Windchaser: bilge reno

[bornfreee]

Ha ha and Louis put that bloody chisel away you wont have much boat left soon

[bearmcnally]

Hi Troppo

That gunk !,in your bilge I think you will find is the dried up sludge that is poured around the lead ballast to stop it moving around . Once the lead is placed in position the bulkhead for the water tank is then glassed in And then then the sludge /resin is poured around the lead .In your case the bulkhead wasn't fitted or it had a gap under it and that is the overflow now in your bilge .

Cheers Bear

[Tales]

The drawing of the MkII shows the lead finishing before the bilge.

MkI much the same.

Cheers,

Tom

[bearmcnally]

The drawing of the MkII shows the lead finishing before the bilge.

MkI much the same.

Cheers,

Tom

Even in sketch the Mk 1 is perfect .

[Troppo]

Bear, posts like that are dangerous.

Dangerous alright. I could have hurt myself being all serious reading the posts then suddenly read ya post and my chest and face spasmed from a laugh convulsion. Ouch.

[bearmcnally]

Hi Tropo
It's good to have a chuckle every now and then while repairing wear and tear . I personally don't think you have a big problem with your Top Hat It is fixable and at the end of the day you will know more about your yacht than boat owners who don't do anything themselves.Some of the things I've seen backyard boat builders do over the years is frightening ,For instance ,I saw a bloke put more glass into his hull and then wondered why the lead ballast wouldn't fit in the keel !Even more interesting was watching him with a crane and a blow torch melting lead off ! The one that sticks in my mind the most,the guy down the bay who took the vanish off his yachts mahogany hull with a belt sander (IDIOT) The great thing about fibreglass is it is an easy material to work with, compared to other boat building materials? You can't blow holes in it while welding ,you can't cut it to short or split it like timber .

Cheers Bear

PS Your Windchaser is keeping the maintenance theme alive

[storm petrel]

Yes, we are all enjoying being kept up to date with your efforts to get Windchaser back in the big blue and Bear's helpful hints.

On the lead ballast front - a tonne of lead only occupies 1/10th of a cubic metre. Now if you used uranium you would get away with even less volume being wasted.

Good luck with the repairs.

Mark
Storm Petrel MkII

[Troppo]

Thank u Bear and Mark for your encouragement.

Days have been flashing past, Windchaser is still on the slip. In between everything else, I am managing to keep moving forward with Windchaser business so repairs are in progress.

Pressure's on as I need to be off the slip by the weekend. Apart from the various stressors, it is quite fun actually, I am learning heaps (just too much too quickly).

Proper updates on this forum will be done when I am able to, which means after I have worked out how to get off my fingers the epoxy and furry fibreglass that has taken a liking to me. Nah, kidding, I have been using plenty of disposable gloves. Seriously, it is easy to use glass fibre and epoxy, it takes a lot more to do it well. So slow and steady is my mantra. Well, it was until the big guy who has the slip booked for this weekend visited me.

Oh Mark, is depleted uranium the same mass as uranium? Perhaps I could use that and save heaps of space. Up the coast here they are reputed to use depleted uranium ammo in the army training ground. USA soldiers are up there now. The depleted uranium is easy to collect. Just sail into their bombardment area and pick it up. They may even send it to you if they are firing and don't notice your entry.

[storm petrel]

I would guess depleted uranium would be almost entirely U-238 as opposed to enriched uranium that is used in fission reactors which contains various fractions of U-235 and U-233. The point is, that depleted uranium is slightly more dense than enriched uranium. Unfortunately depleted uranium is still radiative ( half life 4.5 billion yrs) so probably not ideal for Top Hat ballast unless you have a mutinous crew you want to deal with after they have set you adrift. I believe they use depleted uranium in armor piercing shells because the increased density makes it more effective. Recently when staying in Hawaii I rented a house a few blocks from the US Pacific Missile Facility on Kauai(where they test their drones and missiles in the North Pacific) - the locals call the surf break in front of the Base, 'Targets'!

Good luck with the repairs, I look forward to hearing how you got on once you are back in the water.

Cheers,
Mark
Storm Petrel

[Troppo]

Update on bilge reno:

Used chisel and grinder to remove the soft black fibreglass rubbish and some of the covering harder stuff. You can see the hole in the bottom of the bilge, more on that later. In the picture, the area below the hole and a line to the right were the soft areas of mostly black stuff. I did not take any more out as the black stuff was almost gone and the other stuff seemed strong enough to leave.

Bilge after grinding.

bilge12.jpg (304.26 KiB) Viewed 3473 times

I painted the area with a batch of special runny epoxy to get it to soak into the cracks. A fair bit was sucked into some areas so I reckon it will be all the stronger for it. After laying a dozen or more layers of cloth and epoxy, it was built up but still not quite level.

Fibreglass cloth and epoxy layers in the weak area.

bilge14.jpg (366.34 KiB) Viewed 3473 times

Not finished but stronger than what it was. Last layer of cloth went up the sides and across the bottom. The side which had the cracks on the outside had an extra layer on the inside, so two layers at that point.

Final layer of cloth up sides and across bottom

bilge9.jpg (282.02 KiB) Viewed 3473 times