Breaking All the Rules ...

[JPA Cate]

Homeless,

When we were dismasted due to a cotter pin coming out, we discovered corrosion at the mast base. The rigging company we dealt with at the time informed me that one way they handle that problem is to cut off the base, and then shorten all the wires accordingly. You have to live with a shorter mast then.

I guess the solution wouldn't work for you because of the new sail. I hope that's a good safe solution.

[homeless]

Today I took the new fuel hose back to Enzed and they were happy to sell me an additional fitting so it could attach it to my Racor filter. I also bolted the new anode to the prop shaft ... WITH Duralac which will help to avoid a repeat of the seized bolts that I found.

Bought an impact driver to take out the last stubborn screws in the last 3 hatches that need to be re-bedded and combing painted. Unfortunately after borrowing the courtesy car and driving to the hardware store and finding it and buying it and taking it back to the boat the phillips driver bit broke on the second screw. You would think that an "impact driver" that is meant to be hit with a hammer would be designed to survive an impact, but obviously not.

I did manage to get the pilothouse hatch off because it used flat-head screws rather than philips. It has been raining regularly the last few days, so I wanted a nice simple piece of work that could be completed before the next rain, but I chose wrong with the pilothouse hatch. After removing the last of the 14 screws it still would not budge, but after a lot of hammering and levering and some distortion of the hatch flange I did get it off. Along with the hatch came some splintered teak surround, enough old sealant to fill a few tubes, and large sheets of paint and filler on top of some powdery corrosion. It seems that a previous owner had been busy with this hatch and after splintering the wood had stuck it all back together with the intention that it would never move again. I ground the paint and filler back until it was bonded to the aluminium plate, then ground off the corrosion, primed the aluminium, sanded the teak back to clean wood, then re-bedded it again with sealant, followed by the hatch. Still need to fair around the hatch, prime, then top coat. Only two hatches left to bed ... after I get another philips impact driver bit.

I spoke to the rigger about the mast again. Online prices for 12mm double braid polyester rope is about $240 for 100 meters, but the rigger can supply the same brand for $167 so I told him to replace the main, genoa, and staysail halyards along with the topping lift, lazy jacks, and pennant lines. The old halyards will be demoted to spinnaker halyards, running backstays etc. I also asked him to replace some fractured spacers at the mast head and replace the tricolour and anchor bulbs with LED.

[GILow]

Originally Posted by homeless

. You would think that an "impact driver" that is meant to be hit with a hammer would be designed to survive an impact, but obviously not.

Try keeping the bits warm before you use them. They probably were warm at this time of year anyway, but a mate of mine taught me to keep them in my pocket when they were not in use, and it made a huge difference.

Anyway, if they were a popular Ozzie brand that begins with "I" you were probably screwed anyway, so to speak.

Good luck with the resto',

Matt

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by homeless

I also bolted the new anode to the prop shaft ... WITH Duralac which will help to avoid a repeat of the seized bolts that I found.

The zinc should protect the bolts from corrosion. Isolating them may not be such a good idea (and I hope you didn't put any Duralac between the anode and prop shaft ).

[Cadence]

How about some more pics. Do you have an accounting of how you are doing as far as costs to date that you are willing to share?

[homeless]

A long day today. Grinding paint and fairing off the pilothouse from 7am to 3pm, then wash off the dust and paint primer until 6pm. Still need to grind about 20% of the pilothouse and then move on to the cockpit. The primed surface is not great, so I will need to do some fairing / sanding / priming / painting.

The teak hand rails on the pilothouse are really bugging me. The wood is old and ugly, and they are screwed directly into the pilothouse roof and plugged, so I can't remove them for the painting. I will try to get a quote to see how much it would cost to replace them with stainless steel or aluminium hand rails.

Total spend so far including the standing rigging, lazy bag, and yard is getting close to $40K.

[JPA Cate]

Homeless,

If the rails don't leak, then sand gently. Two coats varnish. Then paint with color of your choice. Actually saw some maroon ones, didn't look bad one time, but the idea is don't make it more difficult than it has to be. My choice would be dove grey, because it echoes the colour of weathered teak.

[homeless]

Originally Posted by Ann T. Cate

Homeless,

If the rails don't leak, then sand gently. Two coats varnish. Then paint with color of your choice. Actually saw some maroon ones, didn't look bad one time, but the idea is don't make it more difficult than it has to be. My choice would be dove grey, because it echoes the colour of weathered teak.

The teak only needs a light sand and it will come up fine. Given a chance I would get rid of all wood on the boat, and especially outside, but need to choose my battles, and the hand rails are an easy target and are impacting my ability to paint the pilothouse.

[montenido]

Homeless, you can remove the handrails fairly easily. Use a very small drill bit to drill the center of each screw plug. Then screw a small screw into the plug, which will lift the plug right out when it hits the larger fastener underneath. Now the screws are exposed and you can remove them. With the amount of work that you are involved in, it might be better to leave them on, as others have suggested.

Good luck, and I am in awe of what you have accomplished so far.

Cheers, Bill

[homeless]

Another day of grinding and priming. Pilothouse is now 100% done, pedestal 100%, cockpit 40%. Surface finish is getting better with more coats, so I may not need to fair as much as I thought.

[JPA Cate]

Originally Posted by homeless

Another day of grinding and priming. Pilothouse is now 100% done, pedestal 100%, cockpit 40%. Surface finish is getting better with more coats, so I may not need to fair as much as I thought.

Good on ya. That's real progress.

[homeless]

A productive day, though possibly expensive.

I pulled off the last two hatches, ground the paint and fairing off the combing, primed them, then re-bedded them. It is a relief to finally finish this, so now I can go back and paint the hatches and dorado vents with top coat.

Ground the last of the old paint and fairing off the cockpit, then painted with primer, and also pulled the aft cabin portlights out for re-bedding. The portlight above the bed in the aft cabin leaks a bit when it rains, so the bed gets damp, and it has obviously been a problem for a long time as it has ruined the teak veneer. Whoever installed the portlights unfortunately tried to seal them to the internal veneer using silicon, instead of sealing the outside to the aluminium plate, which explains the leak, but it also meant that when I pulled the portlight out the water damaged veneer came with it, so now I need to clean up the rest of the veneer on that panel and then will paint it white.

I had to remove the sonar sensor before the hull welding so it didn't melt, and it took quite a bit of force to break the sealant, and I had to cut the nut off the through-hull. I bought another through-hull to use the nut on the sonar sensor, and re-bedded the sensor prior to the hull painting, but the thread was too damaged and I was not able to tighten it properly. This has been bugging me as a potential source of leaks and flooding, so today I again removed the sonar sensor through-hull with the plan to clean up the threads and re-bed it, but unfortunately the new sealant was too strong and the flange broke off the sensor. The sonar is Navman, so not sure I could get a replacement sensor, so I may need to replace the sonar sensor, log, and display. It may have been an expensive day.

[Kevin84]

Better to have it cost you money than have it fail at the worst possible moment and cost you your life. Been following your thread, wow, you've done some work! Very cool seeing another old boat brought back to life.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[homeless]

Today I re-bedded the aft cabin portlights, faired the roughest spots in the cockpit and on the pilothouse, sanded, then primed again. I also did some research on possible suppliers of a replacement depth transducer for my Navman display and sent off a bunch of emails, so hopefully will have some answers tomorrow on how to avoid replacing the display, log, and depth transducer.

[JPA Cate]

Sorry for the problems.

Good luck in the morning.

Ann