Aylings Boatyard, Merrickville

44°55′7″ N 75°50′5″ W

Early last fall Santosha was hauled out & stored for the winter at Aylings Boatyard in Merrickville.

Aylings is a working boatyard where they will perform various repairs for you or you can do the work yourself. I was contemplating getting some fiberglass repairs done to parts of the boat’s main deck & to also fix up several nicks & dings that had occurred over the years. Aylings recommended a local fiberglass repair specialist & I contacted him to give me a quote for the work that I wanted completed.

Jay, “The Fiberglass Guy” as I came to refer to him by, commenced repair work in late May with a target completion date of the first week of July. Jay was fitting this job into an already very busy schedule so I accepted the fact that work would progress slowly at first until he wrapped up a few other projects with other customers.

Renovating an older boat is very similar to renovating an older house – you never really know what you are going to encounter until you get right into it & then there are always a few “surprises” that pop up to greet you.

In Santosha’s case, the deck repairs turned out to be more complicated than expected because the bottom layer of fiberglass of the deck was very thin.

After reviewing repair options with Jay we decided that the best approach was to epoxy 1/2” thick marine grade plywood over top of the existing deck surface, followed by several layers of fiberglass & then finished with Kiwigrip non-skid deck paint.

I am very happy with the end result. The deck surface is very strong & impervious to water.

Jay also repaired several spots on the boat where there was cosmetic damage to the fiberglass – normal wear & tear on an older boat that has had numerous adventures over its life. I must confess that I contributed to several of those nicks & dings!

Jay completed his work on July 16 & now it was time for me to clean up the boat prior to launching. And there was a lot of cleaning up to do!

Thanks Jay!