As I mentioned yesterday, I made a start on the copper epoxy first thing. Before breakfast in fact and it took about 90 minutes to get the first coat done and that was with Tina's assistance.

The first coat and with the tape removed.

Despite the cold making the epoxy very thick and viscous and not to easy to apply, the result is not bad at all.

It is all nice and shiny right now but that will change as the epoxy cures.

I'll keep an eye on the curing during the day since I can overcoat as soon as the epoxy reaches the tack-free state and that may be later on the afternoon. Being able to get the second coat on today would be nice as that would then be an extra day curing time. I'm not intending to reinvert Naiad until the end of next week so that the epoxy has sufficient time to become hard such that the strops will not damage the new surface as Naiad is turned over.

Right now, however, it's time for a cup of tea.

There isn't going to be enough time to put the second coat on the hull before the temperature drops too low, so instead I taped up the hull ready for tomorrow.

The tape was placed on the hull a fraction below the last one to ensure that it was in the right place and not up over the new epoxy.

Since I'll be applying the second coat by myself tomorrow I cleaned out a paint tray and located a suitable foam roller. Normally, you would not use a thick foam roller like this for epoxy as it makes the volume of epoxy in the foam likely to go off very quickly due to the exothermal nature of the curing processes, however, this epoxy is not so susceptible to that problem so should be fine for this application. Being a low air temperature also helps.

The resin, hardener and copper powder were also brought inside and placed by the heater as I found that the resin was a little too viscous this morning. Raising the temperature of the epoxy components will make it easier to measure out and mix. I'll probably also mix it up in the house and take it down to the workshop once it is ready to apply.

Time for a cup of tea.