Greetings!

I was not at EBLS yesterday because we had a lighthouse committee meeting and then it rained later in the afternoon, so I didn’t take any pictures. It look like the crew spent considerable time getting the bolts out of the astragals. All the corrosion made it extremely difficult. Eventually they were able to remove them all.

Today was a very eventful day at EBLS! John Fletcher, president of National Restoration, was on site this morning. He delivered the new UV safety glass for the lantern along with other supplies.

As I previously reported, there was so much dry rot in the rear spire that the bottom just broke off. The crew removed the remaining top today so John could take it back with him to have a new one milled. It took some effort to get it off the gable end. The Lighthouse Service did a good job installing it securely! It was held in place with more than nails. The spire was attached to the ridge board via a pocket in the back side. In other words, the ridge board was inserted into the pocket in the spire. Very clever.

The rear spire was missing the decorative piece from the bottom, so John had the one from the front spire cut off. Now all the parts of the spire were available to fabricate a new one. The decay was so bad, Josh barely got through cutting the piece off the front spire and it broke off completely. At this point the crew determined that the entire front spire should be removed. The bottom of the spire broke off in the same way the bottom of the rear spire. The decay was that bad. It was not visible from the outside but it was there on the inside.

The bottom line is that two new spires will be milled from cypress – a rot resistance wood.

Onward to the new glass installation! When I arrived this morning, the crew had removed all the old Plexiglas. By the time all the old bolts were removed, it was late afternoon when Josh and Dion started installing the new glass. When I left at 3:30 they had three new panes of glass installed and were going to work until the remaining five panes were in place. Finally, the lantern room would be watertight with all the new glass installed. It was a big day to finally have gotten rid of the foggy plexiglas.

As far as the white paint on the stone window sills, they are going to see how much work it will take to remove it using the eco safe paint remover. It if comes off easy enough the stone sills will be returned to natural. If it is a difficult and time consuming process they will be painted white.

John is very satisfied with how the restoration is progressing.

Ed