Hi Loren,
Your boat looks fantastic - both inside and out!
Did your interior have varnish on it originally when you started refinishing it? Apparently, this boat has lots of varnish with some conspicuous drips. Pamaya was able to tour the boat - many, many thanks - and reports that the teak is not as dark as the photos would suggest - perhaps only slightly darker than his Ericson.
Thanks!
Dave
Original Finishes seem to vary from EY in the 80's. Ours was a"stock" oiled surface with some light stain in the oil to attempt to blend the various color shades together across the veneer surfaces and the solid pieces. EY would, for $$$, apply a varnish finish.
Our boat needed refinishing, from neglect.
We decided we wanted it lighter, more natural to reveal the basic color of the teak. Over time we have stripped off the old oil finish (and embedded dirt) and varnished it out. We have used gloss because my wife likes gloss. Like many marital potential disagreements, a guy can always win the argument with the words "yes dear"....
A friend with an E- 38 decided to just clean and overcoat his interior with a harder rubbed oil finish. It is a bit darker, but the surface semi-goes appearance looks more uniform than does ours. It looks 'rich', whatever that means.
This stuff is all subjective. Of course. Totally.
Unrequested Opinion: The surviving mass boat builders have performed quite a magic marketing trick. They have convinced many/most newbies that actual wood grain inside a sailboat is 'old fashioned' and also liberally padded their bottom line by using composite wood panels where hardwood veneer used to expected. Even when younger buyers now roll their eyes at "Ikea" interiors, they go ahead & buy them anyway.
Starting from the early 70's where smaller sailboats had wood-grain Formica surfaces inside, to later when most builders had mahogany or teak surfaces, the industry seems to have returned to semi-faux flat surfaces.
Back to EY and their "real yacht interiors".... teak is indeed darker than many woods. The only wood interiors that were darker to me were the oak ones in late-70's Islanders, which I disliked than and now.
Tartan went to cherry wood, and it looks pretty good, as well.
Obviously we like the 'look' of teak, and have invested our time and energy in lightening it up. Interesting Note-- that when PSC continued several Ericson boats in production in the 90's they selectively changed inside surface parts to an off white finish and still kept much of the richness of the teak while adding more reflected light. So trends do change. I like what they did, similar to liking our interior gel coated panels in the Olson. Teak is wonderful, but more light is also very good.
Back to your used Ericson, my suspicion is that the PO, like quite a few owners, tried to apply a harder and perhaps shinier interior finish. When he overcoated existing old oil & stain (and dirt), the effect was to unnecessarily darken all of it. Ick.
(Opinion: when refinishing, you should avoid re-creating the really really dark interior of the Hans Christian 38 we toured once with vary dark stained/oiled teak, dark green cushions, and black marble countertops..... It was like a
Cave!
You practically needed a miner's headlamp to find your way around inside -- on a sunny day.
)
It has taken me quite a while to learn to lay on varnish without sags or runs, and I still have to redo sections sometimes, so I sympathize with other owners who do lesser quality work. My efforts have varied, too.
It's tedious. The bigger hassle, tho, is their lack of preparation. And that's just time and attention, and time.
If you redo the interior of this boat, be sure you really clean and/or strip the old surface. It really does take 5 plus coats to create a new surface. And, you do need to sand between coats with 320. I use a quarter sheet sander with a hose to a dustless (bag type) vac.
Apologies to rattling on so long, but EY installed awesome old growth teak wood, and it DOES look amazing when finished up properly.
