This old boat is covered with layers of varnish, fiberglass tape and epoxy.  The wood had aged and discolored due to water exposure, UV damage and the tannin in the wood reacting to the metal fasteners.  The natural aged colors of the wood will be left on the boat rather than try to bleach them away or restore a color closer to original.  Less is more and the colors of these boards surely show the age of this boat.

The varnish layers and patches of glass and epoxy are coming off fairly well with heat and stripper.  It is a slow process but the layers are coming off revealing that the patches were worse than the original problems.

The brass rub rails and stem tips are removed and the varnish layers will be cleaned off but again, the years of patina will remain and the brass reattached with the deep brown color remaining.  Most of the screws are reusable and will be part of the boat when reassembled.

There is also quite a bit of wood filler covering sunken screws, clinch pins, slight depressions and surface cracks that are very normal for a wood boat of this age.  The filler will need to be removed to restore the true nature of the boat.  Proper sealing and finishing of the wood will do the job of waterproofing the boat that the addition of wood filler was wrongly intended to do.

So far the work is proceeding according to plan with no big bad surprises arising as the patches of glass are removed.  The stripping will continue until all the varnish is removed.  a