Binnacle movement / cockpit sole flexing

[saphira36]

SoV, pretty sure we've got the same issue on our E36. I keep kind of pushing it to the edges of my mind in favor of so many other projects (and then actually sailing!) but I know it's there and we're going to have to deal with it sooner or later. Guest helsmen have never complained so maybe it's worse in my mind than reality.

If you dig in yourself post pics! I'll do the same when time comes.

 

[Rocinante33]

From your pictures, it looks damn good down there. Small flat washers under the nuts and bolts, though. I might relace those with oversize and then tighten them up and see if that improves it any,.

 

[southofvictor]

From your pictures, it looks damn good down there. Small flat washers under the nuts and bolts, though. I might relace those with oversize and then tighten them up and see if that improves it any,.

Great point Keith, I'd given thought to trying to squeeze a bigger backing plate into the space but bigger washers would be an easy first shot. Not much cost or energy expended if it didn't work, and if it does that'd be great.

 

[southofvictor]

Update on this, pulling apart the backing plates and inspecting the plywood there doesn’t seem to be any bad core problem. One thing I found is that the lateral bulkhead on the port side of the rudder post is glassed to the underside of the sole but the fore/aft bulkhead on the starboard side is not. Is this typical? We placed some wedges in the gap to see if they made a difference but if they do it’s small. I thought I may still do a fillet and glass it to the sole to see if it makes a difference. Would anyone recommend not to do this for any reason? All I could think is doing so could put stress on another area that‘s not engineered for it, but that seems unlikely to me given the fact that the port side is glassed in.

Starboard side with gap between bulkhead and underside of cockpit sole.



Port side glassed to underside of cockpit sole.




Other than that, increasing backing plate size as much as I can (not much given the layout) is the other next step I’m considering. All my nav wiring is on bus bars under there though so it’ll be a bigger project.

The yard suggested adding braces between the pedestal and the sides of the cockpit but I don’t want to go down that road except as a last resort.

 

[Christian Williams]

on the port side of the rudder post is glassed to the underside of the sole but the fore/aft bulkhead on the starboard side is not.

I noticed similar on my E381 model. I have the fuel tank under quarterberth. Those bulkheads seem intentionally tabbed all around as if to make firm connection to cockpit pan. But on starboard side, under the open cockpit lazarette, the bulkhead is not connected such as to make all-around unity.

In a seaway, movement of the cockpit pan against the lazarette bulkhead can squeak. I've watched the movement, trying to figure out if intentional. I even screwed a filler piece of wood in there, having nothing else to do that day but try to reduce the chorus of boat sounds. But it didn't do any good, so I removed it.

It would take a naval architect to analyze the crazy twisting forces of a hull in 10-foot seas, but I have a sense that maybe it's intentional not to tie everything together. In any case, it causes no problem in my boat. Flex is inevitable and maybe it's tolerated by leaving a gap? It would have been pretty simple to tab all that area together, but apparently that wasn't in the specs.