Work on ORION is wrapping up quickly as she is being put all back together. Last week, I re-attached the companionway sliding hatch having polished the tracks and painted the hatch itself. While there is still a horrifying scraping noise every time the hatch is pushed open or pulled closed, I actually don’t mind it, believe it or not. I call it my “burglar alarm.” I might squirt a little Sailkote on the tracks every now and then, which does eliminate the noise, but I rather appreciate knowing if someone is trying to get in my boat.
Companionway hatch installed.
New digital compass holder.
After struggling to figure out how to cover the gaping compass hole, I settled on purchasing a round, flat cover made by Seachoice. I made sure it was completely bedded with 3M 5200, and it is attached with four screws which were also sealed. You can’t really see it in the picture, as the Velocitek SpeedPuck’s holder has been attached to the front of it. But I really didn’t want to change the location of the SpeedPuck, and I didn’t have the time to make any other fancier cover. So I went cheap - and I think it looks just fine. Certainly an improvement over the rotted, delaminating plywood cover.
I have decided not to tackle anything with the centerboard this time around. Next season, ORION will need a new coat of bottom paint anyway, so instead of trying to replace the centerboard pennant now, I might as well wait one more season when I have to put ORION on jackstands anyway to remove the centerboard and paint the bottom. When I inspected the pennant underwater this past summer, it seemed to be in fine shape, so I’m not worried about it.
Only a few little projects left to go before she is launched for the season! Launch date: April 17th. Let’s hope it all works out.