A mission ...

tunnels · Nov 5, 2012

ixplorer said: ↑

I have a glass 16ft VistaCraft with an outboard, that is a 36 yr old hull and has over time had various average quality "glass" jobs done on the interior of the hull to seal and strengthen it. One of those, someone used car bog to add a cap to the wooden keel edge that came up into the boat [thin bit of wood] and when I belted the bog off a few days ago it all came off in big chunks in my hand, and the inside of it was sodden with mud, sand, water. The keel wood was then exposed, i touched that and it moved, pulled it, and I was holding it... about 18" long bit of wood not ply, wet, and rotten.

It has been suggested a day ago by a Marine survey bloke that inspected it, that I grind out all the edges of the boat interior, back to solid glass, cove them all, and glass them all back up to give the whole hull strength. Which I am launching into.

I have never touched anything fibreglass in my life.

Starting with this keel area... grinding it away to expose what I might find. Someone else told me that the metal keel strip has been added to the boat keel and the screws they used might be too long, water runs up them, and gets into the keel wood. His solution, remove them, and cut out anything wet, replace with thinned epoxy to fill the void. I'm not confident in that, both in that it sound like a hell job, and like ill be adding a liquid UP wards, unless i flip the boat. Never done that before either !

So it has 2 problems, water entry from keel screws. And general bad hull interior condition that needs strengthening and a bulkhead added.

Bulkheads or only one should be added, suggested the marine survey guy, just aft of the centre console position and he mentioned the gap with a fillet but didn't give much advice there, so your comments helped alot. And thanks Sam on the WR ideas as I will be going there when it comes to glassing that in.

I happen to live about a km from the largest Fibreglass supplier in NZ. So I went there and spoke to them for a few hours today. As my knowledge of glass is or was z e r o. They were able to call a boatbuilder staff member of theirs, but its the boat show this week and he is there "talking". He will come and visit my boat next week to determine if we are going to be using poly or epoxy as I want this job done right and perfectly, and I am going to be doing it and have plenty of time before I NEED to be landing kingfish over the summer approaching.

Phase 1 for me is the removal of everything crappy out of the hull corners anyway, and that was kicked off with a 2 hour covered head to foot in a moon suit, two pairs of latex gloves and a 3M 6200 respirator which worked a charm. I wear glasses though, and they got covered in glass dust. As goggles would be a bit tricky.

I'll be posting pics of progress and start point shortly. Not sure if that will be of any use to you, but your advice will be helpful as I progress it.

Many thanks
Guy
Click to expand...

wheres ya photos !!

Frosty · Nov 5, 2012

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A mission ...

tunnels Previous Member

Frosty Previous Member