I think I may have screwed up and I have about an hour to figure it out:
I'm sealing our
dinghy (Titan 310, PVC) with Inland Marine's internal
dinghy sealant. I hope that extends the life a bit, and deals with a slow leak through a very pain in the ass patch by the towing bridal D-Ring. That may be a for another post, though...
I removed the valves to pour in the
sealant. I was super surprised to find that they seemed to be threaded into
fabric only. There was a crack as it released and started to turn, like breaking of a bond. Seemed to be the outer ring bonded to the outer
fabric.
I was fully expecting some sort of plastic ring bonded to the backside of the fabric, but there was nothing. I didn't notice anything fall into the dinghy. I did this 3 times and never noticed a backing ring.
I poured in the sealant and screwed the valves back in. Needless to say, they're leaking badly. I have 4 hours for the sealant to cure, of which 2 have gone by. I'm rolling it around from time to time and have heard nothing rolling around inside.
I figured I'd need to just seal around the outside and started researching. That's when I discovered that there usually is an inside ring and it isn't necessarily bonded to the inside of the dinghy.
So anybody have a clue if Titan RIBs had an inner ring?
Should I try to pull the valves and search for a backing ring before it gets glued to the inside of the dinghy with sealant? Or am I just completely screwed at this point? I don't really want to interrupt the sealing process if there never was an inner ring!
Advice welcome!