Riveted iron Hull repair

RCardozo said it's been on his boat since the '70's. They've been doing boats like that for 20 years or so around here and are still doing it. Sam

 

This is what I did

For those of you who helped out this is what I ended up doing:
First of all the material is wrought iron not cast iron. I can be welded using 6011 rod. I beleive itb is about 25 ksi in strength.
The boat was hauled on a railway. I inspected the bottom and cut away the areas that looked to be leaking. Once the fiberglass was cut off The iron was exposed. Some areas had severe corrosion and some not. The fiberglass was bonded to the hull. There was no 5200 sealant. What would happen was that if water entered a crack in the glass then the iron would corrode. That would loosen the bond between the fiberglass and the iron allowing water to advance sideways. In areas without corrosion the glass was bonded to the iron such that to remove it you needed a crowbar. In the areas with a good bond the iron was in excellent shape. I ended up removing about a 15 x 15 area of concretre, glass and steel and replacing the steel frames, plate and the reglassing the hull with about 3/8" of fiberglass alternating matt and roving. I also went all over the bottom and ground out and touched up any fiberglass areas that looked to be cracking or weeping. The boat is launched and no leakes. The culprit was an earlier patch that had a bad cold joint in the glass. Once the water got in it did its thing. Oddly enough the condition of the steel was pretty good and the majority of the hull was sounded and the fiberglass was not delaminating. I will continue to monitor the glass like a hawk and fix any imperfections. Hopefully without the water the hull will be stable for awhile. The concrete was a pain to remove. I am not sure how bad the concrete and steel were toegther but when you add water you have a real issue. Still about 1/3 of the hull has that condition. The hull is watertight in these areas so I hope I have no ongoing corrosion under the concrete. Anyway it was expensive but i think I did a good repair and only time will tell.
Thanks for the help.

 

Glad to hear you got the problem sorted! Here's hoping that's it!



Mike (the 'walrus)

 

RC,

Thanks for sharing the results. It sounds like a careful, conservative approach. Hopefully you got all the corrosion and cannow focus on enjoying that uniquely beautiful boat.

Good luck!