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New Oars for Hatseflats Part 2

Normally I would coat all wood with 3 coats of epoxy followed by 3 coats of two-pot polyurethane paint (marketed as DD paint by PolyService and De Ijssel Coatings). So it was a change to paint the new oars with a one-pot transparant paint from Epifanes. Why? The oars are expected to flex a little bit so we need a slightly elastic surface finish. A hard surface finish of epoxy or two-pot polyurethane might crack in the long term. We don't want that, so bring on the varnish!

I was prepared to let the epoxy cure for 14 days but since the temperature in our garage did not drop below 25 degrees for the next week, Joost argued that I could paint the bare wood on the looms straight away and leave the epoxy on the blades to cure for a couple of days instead of the full two weeks.

Thursday 3 July

I sanded down the looms with 120 and 150 grit paper and applied the first coat of one-pot PU paint. I used 40g of varnish diluted with 20g clear spirit. The varnish went on like water and I used only a tiny amount of the mixture. I washed out the brush with clear spirit and covered up my bowl with mixture with a used nitrile glove.

Friday 4 July

Sanded the looms with 240 paper and added second coat with the remaining mixture of 3 July.

Saturday 5 July

Sanded the looms with 240 paper and added third coat with the remaining mixture of 3 July.

Sunday 6 July

Sanded the looms with 240 paper. Sanded the blades with 120 grit paper, 150 grit paper, followed by 220 grit paper. I ran out of time and only varnished the outsides of the spoon bladed. Created new mixture of 60g of varnish and added 10g of clear spirit.

Monday 7 July

Sanded the insides of the blades and the looms with 220 paper. Varnished looms and insides of blades with mixture of 6 July.

To do

Tuesday 8 July: varnish looms (layer #5) and outsides of blades (layer #2).
Wednesday 9 July: varnish looms (layer #5) and insides of blades (layer #2).
Wednesday 10 July: varnish blades inside and out (layer #3)