Need Advice About Crack in Fiberglass at Ridge of Bow / Keel

[s/v Jedi]

I have never heard of a building method where two halves are joined by fiberglassing the joint on the inside and just some filler on the outside. I don't believe it and even when somebody shows me it is done by builders, I still can't believe it. A child would put glass over the joint on the outside too. Makes me wonder what they did with the joint where the keel attached...

Stick a knife in the crack to see how far it goes. Let the owner grind some so that you can see if it's into the glass or not... he owns the boatyard? if so he should have no problem doing that.

Ask him for the survey report.

cheers,
Nick.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by David_Old_Jersey

If I was the owner I would bodge it with Epoxy filler - and a few coats of Antifouling.................

The boat is in the USA right? I'm quite sure they caught up with the rest of the world where hiding a defect like you describe doesn't stand in court... meaning you will have to pay for it when it's discovered later on.

cheers,
Nick.

[David_Old_Jersey]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

The boat is in the USA right? I'm quite sure they caught up with the rest of the world where hiding a defect like you describe doesn't stand in court... meaning you will have to pay for it when it's discovered later on.

cheers,
Nick.

a) Wasn't me
b) If it was, then new Owner must have done something
c) I can prove my fix was good (or at least enough to argue in Court)
d) where is the boat?
e) where is the complainant? - or witnesses? ("but they weren't on the boat when it sank" - "they are now")

Sounds harsh perhaps. But honest. Just like s/h cars, some folk will do all manner of things - and a lot of them may even beleive they are not bodges (my cunning & novel solution is your bodge - and vice verse )

My line would be filling the crack with wax - I'd splash out on epoxy . and funnily enough my "Bodge" sounds very close to some of the "good" fixes described here........

[CDunc]

A thought, back in the '70s some boats were laminated using DBHP? resin. Its not that it was a bad resin but secondary bonds were problematic. I would research what resin this boat was layed up with as this can complicate repairs.

[SailFastTri]

Originally Posted by Ziggy

I don't think that would be enough pressure to cause a crack like what you describe.

Improper blocking can do all kinds of bad things to a boat.

[STG]

Well, the boat is not that expensive considering its size. There are a lot of things that need to be done, and the owner was pretty forthright. Price reflects these costs. I don’t suspect he knows anything he is not telling at least as far as the crack. He and his wife sailed it, and then he retired. He is too old to fix it up now, and needs cash so he is selling it. If there is something wrong structurally which is causing the crack, I don't think he is aware. If he was pulling something, it would not have likely sat 10 years. He would have dumped it as soon as he parked it instead of waiting. He obviously thought he would do something with it someday and kept it around. He also invited me over to his house to see the mast, sails, and some of the "extras". I don't think he would have let me see where he lived if he was trying to be sneaky.

Still..... I would like to know if anyone has had similar issues. Sounds like a couple people have and they were easy fixes which is the way I am leaning too. I appreciate all of the responses. This is a great forum. I have already found a lot of answers to other questions.

[s/v Jedi]

STG,

The comments about "pulling something" are about Dave Old Jersey's comments about hiding the crack, not about the owner of the boat you're looking at, no worries

cheers,
Nick.

[Minggat]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

.... even when somebody shows me it is done by builders, I still can't believe it. A child would put glass over the joint on the outside too. Makes me wonder what they did with the joint where the keel attached...

Stick a knife in the crack to see how far it goes.

There is soooo much glass over that joint on the inside of my boat. But when you say it's hard to believe that a builder would do something like that, you have to bear in mind that a lot of simple ideas come after the problem is exposed. In my case the problem was a non problem for 36 years. And it didn't becomne a problem until somebody did something you never would have thought about when it was going into dry storage.

So many ways of adding strenght. Where do you stop? This forum is full of ideas that go way past "overkill". Not that is is an example of that, just saying.

As far as sticking a knife in it, if it's like the crack in mine, no way is any razor blade going to fit in it. It's a fine hairline crack. Like baby fine hair. Visable, but hardly wide enough to feel.

[Kristian]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

I have never heard of a building method where two halves are joined by fiberglassing the joint on the inside and just some filler on the outside. I don't believe it and even when somebody shows me it is done by builders, I still can't believe it. A child would put glass over the joint on the outside too. Makes me wonder what they did with the joint where the keel attached...

Stick a knife in the crack to see how far it goes. Let the owner grind some so that you can see if it's into the glass or not... he owns the boatyard? if so he should have no problem doing that.

Ask him for the survey report.

cheers,
Nick.

Well Nick I think it is good that you do not know how the majority of rudders have been made ower the years..It is not very uncommon that they can be separated due to the halves only beeing glued together with polyesterputty and this in some instances well after the laminate has cured fully due to the work with the rudderpost and its strengtening members.
Here it makes sence in laminating on the outside since it is the only place you can laminate on but this is unfortunately seldom done.

I hope I am able to post some pictures from around 1980 where this doubble ender is built in 2 halves glassed together on the inside. This yard also made an IOR externally ballasted fin keeled yacht (very similar to the Swan 36) where the 2 halves where laminated together on the inside.
Regarding the keel section the strength comes from a lamination primarily built up on the inside with a thicknes of 45mm ( almost 2 inches). Not to mention the webb of transverse stiffeners and load transfering SS backing for the keel bolts.

I have modified the keel of one of these yachts and can assure you that the strength of the laminate is exeptional. After some consulting with West epoxys technical adwisor about the the best possible way of refitting the keel it was decided to use thickened West epoxy between the lead keel and the hull , this to ensure on a micro level that the keel kan not move and hence put any acceleration loads on the keel bolts.

I made a misstake and used fast hardener instead of the slow when mixing the epoxy and the result was thickened epoxy the size of two palms going of when we lowered the boat onto the keel preventing the keel to be properly seated.
We had to use 12 tons of lifting to get the boat of the keel and that was after just 35 minutes of curing , what eventually gave was the interbond between the gelcoat and rowing in the keel area the size of the two palms....



On the issue of secondery bonding it is correct that Polyester does not bond chemically ones it is fully cured 2-6 weeks depending on temperature if my memory does not let me down. After this to make good repairs you have to use very big surface area for the gluing ( yes it will be a gluing with polyester) or preferably make the repair with epoxy. The epoxy on the other hand can not be used before the Polyester is fully cured..and Polyester does not adhere to epoxy...If the guys at System three has not solved that one by now I know that they had some things going that might solve this problem.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by Minggat

As far as sticking a knife in it, if it's like the crack in mine, no way is any razor blade going to fit in it. It's a fine hairline crack. Like baby fine hair. Visable, but hardly wide enough to feel.

The crack is 1/16" wide so not a fine hairline crack at all.

It doesn't matter how many layers of glass you put on the inside of the hull; a crack on the outside is inevitable when you fail to put at least one layer of glass on the outside. Actually, the more layers you put on the inside, the bigger the chance of a crack on the outside (crimp while cure).

You now have a crack that most likely will run all the way through the polyester putty until it meets the glass that was used for the joint on the inside. This is bad practice no matter which way you look at it. It just asks for osmosis, de-lamination etc. and it is contaminated so needs grinding out even for a filler-fix. And this is assuming that the crack runs through the middle of the filler without exposing the butt end of the layup of the hull laminate. And all that to save a couple of bucks on construction costs.

Most rudders are a joke too. But I think we should not accept inferior build quality just because it happens so often... it's still inferior and based on reducing costs with the knowledge that it'll cause problems for the owners.

cheers,
Nick.

[Kristian]

Hi again!

I hope this will be my last post on this subject but I feel that I must try to give my view of what might be a missunderstanding on the building technique that is in no way inferior or very uncommon even today.

( Those more interested on the subject can go to the Hallberg Rassy home page and read and look at their pictures where they are joining hull halves from the inside stating that it will be the strongest part of the hull. LLoyds have agreed to this building method for quite some years now issuing cerificates to every single hull.)

First The hull sides are not joined by polyester putty but by normal fibre glass. Nick you correctly describe that Polyester shriks when curing. In this case the " pulling force this shrinking generates will actually pull the two halves together not pushing them apart!

The most important thing in what I have written is perhaps that I do not think it is a crack but a void that in no way has any bearing on the hulls integrity.

I do also ask you to think twice regarding osmosis and delamination or contamination of the fibres.
The difference between the polyester used with the glass layers that is put in between the two hull halves when joining the halves and the gelcoat used to make the joint invisible is small.

Of course when fixing this thing you shall open it up so you can clean it properly and get a good key for the filling.

If you when doing this find any fibres not saturated etc just grind them away and use ( marine) epoxi when filling.

Good luck with the survey and possible buy!

Kristian

[sabray]

For another example check out the peterson web site there are pictures of z boat that had a crack at the hull to hull joint.mine had the same issue. The crack is mostly the gel coat which is not a great filler. So I scraped and ground it out and filled with cabosil and epoxy.

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by Kristian

First The hull sides are not joined by polyester putty but by normal fibre glass. Nick you correctly describe that Polyester shriks when curing. In this case the " pulling force this shrinking generates will actually pull the two halves together not pushing them apart!

Okay, I'm gonna have to give up on this one because I don't understand it. I'm quite sure it was mentioned that glass was only used on the inside and just a filler for the butt joint... but now you write fiber glass is used...

If glass is only used on the inside, yes the shrinking pulls it together of course but when there is nothing on the outside while pulling it inward on the inside, you force a gap on the outside. If you glue the halves together before glassing the joint on the inside, and it holds, you still get the internal stress which, with a little help from a bump here and there, will lead to a crack as described by the OP.

I guess it's a method done by many builders then. Good to know, would love to keep a list of them. HR is hipdeep in sh*t atm with the lawsuit on their building quality so we'll see where that ends.

cheers,
Nick.

[roverhi]

Westsails, 32, 42 and 43 were built in two halves and they have a reputation for being hell for stout. Believe the Morgan yachts were also built in two halves. At least I owned one with two entirely different quality of each side.

[capnorv]

OK, I'll throw my opinion out for ridicule, because it seems the norm. I bought a boat last fall, and it has a gelcoat crack down the stern about 3 1/2'. I do not believe this constitutes a structural fault, but only a cosmetic one. I believe yours is probably the same, but I have not seen the boat. Do you like it? Do you have the conviction to make the repairs you deem necessary, and the ones that will crop up? Do you consider the boat a good deal at whatever price you get it at? Is it the last thing you look at when you leave the marina/anchorage/storage yard? Then facilitate the purchase procedure! If the answer is no to any of these questions...keep looking...shes out there.