Maintenance Log for Syzygy

Jonny built a plywood platform that slides out in tracks mounted on the bulkheads.  It slides out to the mast, and greatly increases the area of the port settee for sleeping.  The plywood is 3/4″ thick and the tracks are pieces of 1″x1″, above and below the plywood, and secured with screws every ~3″.  The most important aspect is the trim piece on the leading edge.  We used the same piece that was on the settee.  It needs to be strong, in order to provide rigidity to that edge.  Ours is still a little wobbly, but I think that if we put a half dozen more screws up into the trim from the bottom (right now it is only screwed in through the front) it will fix it.

The design was based on notes gleaned from the Valiant Owner’s Group, and a huge thanks to all who gave advice on that topic.  It was a reasonably easy job and is a HUGE improvement in the sleeping comfort in the salon.

The original salon table was a 40lb monstrosity that was permanently attached between the mast and the forward bulkhead of the salon.  It had leaves on each side that would fold up; in this fully activated postion the table was so large that one couldn’t walk around it, and even sliding in the seat to be at the table was challenging.  Even with the leaves down, the large wooden box in the middle of the boat took up all the space.

Jonny removed the old table and salvaged pieces of it to fabricate a folding table that stows upright against the bulkhead.  This was not an entirely original idea: most Valiants shipped with tables like this.  Our situation was slightly complicated by the fact that the distance between the mast and bulkhead is about 7″ greater than the distance available to stow it vertically against the wall, so Jonny constructed a solid platform mounted on the bulkhead that extends into the cabin sufficiently to allow the table to fold up.  The resulting table is extremely solid, and the greatly increased space and convenience have made this one of our favorite improvements.

I drew up a pattern and had TAP plastic (we are very fortunate to have one right down the road from us in El Cerrito) make us four 8" x 18" portlights out of 1/2" acrylic, with 2" radius rounded corners, a half-bevel edge all around, and a ton of screw holes.  The portlights overlapped the cabintop by an inch all around, so the actual size of the cutout was 6" x 16".  We cut the holes in the cabintop using a hole saw followed by the cutoff blade on the grinder followed by the Fein tool.  We dug out the balsa core to a 1" depth all around the cutout, then filled it with thickened epoxy.  I stopped by a local lumber yard and collected a brown paper bag of sawdust from under one of their saws, and I used this sawdust as filler for the epoxy–it was a hell of a lot cheaper than the West System stuff.  Although I did have to resort to the West System filler for the top gap, because the sawdust stuff wasn’t sticky enough, it would fall out of the top. After the epoxy cured, I ground it off fair, then used Quik Fair to fair it smooth.  After the quik fair cured I sanded it smooth, then we put a couple layers of paint on it.  We mounted the portlights with #10 machine screws, through-bolted.  I had TAP plastics drill the holes in the acrylic oversized, so that there is room for expansion without the acrylic cracking.  We mounted the acrylic with a washer (one each bolt) between the acrylic and the cabintop, to leave room for the silicon so it wouldn’t all squeeze out. Finishing the inside–keeping it pretty-was the hardest part.  The layers of our coachroof were as follows, from the outside in: fiberglass-balsa core-fiberglass-airgap-veneered trim plywood.  The whole thickness was ~2-1/4".  I did the trim in two pieces: first a ring made out of 18" wide 5/16" thick plank of white oak that is usually used for flooring.  Some great guys at the set building studio at work cut the frame out of it for me, and I never would have been able to keep it looking good myself, so I owe them big time.  Then I used 2" wide mahogany veneer that I bought from MacBeath’s hardwood nearby for the inside surface.  I put a pretty dark stain followed by three coats of polyurethane on all of it.  The trim ring was glued in place with wood glue, clamped with about 10 a-clamps from home depot.  The veneer has glue on the back already; you use an iron to iron the veneer on. The resulting portlights are completely bomber, and still look pretty good on the inside.  We could have used fewer bolts, but I don’t regret our design.  I would do the same thing again. Jonny has some GREAT videos (1, 2, 3) of the process.