Tigerr

If you can afford it, getting it done properly by professionals is great. It's like a new boat when you get it back, and will make you feel good every time you look at it. Plus, a good paint job endures. Stay away from red though. You'll be repainting the red bit long before you want to. If I was doing it again, I would explore epoxy for a more durable hard finish, and failing that I might see if extra coats to thicken the finish might be worthwhile. For the inevitable tree brach scratches etc.

It does rather depend on what your desired 'look' is. Or indeed if you care what things look like inside the boat. As you can see from the above, some folk want simple functionality, others want something else. It's a boat. As a result domestic use furnishing doesn't translate, specifically because of the tumblehome angle. My experience is that venetian blinds, which have a retaining string, are functionally excellent. They allow light in but deny prying eyes. But they only look good in certain areas, or in a modernist boat. More traditional boat look - hard to beat brass rods. Portholes - round cushion stuffers.

I always sneered at the idea of lacquering polished brass. But then I certainly wasn't going to waste my life polishing stuff either. Then I had the brass vent covers polished and lacquered as part of a repaint, and 9 years later they were still like new. If you like the shiny look, and you are not handling the surface - lacquer is your friend. Of course it is also the advertising for the scrap-stealers, and while my covers were not stolen, I have heard of many others returning to find their boat stripped of shiny bits.

This is what I have found.

Currently at Crick, until we start travelling.

I'd like to improve my wifi reception. Currently use an iPhone as a hotspot, ee network. It's very patchy inside the boat, variable depending on which area of boat I am in. Ideally I'd like to be able to watch netflix etc. Don't want to invest a fortune, as we don't live aboard, but I'd like something that worked a lot better. There is an ariel, and a Huwaii mifi unit in a draw that the previous owner left behind, but I'd need another sim and contract to activate it, and not even sure it would be any better.