The boot top is red. Bright Red! Because of this it has to come off. It's also an antifouling paint. So it has to come off. I don't know what paint was use but it hard. Very hard and 80 grit sand paper barely touches it. Fortunately the scraper I bought yesterday does the job just fine. Had it not been red I would have been tempted to leave it on but bright colours like red have a tendency to belly through whatever it put over them so it has got to go.

I tried sanding the first bit of the boot topped this is the result. You ca see that the red paint dust has gotten into some of the scratches on the shite topside paint. that will have to be removed before the topside paint goes on.

This part was scraped of and the grey paint underneath sanded. It was much easier doing it this way. I forgot one of my golden rules, "If it's hard you're doing it wrong".

The top of the boot top was marked by using a punch and a hammer to make indentations in the hull. this way, if I remove the grey coat I will still know where the waterline should be.

The waterline on the repair was marked in a similar manner, the correct position being transferred from the port side.

Time for tea-break and to let the dust blow away or settle. As you can see from one of the photos above I've opened the back door of the workshop to let the breeze blow through.