Robbins Reef Trip Report, Thursday, July 26, 2018

Crew: Cooper, Dave Dallon, Laura Kennedy, Erin Urban

Weather: Sun and clouds, 80’s

Access: We left Miller’s at 10:45 AM and came back at 3:20 PM on the Nicholas Miller piloted by Rob Stumley. Low tide was expected at 2:09 PM.

Purpose of the trip: We had to start to address the deteriorating polyurethane on the windows and doors. We wanted to finish painting the stairwell entry door surrounds and the stairwell walls and ceiling from the bedroom to the fourth floor and put a coat of paint on the base of the Watch Gallery wall.

poly deterioration on sitting room closet door.jpg

Task accomplished: Cooper put a coat of paint on the stairwell from the sitting room to the fourth floor, while David painted the entry door surrounds. We had decided last week to paint rather than strip them, and they needed another coat. He and Cooper also painted the base of the Watch Gallery floor. Molding from there has to be reattached but we have to wait until after we install wiring for solar power.

Erin and Laura scraped, sanded, and peeled deteriorated water-based polyurethane from three sills and aprons in the sitting room; David worked on one in the bedroom. Laura put two coats of Man o’ War marine spar varnish on them.

Next steps: We discovered that we have to remove the deteriorating polyurethane from all the interior doors by sanding and peeling it off, and then apply Man o’ War marine spar varnish to them. We will determine the procedure for painting the stairwell steps, choose what color to use, and paint them.

Scott Van Campen is making rims for the two operable windows on the fourth floor; he will fit them with glass, and we will install them. We have to clean up the round ventilation disks in the Lantern Gallery and paint the beadboard. We’ll make sure the dog door is tight, put in new molding around it and paint it, and install the threshold. We have to clean up the Lantern Gallery hatch cover and put it back and address any leakage from the windows up there. We have to epoxy and paint the interior ladders. We have to grind off the rusted hinges on the exterior door to the cellar and weld on replacement hinges. We have to grind the casements on the kitchen windows so that we can paint them and make shutters for them. Terry DeMeo at Miller’s is overseeing retrieving a block of granite from the original lighthouse for the museum—not an easy task. At some point this season we will paint the exterior wall around the Watch Gallery balcony.

Steve Kalil has completed the cover for the hole in the kitchen wall caused by Superstorm Sandy; he met with Scott Van Campen to discuss installing it. Miller’s will get it out to the lighthouse along with any welding equipment needed.