In my last update, you read about how someone ran into the end of Alpha's mast and broke a spreader. However, that impact seriously bent the spreader base, which is riveted to the mast.
The spreader base is hardened stainless steel, this was quite a crash. You can see part of the sheared off spreader inside the base, on the left. Here it is, sitting on the tailgate of my truck. OUCH!
At first I thought that maybe I would try to fix this myself, but on some advice from wiser heads, I took the job to Svendsens Metal Shop, in the north bay. The word from their supervisor was that he could probably do it, but I needed to be patient. He'd get to it when he had some "down time" between big jobs. Well, it took him six weeks, but all in all, I now have a useable spreader base again!
You can see on the right side, where the straightening wasn't perfect and he had to weld on some bits to make sure the rivet hole was long enough to reach the hole on the mast. This part is essentially irreplaceable. I'm sure they were custom-built for the Pipers back in the 1970's, or possibly a stock part from some distributor, long discontinued. OK! It's ready to go back on the mast.
In other news, I have finally started removing the old bottom paint. I'm pretty sure this is 1970's or 1980's-era vinyl-based paint, and it really needs to come off before I put on one of the more modern water-based, sloughing paints. I bought a little consumer-grade pressure washer (the lime-green thing in the photos) and tackled the bottom with mixed success.
The starboard side came out better than the port side but both sides are going to need a lot of sanding. I bought a random-orbital sander, so pretty soon I'll put on a dust mask grit my teeth and just get in there and do the dirty job.
Unfortunately, the pressure washing uncovered the dreaded gelcoat blisters. Dang it! So now I have a filling-and-fairing job ahead of me. None of the blisters are deep, they just go through the green gelcoat, so epoxy and microballoons should take care of it. Now I bet anything that the white coating below the waterline is a 1990's-era epoxy barrier coat, put on after the blistering started!
