Mystery - What do I have

[cygtoad]

I pressure washed the cockpit, which removed most of the paint. Looks like the PO may have tried to fix some leaking by coating the bottom with 4200? At least is is not 5200. It does budge with some muscle from a scraper.

I have to believe the lack of stringers and/or bonded seats have caused significant flexing that has caused prior leaks. This may explain the goop on the centerboard truck. I also found a lot of silicone which I am sure did very little to stop leaks. The way I see it, the only fix is to completely remove everything to the bare glass and add synthetic coring to provide some structure. Then also add some layers of glass to the centerboard trunk. Not a cheap or easy fix, but still doable. To your point, Green Lake, at least nothing is in my way.

I was actually kind of encouraged I was able to get down to seemingly viable fiberglass (scroll to the bottom of the picture). Still a lot of stripping to do before I can consider coring it, but I really only spent an hour or so with the pressure washer, no sanding or grinding yet. I think I would need to suspend the boat off of the trailer to get the hull in the proper shape for coring.

I read the thread on coring you suggested.

[cygtoad]

In this picture it shows the lack of tone in the hull sitting on the pads. We can also see on the right, which has no paint, what looks to be the original gel coat with some longitudinal cracking, probably from flexing. Looks like maybe the boat was originally white with a maroon waterline stripe. Every inch of this boat requires some love.

On another note, the mast jack, it looks like it is a big screw. Is there a tool used to rotate it?

[GreenLake]

OK so a little more info. First I pulled out the main looking for a hull number, as there isn't a reliable number on the boat. If the sail is correct, I have hull number 86. Given the characteristics of the the boat, that could be right, assuming the sails weren't purchased used. I makes more sense than the 2 on the transom. Still, a pretty early boat if it is 86.

Correction: you have sail number 86. And that is also the class number.

In the early days, hulls were numbered differently. I learned from other posts here on the forum that apparently a yard would number all the hulls independent of model. This changed with the introduction of standardized vessel ID numbers in the beginning of the '70s. After that, hull and sail/class number are the same.

Unless a previous owner bought a sail from a fellow sailor of another early DS and forgot to take off the number, your sail number is indeed 86. If you are so inclined you could join the DaySailer Association (they pay for hosting this forum) and write to the secretary to confirm that nobody else has claimed this number. That's what I did, because I had even less to go by.

We just lost DS #37 due to falling tree damage, that boat was owned by a very active contributor here. So it's nice to have someone on board who owns one of the early ones.

[GreenLake]

Cockpit: I'm not surprised you were able to get close to glass quickly. The insides of these were only ever painted, no gelcoat as far as I could tell (or not a very thick layer).

You do want to cut some inspection ports (as large as you can get lids) into any flotation tank. You are likely to find sodden, waterlogged styrofoam. That's what I found in my bow tank.

Good point on suspension to give you a good hull shape.

Waterline: the stripe for the waterline should be a strip of different color gelcoat. If so, you won't lose all of it unless you sand to the fiberglass.

Mast jack: Mine is a fixed threaded rod on which there's a round nut. There are holes in that nut for a tool, but most of the holes on my boat are stripped. A previous owner drilled a new hole and bequeathed on me an old nail punch. Inserting that with the wide end (not the pointy end) turns it into a handle that allows turning the nut up the the correct tension. (Which is reached as soon as plucking on the shroud produces something resembling a note more than a rattle, and the lee shroud goes slack in 10 knots of wind going upwind).

[cygtoad]

I just finished reading his restoration thread. What a shame.

[GreenLake]

I just finished reading his restoration thread. What a shame.

Indeed.

Mind you, I park mine between trees and one year was lucky to have had the boat elsewhere when a tree hit that spot. But, tempting as that may be, I'm not about to build a concrete bunker...

[cygtoad]

Update on progress:

Moved the boat indoors and suspended the stern on pallets and bags of wood pellets to take the load off of the deformed spots in the hull. I can see the boat had stringers at one time but they were removed. I can only guess why.

The boat leaks from the aft end of the centerboard trunk despite prior efforts to remedy the issue; glob of epoxy on the underside, silicone, Bondo, and worst of all an eighth of an inch of tar over the inner hull. I think the continued flexing from the lack of stringers has been causing unresolvable leaks.

Anyway the solution is to strip back to bare glass and address the lack of rigidity with some new glass and coring. For now heat gun and scraping of paint and tar is the task. I have removed about 3 lbs of tar already. Next is likely Goo Gone and acetone prior to sanding. I will also probably use Citri Strip for the remaining paint.

I will post some pics once I get them resized.

[cygtoad]

Inner hull

[cygtoad]

Stern

[cygtoad]

Bow

[tomodda]

That looks like a job and a half, good on you for keeping at it! For what it's worth, the early DS hulls do oilcan, it's nearly inevitable. It's worst just a bit forward of the Centerboard, so I'm a but surprised that the CB to hull joint is leaking. Once you get the tar/gunk off, I'd lay in a nice radiused bed of epoxy, put a layer or preferably two of fiberglass bias tape on it, soaking in a few coats of epoxy. Look at any website on stitch-and-glue plywood boat construction for how to do it. If you can finagle it, you may want to put a layer of fiberglass on the outside of the CB-Hull joint as well. It not as if you have smooth laminar flow there, so you won't be slowing your hull down if you put in some glass on the outside of that joint. I'll let GL chime in here....

Some personal opinions, not facts: I do like Citri-strip paint remover a lot. What you can't get off with the stripper, you can sand off. All good. For your next step - painting - I highly recommend Kirby Paints hi-build marine topside paint. Doesn't need primer, and covers up a lot of sins. If you are dry-sailing (trailer), then you can use same topsides paint on the bottom, it's good stuff. Being obsessive compulsive, I sanded the bottom down to some ridiculous grit (1200?), but 400 would have been more than enough, thanks to the properties of the high-build paint. I say (write) this because those are the grits that I sanded the bottom and topsides (respectively) to, and I can't tell the difference after painting with Kirby's topside. On the other hand, I think that one place where you do want bottom-type paint is in the bilges, since they tend to accumulate water and you don't want to grow a swamp in there while boat is on the trailer. I used up about a pint of Petit Bottom Paint (in grey, for what it's worth).

Tom

[cygtoad]

Thanks for your thoughts and encouragement, Tomodda. Projects like these require baby steps to avoid getting demoralized.

I was reading about coring on other threads and I think I might try pulling the hull back into shape with externally mounted boards and screws when I get to that point.

It is hard to tell where it is leaking as I have never had it in the water, but rain water will drain out just aft of the centerboard trunk. Is this the weak spot you were referring or is there a weaker spot between the centerboard and the bow?

To your point It is probably best to put down a layer or more of glass over the most of the hull near the centerboard and then add the coring for stiffness when the hull has the correct shape. I do plan to refinish the bottom so adding a layer of glass there is not out of the question and it would probably help to prevent water ingress and potential blisters. There is Bondo in just one area, so perhaps that is an old repair that goes trough the boat. It is hard to say without flipping the boat and sanding things back. I need to pull the centerboard out to inspect it as well.

It will be a long road ahead, but I have the winter, and the boat is just downstairs so that helps a lot. My old boat was a two hour drive to the ocean, and that really sucked. It was hard to get work done.

I will check out your suggestions on for the Kirby paint.

[GreenLake]

At some point the DS1s got a drain at the back edge of the CB trunk. Once you've removed all the gunk you should be able to confirm whether you are dealing with a hole from such a fitting or a cracked trunk.

If the latter, I would grind the outer hull a bit to allow a layer of heavy tape over the outer edge of the cracked while not adding any more overall thickness. If the existing laminate is cracked through, you should feel free to grind away inside and outside as long as you leave just enough to hold the CB trunk in place and retain a solid substrate onto which to lay up the fresh laminate.

What Tom means with the pointer to "stitch and glue" is that there the wood is the substrate and when laminating corners you need to fillet then to ensure a smooth radius. And the usual technique includes using tape of decreasing widths to avoid hard spots (on the inside). On the outside, if you add laminate you would fill an area you ground off, so the surface would end up level and no worries about hard spots. But you'll need to fair.

On the inside of the bilge I 've gone back to gelcoat. It's more durable than paint wrt moisture or walking on it. As long as you test the amount of catalyst needed, apply it with sufficient thickness and get the kind that cures in air it's not complicated. I have an older post on this somewhere. I used a spreader to apply and liked that the result was a bit structured. That worked well with the surface being already a bit uneven from tabbed CB trunk to stringers.

You can tint gelcoat with universal tints if you don't go overboard. A medium gray should BA achievable and would make an attractive bilge color.

[cygtoad]

GL, I agree. I won't know what I am dealing with until the area is cleaned up back to bare glass. I will definately look for the remnants of an old drain.

I have also been thinking about coring material and that should probably be Divinycell from what I am reading. I have also been looking at Coosa, but I don't think it is flexible enough for this application. It is also heavier, but it won't crush. Divinycell probably won't crush either once it is glassed in.

Anyway, I am probably getting ahead of myself. I am not sure I can get way with glassing things in until spring as the garage I have the boat in is basically in the basement of the house. I could do it, but I might be divorced by the end of the project after sinking up the entire house.

[GreenLake]

Definitely don't use polyester. Epoxy is less smelly an perhaps you can vent?