Shoot for the stars and you might reach the moon.
We have had the boat hauled out over the past 5 days at a DIY yard. My wife single handledly knocked out the bottom paint over two days while I fiddled around with various projects including a new jib furler, mast step repair and external routing of wires, and the fo’c’sle repair. I had every hour planned and accounted for in advance, and surprisingly all went according to plan except the fo’c’sle repair. It was unusually hot for this time of year which was a both a blessing (epoxy) and a curse (heat stroke).
The trusty Fein Multimaster easily cut the fo’c’sle structure off flush with the deck. My suspicions of water intrusion were confirmed when brown water started leaking out although I found less water saturation in the plywood than expected. Clearly it was enough to cause all the damage during freeze-thaw cycles though.
I cleaned it all up with a sander.
It’s a little hard to tell how the structure was laid up in this area but what I do know is the deck under the 7 screw holes on the left contained more plywood. Since I had limited time available to make repairs I decided not to dig any deeper, as that would be getting into the realm of total deconstruction, which I may not be able to recover from.
So over the course of two days I faired and sanded and covered it with a layer of fiberglass, sanded it again and did a final coat of epoxy to fill the weave.
So what about the fo’c’sle replacement? Well therein lies the problem and why I’m only at the moon. I was thinking of reusing the shell and filling it with fiberglass and glassing it back in place, but when I removed all the plywood it became apparent that the remaining fiberglass was too compromised to be reused.
With launch date fast approaching I decided to simply paint the deck and be done for the time being. Unfortunately the baking heat, an overly thick paint application and a late afternoon thunderstorm disrupted the paint cure and it was still soft the next day. Nonetheless, I went ahead and installed the pulpit after waiting as long as I dared. Hopefully it will continue to cure.
I’m not sure exactly what to do next. Options I’m considering include crafting a replacement out of teak (leave natural) or white oak (painted), or out of G10 (painted). Wood is easier to work with and there are going to be a lot of curves and angles to manage so I am leaning that way. We’ll see.
Update- In the water it actually looks pretty good without the fo'c'sle and bow roller. Sure do need that roller, though.
We have had the boat hauled out over the past 5 days at a DIY yard. My wife single handledly knocked out the bottom paint over two days while I fiddled around with various projects including a new jib furler, mast step repair and external routing of wires, and the fo’c’sle repair. I had every hour planned and accounted for in advance, and surprisingly all went according to plan except the fo’c’sle repair. It was unusually hot for this time of year which was a both a blessing (epoxy) and a curse (heat stroke).
The trusty Fein Multimaster easily cut the fo’c’sle structure off flush with the deck. My suspicions of water intrusion were confirmed when brown water started leaking out although I found less water saturation in the plywood than expected. Clearly it was enough to cause all the damage during freeze-thaw cycles though.
I cleaned it all up with a sander.
It’s a little hard to tell how the structure was laid up in this area but what I do know is the deck under the 7 screw holes on the left contained more plywood. Since I had limited time available to make repairs I decided not to dig any deeper, as that would be getting into the realm of total deconstruction, which I may not be able to recover from.
So over the course of two days I faired and sanded and covered it with a layer of fiberglass, sanded it again and did a final coat of epoxy to fill the weave.
So what about the fo’c’sle replacement? Well therein lies the problem and why I’m only at the moon. I was thinking of reusing the shell and filling it with fiberglass and glassing it back in place, but when I removed all the plywood it became apparent that the remaining fiberglass was too compromised to be reused.
With launch date fast approaching I decided to simply paint the deck and be done for the time being. Unfortunately the baking heat, an overly thick paint application and a late afternoon thunderstorm disrupted the paint cure and it was still soft the next day. Nonetheless, I went ahead and installed the pulpit after waiting as long as I dared. Hopefully it will continue to cure.
I’m not sure exactly what to do next. Options I’m considering include crafting a replacement out of teak (leave natural) or white oak (painted), or out of G10 (painted). Wood is easier to work with and there are going to be a lot of curves and angles to manage so I am leaning that way. We’ll see.
Update- In the water it actually looks pretty good without the fo'c'sle and bow roller. Sure do need that roller, though.
