Does your boat creak?

[welljim]

Does your boat creak when:
- you walk in the cabin while at anchor?
- you are in the cabin underway in moderate weather?
- you are in the cabin beating upwind in a blow / high seas / offshore / other?
- what kind of boat is it (year model)?

Thanks

[mikefossl]

Our 2000 CS40 creaks in heavy seas (25 knots up, 6 ft seas and up). I can generally guess the sea state by the sounds from below.

Under 20 knots in moderate seas it's pretty quiet.

[centaur]

The only thing on my old Westerly Centaur that creaks is me!

[GaryMayo]

No......

[daddle]

No, only in the v-berth while at anchor.

[atoll]

i've never been on a boat that doesn't "Talk" to those onboard in some way or another!

after many years on passage,or at anchor onboard i have problems sleeping if their is not some noise or other going on!

wd40 works great for squeaks and creaks,as does candle wax if it really bothers you!

[boatman61]

You mean some don't..?
Shoot every boat I've had or delivered has its own voice.. to my surprise even steel..

[Snowpetrel]

back in the days when I worked for P&O containers all the cabins on the ships had bits of folded paper or cardboard stuck between any joint in the cabin joinery. It would take years of successive occupants to stop the worst rattles and groans.

One cabin even had a broom nailed to a wall panel. you put your work-boots against the broom to apply just the right pressure to stop the panel drumming depending on engine revs.

I remember one Mate joining a ship with his wife. He went out and started the handover while she sorted the cabin. When he finished his wife proudly showed him all the little bits of messy paper she had removed from the ceiling panels...

One square rigger I worked on made so much noise below that the paying crew complained they couldn't sleep (even at anchor). We sent the chippy down with a drill and an oil can. He drilled a hole in the top of a joint that he thought was making noise and then squirted in a dab of oil. This would stop that creak for a few weeks. Then he was back on the oilcan, complaining that he was a chippy not a greaser.

Snow Petrel was very quiet, creaking wise, as is Sunburst, unless the babystay is loose they the mast creaks a lot. I have sailed on a few steel boats that made some noise, both didn't have much in the way of solid bulkheads.

Two big alloy boats with welded in water tight bulkheads were very quiet (from a creaking point of view) with the structure feeling very stiff.

Of course on all these boats the water noise was loud, any blocks banging on deck were very annoying, and loaded jib sheets can transmit lots of sound into the cabin, and the pounding could be pretty bad.

The quietest boats seem to be well built traditional wooden boats, they sort of muffle sea noise and even a lot of the deck noise, the joinery creaking can seem rather pleasant in contrast to the drumming of a monocote boat bashing through a seaway.

[Dockhead]

My present boat is extremely quiet. The fully cored and partially Kevlar skinned hull is extraordinarily stiff, and the coring attenuates sound from outside to a remarkable degree. Even falling off 3 meter high square waves doesn't seem to flex the structure. So in extreme conditions the only thing I hear besides the wind howling are pots and pans flying around, hopefully inside the galley lockers, and not across the salon

[bobconnie]

If my boat did not talk to me I would start to get worried LOL anyway how can ya sleep without some normal boat noise ?? I can't, it lets me know all is right! and could tell me if somethings wrong !! I love those little noises!!

[Minggat]

Least favorite creak is the sound of my bow being sawed off by my anchor bridle during a blow. I just move to the salon to sleep.

[Neo]

Our boat creaks like a haunted house, Pearson 31-2, 1987. The cored decks are particularly noisy when you're below and someone is walking on deck.

Is this a sign of delamination? We will be cutting the deck open later this week.

Could it also be a sign that the rig needs to be tuned?

[Tim R.]

Not yet.

We once chartered a Beneteau 42 in the BVIs and it creaked so loud at anchor it was difficult to sleep.

[SimonV]

Mine Talks when the she has the bone in here teeth on a good heel, I think she is having as much fun as I. Boats are not meant to be quiet, I hate sleeping on board when on the hard, it just feels wrong.

[thomm225]

My 1974 Bristol 27 cockpit sole/floor creaks near the tiller when you step near that area when it's really cold out. Down below on the underside, the cockpit sole looks good. May be some dampness or something there though.