Rotted Coaming: Part 2

My garage. I can't wait to put all this stuff back on the boat!

The Port side deck has been recored and epoxied. I need to grind down the seams and do the scarf joints. At this point, I'm hoping I can at least get that done before battenning things down for the winter.

Time is at a premium. With school starting for my son, soccer on the weekends, shorter days and Fall chores - it's tough to find time for the boat.

I've yet to take any pics of that work, but I did do some tinkering with the rotted coaming. I treated for the rot it as previously noted. After some reading, I found that "Git Rot" or whatever it's called, is basically thinned epoxy. You drill into the rotted section, then inject the mixture in. I read in the West System Manual, that thinning epoxy compromises some of its strength and adhesive qualities, and they suggested warming the surface before applying epoxy so it'll draw it in when it cools.

Since the rotted area on the coaming won't be visible when I remount it, I decided to try an experiment of sorts. I drilled holes throughout the punky rotted section in the top and sides being careful not to go all the way through so the visible portion would remain unaltered. Then I applied heat with the heat gun and heated a squirt of resin as well to thin it. Then I added the hardener and filled the holes. After it dries, I'll do this on the sides and end and well to try and get the epoxy throughout the insides.

After all is said and done, I'll coat the whole works with the special clear epoxy (209 methinks) then finish off with varnish. We'll see.

Progress

Saturday: Grinding. I hate grinding.
Sunday: New core was cut and glued between the cutout panels and the lower deck skin. Lots of epoxy was mixed - properly.

I didn't even take pictures, not very exciting, really. It would have been a really nice day to sail though.

The beat goes on...

It turns out, Thursday I had a couple of hours to work on the boat. Satisfied with the fit of the stern rail, I went about getting the beautiful thing out of harms way for the fall and winter. I attached it to the garage ceiling rafters.

Next, I went to work on the boat. The previous weekend, I had tried to identify where the trouble spots were on the port sidedeck, and used a sharpie to mark where I thought I should cut. Without further ado, I peeled up the tarped, plugged in the extension cord, and got the saw. I cut on the dotted lines where I could get to with the circular saw, then finished up with the dremel.

Without the initial timidity I had on the starboard sidedeck, it went much faster. After the cuts, I got the tools I used previously for prying up the deck skins, and went at it. I was pretty satisfied with the results. Most of the skin sections I cut weren't too bad at all to remove. There are a couple of spots where I may need to cut more, however. I'll have to dig around and see how far back under the skin the wet/bad core goes in those spots...

So, after the panels were removed, I chisled the remaining core material off the undersides of the skins and the lower layer of the deck. Done!

This weekend, the weather looks good and I hoping to grind everything down and at least get the new core glued in place. We'll see. I added more pics of the carnage to the September album to the right.

A Preview of the Stern Rail

I'm sure that this is exciting to exactly nobody but me, but I just had to go out and test fit the stern rail today after work.


The boat is quite bare without the coamings and hardware, but I am very pleased with the way it came out. In fact, I'm wishing I'd gone with the welded bases because it fits so well. It'll still be nice to be able to adjust them as I'm installing the rail though.

I think I'll even add the other pictures to the album...

Stern Rail arrives: 09-12-06

Well, it arrived on Monday and has been sitting in my office. It's been very hard to concentrate at work, too. I went and picked it up tonight just so I could have it here at home and test fit it ASAP.

For all the bitching (and justified, I might add), Tops In Quality nonetheless came through and did a really nice job. I sent them pictures of Sirocco, a beautifully restored Ariel on the forum, which I thought had an exceptional stern rail. It wasn't just square and boxy tubing like so many I've seen, but it had a nice curve to it that accented the transom and taff rail quite nicely.

I can't wait to see how it fits. The picture just doesn't do it justice.

Mmmmm, soooooo shiny!

A New Look

Well, last weekend I was deciding between doing some grinding on the starboard deck just to smooth things out a bit, or move the staging to the other side of the boat to start working there. I decided to move the staging and call the starboard "good enough" for now. To celebrate, I walked back and forth on the new deck a few times - I even bounced a bit, too.

On the starboard deck, I had tried the shot-filled hammer bit - tapping the deck and listening for the dullish "thud" to indicate a delaminated spot, and except for a couple of spots, was never quite sure if I was hearing correctly. Tim L. suggested a small steel hammer of his forum when someone asked about "sounding", so I thought I'd give it a try.

First on the starboard deck. I tapped across and up and down, and generally got a nice sharp "ping" in return on original good deck. My recored deck was not quite so satisfying and a bit duller. I'm really hoping it because the Corecell core is dampenning the sound a bit more than the balsa. Then, I found this spot. A definite dead spot - "thud". I started marking these spots with an "X". This is a seam on the forwardmost part of my starboard sidedeck work. No core was added, it was just sawed, then the seam filled with resin, then glass over. You can see through the original glass where I sanded off the paint, nonskid and gel coat. A definited spot where it looks as though the lower side has debonded. (or was never bonded?) Anyway, I'm thinking I'll take a holesawto it or drill two holes a fill it with epoxy...

Moving right along. The goal was to do my exploration before getting out the circular saw. I did some exploration last time, but was not very confident in my findings and just figured it'd be easier to just start cutting. Bad idea.

With this in mind, I moved to the port sideck and sounded the same way, again marking "X"s where I heard the "thuds". I also did the cabin top and was not pleased at some of my findings there - not surprised either with all the holes up there. Then I got out the drill and started with the "X"ed spots and tried to determine the radius around those bad spots. To my annoyance, many of those spots seemed to have perfectly good core! I reminded myself, debonding does not always mean rotten core.

So, I got out the hole saw. I figured I could see better what was going on, and it'd be easier than recoring. The picture on the left was from around an "eye" thingy where the lifeline terminated on the deck, just before the cockpit . The core had obviously been wet at some point as it was very dark - but still quite solid. It took a little effort to gouge it out. The picture to the right was good core, but definitely debonded. You can see the glass strands on the back of the plug where I'm guessing it had never been adheered. I gouged out as much of the balsa core I could, then wetted all these holes with unthickened epoxy, then thicked, then placed the plugs back into the deck.

Finally, I mapped out where I'll be cutting my next session. Hopefully, it'll go a little smoother.

I also added these and more pictures to the September web album.

Side Deck Recored and reGlassed

It was a good day today. With the major cleanup done, all that stood between me and finishing up the glassing of the side deck were a few simple chores. I detarped the boat, scrubbed amine blush off the few spots that I had glassed yesterday with water and a brush. Then got out the sander and with and 80 grit disk and smoothed out the rough spots and gave the entire deck a going over just to make absolutely sure there was no unground surface left.

I had exchanged emails with Tim earlier in the week, confessed my stupidity, and checked on the proper method of doing the scarf joints. Armed with this knowledge, I was ready to tackle the job once and for all. At the last minute, I called my friend Scott who graciously came over to lend a hand. He arrived just as I was finishing the grinding. I vacuumed up the dust, then we wiped the deck down with acetone. Time for the scarf joints.

I wanted to get at least one layer of biax on each of the seams where I had cut out a panel and recored. A few of them got two. Then we laid the 8 oz cloth over the top of each seam, except the aft most cuts where the first layer was still intact and hadn't been ground all the way back down. The biax can be seen under the layer of cloth in the picture to the right - its the cloudy looking stuff on the seams where you can see the Corecell underneath.

We traded off mixing epoxy, wetting out the deck, cutting and laying the biax or tape, the rolling out the glass. In a few short hours, we completed what it took me almost and entire day to botch up earlier. It's amazing how much another set of hands helps. All boatwork should go so well.

Two Steps Backward, One Step Forward

As a sort of penance for my stupidity, on Saturday morning, I decided to regrind everything just to make sure it was ready for round two of the scarf joints. With the remnants of Earnesto blowing in, however, the day was shortened, but I did manage get everything cleaned back up and reground, and also filled the forward stanchion holes I drilled out with biax and expoxy. This time the batches hardened in no time like they were supposed to. I switched the pump to the fast hardener as well.

I added the pictures to a new "September" web album - not much new to look at yet, so I tried a different perspective...

Goo Removed

All I can say is, if you're going to screw up mixing epoxy, do it well. With the 25:1 ratio of goo, the fiberglass cloth strips and biax peeled right off. Then I scraped as much of the rest off as I could. Then bathed everything in acetone. Back to two weeks ago now. Oh well, live and learn, right?

The only thing concerning me is the three 1 inch holes I cleaned out and filled with the bad stuff. I got as much as I could out and sloshed some acetone around in there, but it will be impossible to get it all out. I'm thinking about a mini-recore of the area to really make sure it's cleaned out.

Tomorrow, knock on wood, I should finish up glassing the starboard side deck - again...