commuter boats

Thank you and you're welcome, did anybody notice that in the first photograph there's a thermometer leaning against a grinder that reads 20° ( Fahrenheit )... by the completion of the project the temperature had warmed to 36 ° and heavy rain....

ChiefD

Really nice work Gerald!

A serious repair for sure.

Grinding and glassing overhead..........doesn't get much more fun then that!

Happy holidays my friend. Thanks for sharing.
D

surv

I noticed it but didnt notice the temp it was reading. How did you go about heating it before applying your new glass?

That looks to be a good size boat, how thick was the glass in the keel where your repair was? What did you use as a backing to get the shape of the keel before applying your new layup?

commuter boats

Thanks chief, grinding fiberglass is a lot of fun but laying on the cold, wet ground and grinding on something that's just a few inches above your nose is special...
It was a 42 foot sailboat that had previous damage that wasn't repaired well. I had removed about a cubic foot of crushed putty that filled the space around the lead ballast. It was necessary to replace that putty and completely fill the void around the ballast so it was easy for me to make a cardboard form and inject a slurry of microspheres and resin as a backing to laminate against.

Heat was a 50,000 BTU kerosene space heater and a 30,000 BTU propane heater, the keel was nearly an inch thick, the repair was 7 feet long.

These are the type of jobs that I make money on, miserable but lucrative work and I move on to another one tomorrow.
Gerald

DJWILLIAMS

are you guys no longer doing build threads, or social media updates??? Really enjoyed following along.

kln

Hey DJ. We havent been doing any build threads. And haven't been doing a very good job updating Facebook especially. We do quite a bit on Instagram. With three builds going on and another in design now we have really been focused on the work.

I know you (and a lot of others) have really followed along closely and supported us from the start. Can't thank you enough. Going to do a better job in 2017!

ChiefD

Gerald,
Please keep us posted on your next repair and future repairs as well if you can. The build threads are great but having done a fair amount of repair work (really nothing compared to your stuff) I find your your post/threads very interesting and informative!

Kln,
Some of us old buzzards aren't so much into social media........if you can find the time to update us on your builds using this forum.......I know I would sure appreciate it!

Happy New Year guys!
D

kln

I don't mind Chief. And I know Gerald doesn't mind me sharing some pictures on his thread so here.

Big Iron

Woah. That drawing looks sexy. Bow of a yellowfin/ Cape Horn with the stern of something else.

kln

Thanks big iron. Something a little different.

Working on 3d modeling the interior of the 64'

commuter boats

Kln,Thanks, I enjoy and appreciate your contributions to the thread.
Happy new year chief, I was a little slow getting started on the next project but I'm into it now and I'll post a few pictures later on.

There's so much rhetoric on the shortcomings of polyester on these forums I'd like to ask those with some outstanding examples of the good of polyester ( situations where it's performed well ) and particularly those that involve polyester and wood to post up pictures and stories of those successes.
I'll start with this little dory, a gentleman came to town a little over 30 years ago and because we live on a rock that prevents doing much of anything without a boat and because his budget was a little on the skinny side he got into this plywood Dory for $1000. About 1/4 of the outside veneer of the plywood was failing, he use the boat for about a year and 1/2 and fell in love with it. With a new 40 horse OMC outboard he could efficiently cruise at 17 kn and really enjoyed the fact that the boat had few bad habits, he had small children and really liked the depth of the cockpit, it was easy to keep the kids in.
He parked it in his carport after his second season with it and begin researching a fix as more of the plywood was failing. He came to me after reading many stories about how fiberglass and polyester would be a waste of time and money but he was in love and open-minded. I like challenging projects and had confidence that I could get him enough additional years to justify the expense.
We had a relatively cold winter that year and cold and dry did a good job of drying the plywood, we put it in my shop, turned it over and left an electric heater under it for a couple weeks.
We removed all the failing veneers and most of the paint, primed the boat with vinyl ester resin ( thinned with 10% styrene, bumped up the cobalt, added some DMAA and worked hot ), faired the low spots ( from the missing veneers ) with micro-balloons and iso-resin, and laid up a mat and roving over the entire hull. With that cured we drilled for bronze ring shank nails into the chine logs and frames, nailed it off with about 3 pounds of bronze fasteners, then applied two layers of mat, a little fairing and a roll coat of gelcoat. Turned the boat right side up and glassed over the upper decks and onto the hull.
About 28 years later I'm driving down the road and glance over to a parking lot and see this relatively good-looking dory sitting on a trailer and pull over to check it out. I've gotten some feedback over the years as the boats gone through a few owners but I've never had a chance to lay eyes on it since it left my shop, I was very pleased after a short walk around, I'm quite certain that it still has many years ahead of it.
While downtown the other day I ran into the gentleman that I did the work for and we shared a little time reminiscing about the job and about how much enjoyment he had with the boat in the 15 years that he used it. He was able to remember that I charged him approximately $2200 nearly 30 years ago and confirmed that he felt it was a good investment.
I don't know when the planing boards were added.
Gerald

Capt Hugh Wilde

Nicely done.

commuter boats

Thank you Capt.

ChiefD

Gerald,
Not even close to 28 years but........

My sons and I built this about 8 yrs ago for them to dive/fish near shore. Flat bottom 18'X6', 1/2" ply bottom, 3/8" sides from the local big box store.

2 layers 1708 outside, 1 layer inside all overlapped at chines, transom, stem etc. used nothing but poly marine laminating resin. Everything is glassed in and out, no bare or resin coated wood anywhere even under the gunnels.

They beat the crap out of it regularly and it returns the favor (being flat bottom). Sits outside 24/7 and I have yet to see any issues period.

I think poly often gets a bad rap due to poor prep/laminating practices.
D

commuter boats

Excellent project chief and good job imparting skills in those young people.

I agree, Poly gets a bad reputation because it's less forgiving than epoxy.
I'm in no way denying that epoxy has some superior properties but they are very much exaggerated.

As per your request chief ( and anybody else that might want to follow what a forefoot repair might look like), I took a couple days off over Christmas and I’ve been having some air compressor problems at the shop along with a few other logistics ( I just got the engines an electronics for my ladies boat ), but I got a good start on this project last week.
The first few pictures are the shelter ( it’s winter in Southeast Alaska ) and there’s a little grinding that I had previously done in the interests of understanding what I had.
I also took a little time to accurately pattern the profile that I want to build back to.

commuter boats

In these photos I’m chasing the delamination, if I can remove it with a chisel I’m going to try to set myself up for that. The goal is to remove all the damage and provide a nice, smooth scarf joint around the perimeter of the damage. I am patching this from both the inside and the outside so I’m willing to go a little steeper taper on the outside then I did on the sailboat, I was working 15 to 1 on it but on this job to avoid getting into the topside paint I will accept a 10 to 1.
This is my rough grinding, the final grinding will be done immediately before I lay glass. I’m leaving little flags of delamination all the way around the perimeter of my grinding, if I have to justify my workmanship to an inspector or the client I have preserved evidence of the damage all the way around my grind.
A big challenge on these type of repairs is getting the shape right, these jobs are pretty tight estimates or bids, you can lose your ass if you don’t get your foundation right and build correctly to the finished shape. The more references and the smaller you can keep your repair, the easier it is to get back to the correct shape.

commuter boats

With the bulk of the outside grinding done, I built a framework around the forefoot so that I could use a fan below the boat to put negative pressure in the forecastle to minimize the mass while I prep the inside and I got a good start on that prep.

More when I have steam enough to post...

duke460

Great information. Thanks for taking the time to share

kln

Good looking little boat chief!

Thanks for sharing Gerald. Looking forward to seeing the rest. Always like to hear your thought process and see how it's executed. Very calculated. Your experience shows.

maxie

Thats some serious damage...was it reefed or did it hit a log floating below the surface?