Redoing the Deck

I love my Cape Dory, but like all boats it is not without its problems. Like many other the deck of our boat has a good bit of crazing. We had our boat inside a friends warehouse to paint the hull in 2014. At that time our plan was to leave the decks alone but seeing all the spray gear was still in the building we decided to go ahead with the decks. We prepped and painted the smooth areas inside and saved the nonskid areas for after we launched.

We loosely followed Don Casey’s suggestion for repairing crazing. The deck was cleaned, sanded (we only lightly sanded), masked, and then primed with an epoxy primer. We used Kiwi Grip for the actual nonskid. When I look closely I can still see some of the crazing, maybe 20% of what was there originally. I am unsure if they have opened up with time or never filled. Larger cracks in the gelcoat were sanded or ground out and filled back in with fairing compound, then primed and paint.

After painting in the warehouse

This shows the crazing that was in the deck.

Taped off and ready to work on the nonskid

Starboard side done and the first coat of primer on the port side

Nightmare come true!

Even though the forecast was for no rain shortly after applying the Kiwi Grip to the cabin top in began to rain. Fortunately in rained all night and at first light my wife and I spent only a couple hours cleaning. It cleaned off every surface clean rags and water.

The cabin top looked terrible. Some places setup before the rain, while others washed clean off. To my amazement the Kiwi Grip blended in perfectly and by the next day I couldn’t tell where the problem areas where.

The finished product.