the boat today. I started sanding at the bow of the inboard side of the hull. The inboard side has a much different shape to the outboard side, and unlike the outboard side there is more of a curve to the hull both top to bottom and from bow back as the hull flares wider. This presents both problems and advantages for fairing. The advantage is that irregularities on a curve are harder to see than on a panel that should be flat but isn’t, and difficulties in that a curve is harder to fair than a flat section. This is where the Bohler is quite handy. The 3 sanding heads are on pivots and can sand curved sections (both convex and concave). I sanded the first 2 meters of the bow today and whilst there is still a bit of work, I only worked for an hour and got it fairly smooth. I still have some filling to do on sections but overall it looks ok. I may also use high build to fill as the gaps are less than a millimetre. I am not sure as to how much I can depend on highbuild to fill yet.

I have also finished the sanding board, except for adding the hookit (which is optional, as I could attach paper by using blocks screwed to the top if I wanted). I figure hookit will keep the sandpaper more taught against the board and also allows for easy changing of paper, both when worn or when changing to a different grade. At around $30 on material (including $11 for handles = 2 x trowels, $10 for a sheet of foam of which I used a 1/4, and $24 for 4 meters of hookit again using a 1/4 of it, and 500mm of glass and resin) this is a bargain when compared to what 3M are asking for a 1 meter composite sanding board at $160. The weight is around the same and I figure the use is about the same. If it works well I am thinking of making more of them in varying lengths, maybe a short one at say 40cm and a really long one at 2 meters.

I will try to get another hour in tomorrow. Maybe sneaking up on it is not such a bad idea.