While my beautiful and as yet unfinished stripper lies dormant in my basement, I have devoted some weekend hours to restoring the old Tyne kayak that I picked out of the trash. This kayak had obviously suffered the indignity of years of paint and repair.

There was, in places, 4 coats of glass repairs covered by paint (yeah, they just glassed over the paint) Using 60 grit discs on my ROS I got it all down to its original Blue over white gel coat. The actual damage to the hull and deck were suprisingly minimal. This boat was definitely english, while the beam is 25 inches, the hang down molded seat and cockpit were way to small for my american butt. So using a jig saw out it came, I cut the whole thing out, coaming and all. Now the cockpit hole is an inch bigger all around. While I had the saw plugged in (why waste motion) I cut fore and aft hatches out.

The interior was in pretty rough shape, most of the strengthening ribs were cracked and or damaged and or missing, so I ripped all of them out too. They were constructed out of non woven matting over fiber (or perhaps fibre) board tunnels. Sandind and cleaning the interior has been a bitch but its done.

This afternoon I will reconstruct all of the reinforcing ribs using foam and 9 oz cloth. Put patches over the inside of the holes. Then lay down a layer over most of the interior. Maybe this weekend I will attempt to mold in place my cockpit and hatch coamings ( my hatches will not be flush ). Then in a couple of weeks fair and paint the outside. The idea of painting the outside is *really* appealing, probably with rustoleum, I will leave the whole "perfect finish" thing for the stripper sitting neglected down stairs