As you can see, I very nearly hit the exact center of the center roof rib!
I cut a 5" section of pipe and then cut a section out of the end.
Now it was no accident that cut out is lined up on the lettering on the pipe. I used it to help line the pipe up in the hole. That pipe sits all the way down in the hole and the cut out section is oriented towards the hole at the end of the arch. This will help feed the wires that direction.
As the pipe was fed down in the hole I spun it and applied 5200 at the same time coating the inside of the hole to help waterproof and seal it. I'll apply another dab around the pipe again tomorrow as a final measure.
Then it was on to prep work on the roof for painting. First up was cleaning up the rear edge of the roof with the sander to flatten it out and get rid of all the squeezed out epoxy. Then I screwed up a piece of 3/8" plywood and traced the top and bottom of the roof. Cut it out with the skilsaw and verified it was what I wanted and set it aside.
And then the sanding commenced. You'll notice in the pictures above that the roof looks kinda pebbly. All that had to be sanded down smooth.
So I started sanding, and sanding, and sanding...
After vacuuming the piles of epoxy dust up I realized that I hadn't sanded nearly enough.
So I went back to sanding, and sanding, and sanding...
All the while doing so while essentially standing on the balls of my feet as I had to stand square on to the roof to be able to reach the middle. My calves hurt.
Then I vacuumed again and found I'd gotten the surface where I wanted. It's never going to be perfect as I could spend a week fairing and sanding. I'm not looking for perfect. I made a mixture of hot water and ammonia and wiped the entire roof down.
The paint was next. I had two partial gallons of white, one with some mineral spirits, and an almost full quart. I poured the quart into one of the gallon containers, then poured them back and forth several times, stirring in between to get them thoroughly mixed.
I went back to the rear edge of the roof. I made up a small batch of epoxy and coated the rear edge, then the wood strip, then the rear edge again and finally I screwed the wood strip to the rear edge.
By this time the roof had dried from its washing so I grabbed a roller, 2-1/2" brush and the pan. Poured some paint in the pan and starting at the port rear corner I painted my way around. I'd lean over the grab rail and paint the inside of it with a brush, then roll paint up towards the middle of the roof doing a section at a time, use the brush to fill in any areas that I'd missed with the roller and then tip the paint.
Now I learned a trick while researching my paint. It seems the best way to keep your paint from running is to roll horizontally across the surface, then tip vertically. Apparently doing this "trains" the paint to be oriented in a vertical manner and it supposedly helps to keep it from running. We'll see. :-) One thing I did notice was that with the mineral spirits in the paint and the tipping it seems to self-level in a hurry. Without the tipping it wanted to stay pebbly and not smooth out.
After doing an upper section, I'd do the other side of the handrail and the lower section of the roof. Back and forth I went until I'd worked my way around the roof. Hard lesson learned though, the paint line up near the center of the roof had hardened sufficiently by the time I started working down the starboard side that I think it's going to have to be sanded out. Won't do that again.
It can't be seen in this photo, but I didn't paint the area around the pipe up front. I need to build a radar and GPS mount to put up there and it needs to be epoxied to the roof before painting. I'll work on that tomorrow night. I may get to put a second coat of paint on the roof as well. The added mineral spirits should help the paint to "flash off", or dry faster.
9 Hours