Yes we're still here in Danga Bay, hey I don't know of any other marina that's free so it makes a good spot to catch up on long neglected maintenance projects.
When we bought the boat ten years ago one of the notations made by the surveyor was delamination of the deck skin from the core. Think of the deck as a sandwich. Two skins of fiberglass with a wood core in the middle. In older boats it's common for the outer skin to delaminate from the core. Ours has done that in a number of places. I had previously made some repairs but lots more were necessary, so here we go.
Out came the small circular saw and I cut out a rectangle. In the past I had cut two inch in diameter hole but this time I wanted to see what the core material truely was.
On lifting the panel off we found five inch square pieces of plywood stuffed together and then bonded with resin. It looks as if during the manufacture they made use of all the scraps putting them in the core.
For these sections we mixed up thinned epoxy resin and satuarated the core, then replaced the top section. After observing exactly what the core material was we went back to a simpler method of just drilling holes through the top skin and then injecting the epoxy mix into the holes.
On injecting the epoxy there is a cappillary effect and the epoxy flows through the core material. you continue to mix more and inject until at last the holes fill. Next it's a layer of seran wrap and weights. Once the epoxy cures the soft delaminated spots are gone. At least for now.
Now the deck is once again solid. Next will be some more filling to make it smooth and the re-paint and non-skid.
We have been moving along a section at a time. now the aft deck is done.
No comments:
Post a Comment