Posted by Frank Minelli (myslo@…>)
In 1995, when I retired and wanted to go cruising, I found my F33, the core of it, saturated with water.
I went about to research what the experts thought my options were, and the consensus was that the best course of action would be to chop her up with the chainsaw.
Reglassing the hull would cost too much and it would nnot be possible to achieve a first rate layup.
With other words, ït can´t be done¨.
The project took about three months. the stripping off of the outer hull, after some experimenting, was easy. I took the little angle grinder with a 1/16¨cutting disc and cut the hull into strips, about 6¨wide, with a cross cut every once in a while. A crow bar did the rest.
This was done from about 6¨above the water line, down to where the hull is solid , a few inches up from the keel.
Some of the balsa proved to be totally ruined, almost reduced to cellulose. The rest dried out in a day or two, exposed to sun and wind. We replaced the tuined balsa andI then saturated it all with a very thin, penetrating expoxy. After that had cured, the balsa was rock hard, to never again soak up water. At the same ti me, the epoxy soak took care of any delamination between the old balsa and the inner hull. as proved out with some core samples.
Then it was time to re glass the hull. This is where the expert opinion said that it could not be done, i. e. it would be impossible to achieve a hi quality lay up working on vertical and past-vertical surfaces. We used a diagonal weave cloth , 27 oz, with random mat stitched to the back side. (5 plies) The resin was Sytem 3 epoxy. After preparatory work such as cutting, etc. the actual lay up was accomplished , each side of the boat, in a long day.
It then took of course manyhours of fairing and painting. Today, ten years later, when the sun is hitting the hull on a very oblique angle, you still can see where the new hull meets the old.
The boat has since been used as liveaboard, been out of the water just a month or two each year and has seen many miles of cruising in the Caribbean, including a couple of quite frightening groundings and some rather rough weather at sea.
We inspect her closely on every haul out. As far as we can tell, there has been no detrioration.
The job cost about $2500 in glass, about the same in expoxy, and maybe about another 3000 for the yard, for paint and for incidentals. I estimate it took a total of some 400 man hours to do it.
Dave_Benjamin <dave_benjamin@…> wrote:
Should the hull prove to be wet in several areas, or even all of it below the water line, dont lose interest in the boat, it can be repaired , and, done right, you even wind up with a stronger hull than before. > I respectfully disagree. If all of the core is saturated the project is a bit much for amateurs. It’s just not too viable economically although if you got the boat for free it might, and I emphasize, might be worth it. You’re talking about removing the entire outer skin below the waterline, recoring, and the building a new outer skin. I’ve seen it done on a
practically new F-39 that hit Ano Nuevo reef. The insurace company wrote the boat off. Someone came along and bought the boat and recored it. I think it took over 5 years.
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