My Beautiful Skylight

The beginning..... Nathalie and Olivier have spent the last few years refurbishing a wooden boat that is in France. Nathalie was a huge wealth of information, and taught us how to do this job correctly.

The first step was sanding every surface of the skylight, and then washing it down with soap and water.

The main repair that was needed was reinforcement of the base where it seats on the deck of the boat. Here we are applying the first layer of fiberglass with epoxy. First, you apply a layer of 2 part epoxy, then you lay the pre-cut piece of fiberglass over that area. The next step is brushing on epoxy until you cant really see the fiberglass any more. In the heat, it was quite a tricky operation, because the epoxy would cure in minutes.

Brush on......

After about 3 coats of epoxy it is time to re-sand every surface and prepare for varnishing.

Sanding away! It was kind of tricky to sand off the waxy layer of epoxy, without sanding through any part of the fiberglass.

As I have pointed out before... My dear Nathalie always has a beautiful smile on :-)

Oh ya... The doors for the skylight all had to be done as well! Although they did not require any fiberglass, they still needed to be applied with epoxy and sanded between every layer.

Here is Tamer test fitting the doors, they were marked when they were removed months ago, but the markings had weathered off.

First coat of varnish finished!

First side finished!

Installed, and awaiting one more sanding and coat of varnish. One thing that I learned from this project, was that it is well worth investing in an expensive varnish. It is really easy to apply, and dries super smooth and without brush strokes.

I did not remember to take a picture of the doors installed before we left the boat, I will have to get one when we return!