The biggest and most visible issue with the boat when we bought it was the walls and ceiling of the doghouse where the paint had started flaking off badly.



I started off with scraping off all the loose paint. After that quite a lot of sanding, the best tool for the job was a “Mouse” kind of sanders and a 40 grit paper. I never intended do remove all of the old paint, just the loose stuff.
At first I thought I’d do just a “quick&dirty” fix but ultimately decided to remove the roof hatch, the windows and all of the electrical wiring to really get into the corners as well. Since the windows were removed, it was also a good opportunity to replace the (original?) window seals that were almost all leaking.


Then it was time for fairing. On the port side I tried out some different fairing compounds, deciding finally to go with West system epoxy and their 410 Microlight filler. It creates a fairing compound that is easy to lay out and easy to sand. I put on fairing and sanded three times, it’s far from perfect but good enough for now.


Next step some primer, I used Hempel Primer Undercoat and put on two layers of it. It already starts to look a lot better!

The next day it was time to put on the actual topcoat, which was Hempel Brilliant Gloss Topcoat and the color off-white. The biggest reason for this paint was that two full cans actually came with the boat so why not use it. One can (0,75l) was just enough for two coats, will use the second can for the outer side of the doghouse once the weather permits painting outside.


The reinstallation of the windows was as expected a bit tricky but with the help of soapy water, teaspoons and a bent coat hanger it eventually went pretty smoothly.





Done! Just in time on the evening before putting the boat back in the water.

*Updated 16.8.2019* Added picture of final result with roof and electrics.
I wonder if you could fashion a sliding window similar to a moon roof. The trickiest part would be sealing it but it would be pretty awesome in my mind.
Yes something like that is one of the main ideas, there’s a solar panel on the “big roof” behind the hatch but it’s small enough that it could sit at the very aft part and allow a full size hatch to slide backwards. As you said, sealing it is the main problem. It seems most people don’t really like the original canvas, not very waterproof either I’ve heard?