Telstar 26 complete renovation and modification project

big dilemma !!! i am facing a " problem "... after i saw the look of the crude plywood clear coated with resin , i am not very shore about my first design and cover all the deck in wall nut grit. i like it so much the wood texture ... i have decide to stop for a moment and make some tests on the cutout piece from the deck and also with my new plywood decks .
i am really thinking to sand all the paint from the main deck till the wood texture !!!

and i have made up my mind ! with a little fear from what i could find behind the deck paint , i started to sand all down . and i was very pleased ... the plywood is perfect ! just a short line where the two pieces meet near the hatch ! no faults , no cracks ... i am happy
now i have to match the color of my old deck with the okoume plywood from my new front/rear decks . seems that the old plywood is teck ...
and here are the final touches and the old deck sanded !

 

teak wood texture is very different from okoume texture. second thing the color is very different between them when crude and much more different when they are clear coated ! above all this , i want to paint the teak into light red/copper color ...
i have a friend who is working in a color mixing shop for different purpose paints and he has wood texture paint also. well because on his samples there was no okoume as basis and i wanted to go orange teak with the paint, he gave me 10 bottles of different pigments and he told me to mix myself as much as i wanted to )) i was very happy with this until i ve got to my work shop and start mixing ! 34 different samples i made to try to find the right one the one that looks as close as possible to the teak from different angles is with 3 different layers of paint sanded between them so the first and second one pigments remain only in the deep texture and the upper wood fiber to get the golden color of the teak ... enough talking , here is my best result after 8 hours af mixing ...

 

after i have consider that i have found the best color mach possible i have started to go with the painting .i have decided to make only some stripes in nut shells for nonslip and keep as much as possible the wood to be visible. the test is with some paper tape just to get an idea of how it will look like and the deck after the wood paint ...

next thing to do was the semi decks ... 3 layers of different wood pigments to obtain the closest color match to the teak deck. after that 2 layer of clear gelcoat hand made followed by sanding. next was masking the areas for the shells , hand layed gelcoat and spread the nuts. also on the nuts i have put a wood paint to bring them also to the general color . in the end a have sprayed two layers of clear gelcoat on top of everything . those were some looong days and looong nights of working because it was cold and humidity was high the materials took forever to cure....

 

wallnut grit spread over ... and after wood pigment paint to coma closer to the rest of the color

 

after the last gelcoat over the whole deck ...i am very happy with the colors and their match

 

next on the list is painting the rest of the ama in white gelcoat . sanded , made some minor repairs in different pots , small original gelcoat cracks etc...long nights again ! followed by sanding again everything with small grit and prep it for golden painting and final clear coating ...

 

sanding again the clear gelcoat on the deck , all the upper side of the amas for the paint and clear coating
the last days of work on this hull and the best days !!!
prepping everything and golden paint after that clear coat . i want to have warm feeling on board of this boat and decide to "frame" the wood in golden ! a lot of masking , unmasking , degreasing...

 

and finished !!! after 2 month of work ... very tired but also very happy !
the wood is looking like a musical instrument , deep ,clear ...
the gold paint makes everything more warm and friendly ...the transition from white to wood brown is very nice looking
the white is very glossy ...
in the end all the effort worth it and all the long days and nights of work seems that they didn't even been there !!!

 

the other ama work steps were exactly the same as the first one so doesn't need to post, but this one only took me 1 month . maybe because i have already know how to do and what to do .
some pics from small bits ... every aluminum parts were polished , the stainless steel parts also polished , rounded corners to the door hinges and supports , i like them better this way than the original square shape

 

i have painted in gold front and rear round hatches and in brown the hatches on the wood to match )
and took it out for pictures in the sun !!! very nice and warm colors ...it is exactly what i wanted to be !!!

 

more pics with the other one ... same thing

 

last few days of work on the second one ... this was just a fast forward review

 

finished !!! some detail pics about the work...

 

first sunbath
well it was not a really sunny day , but for a split moments i did catch the sun it !

 

finally sitting next to each other ...this was a cold raining day , i was soaking wet when took them out and sat them down ... ugly day ... but i was in high spirits !

3 month of work for two people : 8 - 10 hours a day , 6 days a week ...about 1200-1500 hours of work in total so far ! seems a lot , but when i am looking at them it doesn't mater anymore ! i am HAPPY ... i see some part of my dream came through ! that is the most important thing for me !

thanks for looking !