To bleach or not to bleach

[David Conard]

I am restoring a 21' L.F. Herreshoff cat yawl (Design #102, for those of you with Sensible Cruising Designs handy). It was very well built (by Montgomery's boatyard) but has been very poorly maintained. I am in the process of wooding the spars, which are Sitka spruce, box construction masts, solid rectangular booms and gaffs. The masts were out in the elements for several years as the varnish failed. There is no evidence of any glue failures, but there are lots of areas that are badly discolored. Would bleaching these areas create a risk of damage to glue joints or other problems? If so, I will probably remove as much of the discoloration as possible by sanding and accept what remains as part of the "patina" of the boat.

[Concordia..41]

First rule when wooding/revarnishing spars is to measure off the bottom 10’. Seriously. Figuring you’ve got the mast removed and sitting on sawhorses, draw a line on the ground 10’ from the base if deck stepped or do the math if keel stepped.

Now quit worrying about anything higher than then 10’ mark. Trust me, I’m the president and chair of OCVA (Obsessive Compulsive Varnishers Anonymous). Spend your time on the area that is readily visible and resist the urge to spend even 20 minutes on a spot 20’ off the deck.

If it’s a dark spot that’s rot that’s another matter, but cosmetically if you own a wooden boat you’ve got other things to do.

If your sticks were out in the elements for several years I find it hard to believe that you don’t have glue failure, so check carefully and consider yourself lucky if that really is the case.

Figuring you’re going down to completely bare wood, work in sections. Resist the urge to wood everything because you’ll end up getting busy or called away from the task and you will have problems if you let the sticks sit bare.

Sand lightly – i.e. no belt sanders and you probably don’t need anything GREATER than 220 grit on Sitka. Maybe a sheet of 80 on a hand block for a really bad area. (Second rule is start light – 320 or so and get more aggressive if necessary.)

Check the search feature for oxalic acid and mast and you’ll get several old threads that discuss bleaching the discolored areas. Also, there are ways to minimize the look of the remaining dark spot with stain.

Happy sanding!
- M

[Scott Rosen]

In my experience, it's really hard to remove stains from spruce.

Margo, that's great advice. I learned it the hard way. Now when I paint my mast, I don't much worry about the finish above the spreaders.