Vayu Restoration

Sweating the small stuff
By Capt. Wayne Canning, AMS
With the holidays and all it has been hard to keep up with the boat work. At times like this I like to try to do little tasks when I have a bit of time. One of my small projects has been redoing the salon table.
The table that came with the boat had some really bad supports and was water damaged. I sort of wrote it off but kept it because I have a bad habit of never throwing anything out! Well that and I did think maybe one day I would do something with it or use it as a pattern for a new one.
I recently saw a really nice table lift on EBay for a reasonable price, it is one of those fancy hi low gas lift ones. This got thinking about the table again. That and I have been thinking a table would be nice for inside entertaining and such now that the weather is getting colder. Also I have been thinking it would be to have a place to work on small projects, so the table sounded better all the time. As this base folds down to a height that will allow the table to act as filler and make a double berth in the salon it seemed like it was a win win.
All in all this would be a big project but I am taking it one small step at a time. I have found that sometimes you have to hack away at something a bit at a time rather than trying to do it all at once. This is a good example of a project that lends itself well to that way of thinking. First step get the old table out and see if it is salvageable. Surprisingly it looks like it is so first I take it apart.
It has 2 leaves or sides so I am doing one side at a time. Working on it just about 30 min a day I have sanded it down and re-varnished it. Now I can move on to the other side. This side will need some re-gluing but I will do a little bit at a time. At the same time I will build the floor support so when the new base gets here I will be ready to bolt it down and at least have one half ready to set up.
So over a couple of weeks I will slowly get the table finished. The trick is to keep at it and do just a little every day or at least as often as you can. The table is something I have put off for 4 years as it seemed like a big project and not one of the more important. But by taking just a little bit of time I might have otherwise wasted I am getting this project done a little bit at a time.
That is one of the tricks to any project boat just keep hacking away at it in small steps. Most people see the big project and quit because it seems like too much. The trick is to break it down into very small steps as in this project it was:
1. Get the table down and inspect it.
2. Take it apart
3. Sand one side.
5.Varnish one side
and so on, by only focusing on the one small part of the project it does not seem so intimidating and can easily be fit into time frames you can manage even if things are busy.
Not all projects lend themselves so well to being spread out over a period of time. I need to fix the attachment of my main bulkhead to the hull but that one will require taking things apart and that will make living on the boat hard so it is better done when I have a full weekend to devote to it. But that does not mean I cannot get a lot done with the small stuff one small step at a time.