Trouble with Hands and Other Problems at the Workshop

|Peter Johnson
Trouble with hands and other problems at the workshop

A rough year at the workshop — a lost friend, a sub-contracting mix-up that cost us months, and a nasty reaction to another company's epoxy that reminded us why we only use MAS.

A difficult year

I have to apologise to everyone for not keeping you updated on the comings and goings at the workshop — it's been a bit of a bad year.

It started when we subcontracted out some work to Hawk Marine, to make and supply new yards, booms, and the mast for the Junior project. We had good communication with Hawk and sent them the required lengths by email. My friend Robin offered to help by taking some drawings to Hawk on my behalf — sadly, I didn't know at the time that Robin had cancer, and shortly after delivering the drawings, he became very unwell very quickly, and we lost him.

I should have gone to Hawk myself. I assumed that between the plans and the measurements, everything would be fine — but Hawk ended up working purely from the plans, and unfortunately, they were the wrong ones. The result: a number of spars that are too short, fitted with cruising fittings rather than the deep-water fittings we actually needed.

Bringing the work in-house

The workshop has now invested in the tools to produce this kind of work ourselves, which is what we should have done from the start. As a result, we'll also be able to offer bespoke stainless work, with fittings strong enough to hold the proverbial battleship.

A reaction that reminded us why we use MAS

This rethink led me to some off-site work with Howard and Michael, who wanted help with epoxy work. At the time, they weren't using MAS, but a combination of West and a product bought from eBay — I should have been more suspicious when I couldn't get safety data sheets from the seller.

The photos below are the result. Even though I was wearing gloves, the contaminants in their workshop still caused me real problems.

Skin reaction on hands from non-MAS epoxy

I now have to be very careful

Reaction spreading across the palms of the hands

This slowly spreads all over the palms of my hands

I'm back in my own workshop now, where we only use MAS epoxies — and thankfully, my hands are on the mend.
Peter Johnson

Written by

Peter Johnson

Pete Johnson is the owner of Epoxy Ltd, trading since the late 1990s and supplying MAS epoxy and boatbuilding materials to professional and DIY builders alike, all under the philosophy of "Simple Perfection". When he's not helping customers, he's usually elbow-deep in one of his own projects, from building the 38ft schooner Iracunda from scratch to restoring boats like Junior, a 1950s Yachting Monthly dinghy rescued from the scrap heap. He writes the workshop blog to share the practical, often hard-won lessons learned building and repairing boats with epoxy.