Trimaran - Especially Searunner - Owners

[Roy M]

Can you install an inspection port on your A-frame?

[Roy M]

I took another look at your installation. Can't you install an inspection plate on the inboard side of the hull in a location near where the work needs to be done?

[searunner31]

Someone else mentioned that also, and I think that would be a good idea.

j. Marple said the hull is totally finished..before attaching andcan't see how. Using know anyone small enough to get inside that would have the strength to tighten all the bolts.

[Mark Johnson]

I too use Beckson deck plates in my ama sides, for ventilation, and access to the nuts on lifeline padeyes, cleats, etc.

A note about these Beckson "o" ring deck plates. They are cheep, totally secure, dry, and really last! I'd say, > 30 years... Am I right Roy?

I LOVE DIRT CHEEP, REALLY QUICK, PERFECT SOLUTIONS. It makes the other 99% of boat work more tolerable! Here's a couple...

PVC ELBOW DORADE BOXES:
If you want good ventilation, but not rain infiltration, (I mean NONE), I would use these Beckson deck plates rather than the clam shell type or scoop vents that are so popular. In a blow, rain gets in these, even with the little deflectors added...

With the deck plates, here is how to make them into a true dorade box, with ZERO water infiltration. Now, this is at the dock, at anchor, or motoring up a creek. Under way, we always cap them.

The Beckson deck plate plastic is easily solvent welded to standard sch 40 PVC pipe, with PVC cement. You use a 90 degree sewer pipe elbow, cut one end of the elbow off just a bit short, (but 90 degrees to the other opening), and glue the other end of the elbow to the round flange on the deck plate.

My memory gets fuzzy here because I have made several versions, but... Either you use the flare end of the elbow, or slip the elbow in a flare upsized adapter sleeve. Which ever I used, had a beveled inner hole with already eased edges, and the OD of the fitting was a PERFECT match for the Beckson Deck plate's flange. (Both had the EXACT same OD). Just take your deck plate and go to Lowes. Play with the pipe fittings till it all fits...

After gluing the elbow onto the deck plate's flange, With the deck plate held vertical, the far end of the elbow sticks up vertically, no more than the deck plate's outer mounting flange does. (cut off any excess) If you now mount the deck plate with the flange's OD about 2.5" down from the deck, the PVC pipe elbow's horizontal opening, is now parallel to the deck, and 2" or so below the ceiling in the ama. This much room gives PLENTY of air movement, with no water. This air movement is due to a strong venturi effect where one ama deck plate pulls air in from the one on the other end, even in VERY light winds.

A nice and important finishing touch to keep birds and dirt dobbers out, is to cut a disc of standard house fiberglass bug screen, and glue it to that PVC elbow adapter's beveled inner edge, that is now JUST after the glue joint to the deck plate's flange. (PVC cement works great here too.)

My "dorade box ama vents" still have the original deck plates, screens and all, after about 19 years. I do carry spare lids, in case I drop one. (So far so good)...

These deck plates are good enough, btw, that I even used them on the lid to my holding tank, which was built out of the hull itself. I trust them.

ANOTHER APPLICATION:
The "dorade box out of PVC elbows" works in other applications too. I.E. For ventilating our sealed and sound insulated sub floor engine compartment, (under the aft companionway ladder), we use 4" in and out elephant's trunk hoses. They run up to the ceiling in the galley storage shelf areas, (1 port, & 1 starboard), then along the cabin ceiling in there, to the cabin sides. Here they turn down and are immediately hose clamped onto one of these PVC elbows, that goes down, turns & goes out. To cover this hole on the outside is a large SS clamshell, tipped down just a bit.

For making the "dorade box vent", The 4" PVC elbow was glued to a threaded adapter sleeve first, and the threaded part was fitted through the epoxy lined hole in the cabin. Then a 1/2" long slice of the female threaded PVC sleeve is screwed on as the "nut", bedded in caulk.

To get into the engine compartment, water has to go into the clamshell, (half way up the cabinside), turn to enter the PVC elbow, turn again to go up about about 10", (before entering the hose), and only then does it start the horizontal & down hill run.

It works in all manner of deck sweeping waves, hurricanes "hunkered down somewhere", and gales at sea. The only water infiltration failure was when a wave broke WAY over the ENTIRE boat, while going hard to windward in a gale. Then water was close to my knees in the cockpit, and it got in from every opening. I don't count that, and I don't sail that way anymore anyway!

M.

[Boatguy30]

I am 5'10" and 150. Average sized by world standards and I can easily reach the far ends of a 34 or 37 AMA and have been inside a 31s also and it didn't seem too bad if I recall. Shouldn't be hard to find someone to do the work for you. you wouldn't want to cut extra holes to do a repair like that.

[Mark Johnson]

Originally Posted by searunner31

Someone else mentioned that also, and I think that would be a good idea.

j. Marple said the hull is totally finished..before attaching andcan't see how. Using know anyone small enough to get inside that would have the strength to tighten all the bolts.

STRENGTH TO TIGHTEN BOLTS:
A note on tightening bolts... With new SS machine screws, all gooped up (= lubricated) with caulk, a very light touch is called for. NO MORE. After just snug, I go around several times in a cross pattern, (like torquing down the head of an engine), but with about ONE pound of pressure! The idea is to squeeze out ample caulk all around, just get uniform contact, then make NO MORE than half a turn after that.

It is counter intuitive, and SO different from mounting stuff down on hard FRP production boats! Our thinly glassed plywood boats are really tough, but hardware crushes the deck/hull easier than you would ever imagine. Then you get micro pores in the glass around the fitting, and bad things start from there.

I actually use only my finger tips, and really choke up on the wrench or socket... Like hold it 1" from the nut! It is that hard to NOT screw up.

M.

[searunner31]

I agree I have the pvc openings on the deck at each end. But this rip out happened right up to under the aframe. So have to remove the aframe at the AMA hopefully not from the hull. Repair it, backup and reinstall the stanchion but I noticed where the pulley next to the stanchion is bowed up a bit and felt down in there a small backing plate. So want too fix this all at once. maybe I'm make more out of this because of my size. I really like this boat. But have to fix or replace the rudder, and a little rot ,in the cockpit seat where water stood because someone had stuff up against the drain hole and water couldn't escape.

The man that built this boat paid allot of erattention to detail. But I'm surprised at all the teak and mahogany used. I would have thought it would have added to much weight.

[Roy M]

Can you take a few more pics for us to see more clearly the issues?

[searunner31]

Here are my major issues. The stanchion, cockpit and the Rudder to fix or remake. That's about it

[Roy M]

Thanks. It's been a while since I worked on a friend's A-frame 31, so please bear with me and corroborate with John Marples, et al, about any suggestions I'm about to make. Assuming you can remove the entire ama from the structural a-frames, you will need to do so to access enough solid material to ensure a good repair. As I recall, the horizontal "deck", that the stantion was fixed to, can be removed with a chisel and/or sawzall. It seems pretty dramatic to a first-timer, but you are merely removing "dead tissue" from a wound. Once you have removed enough plywood to encounter solid material (which doesn't have the texture of peat moss), search all around the perimeter to ensure you have no further dryrot whatsoever. At this point you will use your epoxy resin/hardener mix of choice, but diluted 50% with acetone, and thoroughly saturate all the exposed wood, keeping up the saturation until it begins to harden. You are attempting to seal the damaged remnant and make it resistant to future dryrot. Once it cures, file, grind or sand the areas that are sealed so that they will accept the epoxy at the next step. The plywood deck replacement has to rest on something, a ledger or butt block, or both. Play with pieces of plywood and fir stringer material (3/4" X 1 1/4" strip) to see what works. Temporarily screw them in place with self-tapping screws. These will become temporary clamps in the next step. The butt block should overlap the underside of the existing solid deck piece by at least 3", or be supported on the 3/4" edge of a stringer where ever you can do so. Then cut and fit the replacement deck ply, I recall that it is also 3/8" ply in the 31. When all these pieces fit reasonably well, pull them out and completely seal them with a couple coats of epoxy resin/hardener. Now, begin the re-installation of the manufactured pieces, beginning with the stringer material and being sure to use screws to solidly attach the butt block to the underside of the original deck, from the top down. You will fill these holes later. Add a couple of partially fastened screws to the top of the butt block so you can hold it in place, if need be, until the clamp screws are in place. If you can, add whatever plywood pieces that allow you to make a physical bond with any vertical surfaces, to make the base really strongly attached to the original boat. No one will ever see these, or probably know what was going on anyway. Just make sure that you have built a solid substrate for the final deck piece. Now, install the deck piece, having removed all the temporary clamp screws. Then mix up some epoxy and low density filler and create the fillets (remembering not to put goop where the A-frames will be mating with the vertical portions of the ama). Figure out where you want to put the inspection plate, hole-saw and seal the rim. Now, decide how much painting you want to do, the whole ama or a smaller section, then prime and paint. Remount the stantion, as mentioned earlier, the remount the ama to the a-frame. Pat yourself on the back and have several cans, bottles, or glasses of "industrial solvent" to replace lost electrolytes.

Then, having successfully achieved that victory, use the same techniques to repair all the other sections in the cockpit. Don't mess with repairing the rudder. Rebuild it with all new materials. Never skimp on your rudder.

I used a similar technique when replacing my cabinside fixed portlights I found some dryrot in the sterncastle side. It all came out beautifully in the end, but the initial feeling was one of complete dejection. It's amazing what you can do with a Searunner.

[searunner31]

Roy thanks a lot, I really appreciate it here are a few not pic don't know if these helps. I hope I don't have too take aframe off boat and AMA.

Haul ours and yard time are expensive here.

Thanks again for your input

[clemon]

Hello All,
In the continuing saga of "Why West System boats like Searunner 34's should not have deck penetrations", I'm removing a set of large deck mounted quick release lever arms and cheek plates that are used to tension the running back stays. These also cause the deck to flex, which eventually causes the fiberglass to crack nearby, which in New Zealand, leads to the dreaded wood rot. Has anyone come up with a simple quick release mechanism? I've read that a 4:1 block system will work fine, set up sort of like a vang tension system, on each backstay to chainplate system. This looks fine, but cheaper or other clever ideas are worth looking at.

On the continued dread issue of wood rot, I'm starting to get paranoid about the head stay attachment, as I'm suspicious that water may be getting into the bow area. I can't tell if water seeping into this area can drain out, or whether it will pool and rot out the headstay mounting plate. I really wish the searunner had an external chain plate for the headstay. Has anyone come up with a clever way of inspecting this area, aside from cutting in through the deck top?
Cheers, Chris

[Roy M]

Clemon, when I built mine, I anticipated the chance that rot could happen, so I heavily coated all of the relevant pieces with epoxy, including all the bolt holes. Then, the entire facing of the bow was fashioned with foam, glass and epoxy. If I ever cream another boat or a seawall, I can whack off everything forward of the chainplate and rebuild it of foam.

And I am old school enough to realize that s**t happens, and that Murphy's Law hasn't been repealed yet, so I am ever thankful that my boat can be relatively easily repaired, and be durable enough to survive a very long time. Thank you Gougeon Brothers.

[Boatguy30]

Here is a pic of the stem cut out to replace the forestay chainplate on a SR 34. The piece removed was then glued back in and glassed over. Not at all structural, though on this boat was solid timber.

[Boatguy30]

Originally Posted by searunner31

Roy thanks a lot, I really appreciate it here are a few not pic don't know if these helps. I hope I don't have too take aframe off boat and AMA.

Haul ours and yard time are expensive here.

Thanks again for your input

No reason you couldn't remove the ama in the water and float it onto a powerboat trailer. Work on it anywhere. Could lash a barrel to each A frame. Have someone with wood multihull experience survey your boat before you plan to take it offshore. You probably have a lot more problems than you realize. It really sucks when a hull falls off.