One of the main jobs that needed doing was the reinforcement of the engine cover. Previously when you walked on the engine cover it flexed significantly and it was also incredibly slippy when wet, meaning I went arse over tit multiple times while sailing.
The first job to reinforce the cover was to use an angle grinder to remove the old fiberglass in the spaces in which we wanted to add the reinforcing. This was a messy job and to hopefully reduce the chance of me having an allergic reaction, I wore a full face masks, googles and gloves.
With the old fiberglass removed I was able to move onto stage 2. Using wooden blocks as formers, I cut fiberglass matting to shape. Then by applying several layers of fiberglass resin, waiting for it to harden in between each layer, it created rectangular reinforcement panels.
The final stage once everything had hardened was to apply Treadmaster to the top surface, to do this I used a spray contact adhesive. It of course had to be a pretty colour and the funkiest colour they do Treadmaster in was blue. No purple unfortunately
