CC Hull Number 40644 State Registration WN 2966 LH VHF Call Sign WUT 4323
Transom Refinish
Maranee's transom had last been stripped down and refinished around 1960. The discoloration and blistering showed that the job was past due when we tackled it in 2018.
As we found with the foredeck, the wood underneath the old finish was in excellent condition.
One of the hardest parts was realizing that we were removing the excellent vintage hand-done transom lettering.
Pausing before scraping off the final bit of hand-painted lettering.
Similar to a "sunburn", the ultraviolet rays over the years had printed the old transom lettering into the wood. It would take careful bleaching and hand sanding to get a clean surface.
The old lettering still appears after meticulous sanding.
The old mahogany is starting to look clean.
Our next step was to carefully tape off the seams, apply a miniscule amount of a mixture made up of mahogany sawdust and epoxy, and then sand smooth.
Pictured after staining and five coats of varnish, heading toward a total of fifteen coats.
With a goal of trying to exactly recreate the hand-painted transom artwork, Matt scanned and vectored it all prior to its removal, right down to the individual brush marks left by the artist 50 years earlier. He made a digital recreation of it, and had it rendered into a huge decal by a local sign shop. Here the decal is shown displayed in the main salon prior to installation.
