S&S 34 Teak Deck Removal (1970 Aquafibre)

[Olonne]

Hello! I bought a beautiful S&S 34 last month in Germany - it's a 1970 Aquafibre build. I need to remove the old teak deck and was wondering if anyone has experience / knowledge about the S&S 34 Aquafibre deck structure - do I need to add a few layers of fiberglass after stripping the teak or should the deck be structurally strong enough? It's a glued on teak deck.

Thank you for any comments!

Best, Lutz & SY Olonne

 

[earlybird]

The standard Aquafibre 34 has a solid deck moulding and shouldn't need any structural reinforcement. I would expect your teak to be a later addition. Most new 34's were for racing and the extra weight would not be wanted.
Edit:- just clicked on the picture, Is that a wooden coachroof? That's very non standard, so your deck seems to be a bit of an unknown.

 

[Concerto]

That looks like a timber coachroof, which is not standard as the deck was completely glassfibre. It may be possible this has a wood, not glassfibre deck. Check inside to see it there are timber deck cross beams as this will confirm it is a wooden deck. The SS34's I have known all had a glassfibre deck and this looks very different.

 

[Concerto]

Thinking further the SS34 was launched at the end of the 1960's, a period of massive transition in the yacht market. It was a very competitive race boat, Edward Heath had one as a Morning Cloud. At this time it was popular for people to fit out a hull and deck, and some people liked the idea of a glassfibre hull but still wanted a traditional wooden deck and used a yard to complete. A lot of the Twisters were built with a wooden coachroof and are much prized today. I still suspect a full wood deck which would meant the teak deck cannot be removed to expose a glassfibre layer. The OP may be able to glass skin your deck as a cheaper option to replacing the teak.

 

[spottydog]

My Aquafibre hulled S&S34 is a composite construction having an all wood deck/cabin like a Twister. She was finished at Lowestoft Boat Building Training college and launched in 1986. I would post a picture but I don’t know how as the images I have are being rejected as too large.

 

[Concerto]

My Aquafibre hulled S&S34 is a composite construction having an all wood deck/cabin like a Twister. She was finished at Lowestoft Boat Building Training college and launched in 1986. I would post a picture but I don’t know how as the images I have are being rejected as too large.

That is good to confirm my thoughts.

There are plenty of free photo editors which can reduce a photo's resolution. You to resize it for the longest side to be 1000 pixels and you should be able to load it fine.
free photo editor for pc - Google Search

This is probably the easiest for speed with a jpeg file and not learning how to use a program.
Compress JPEG Images Online - FreeConvert.com

 

[Bajansailor]

@spottydog please do post some photos of your lovely S & S 34 - re photo size, as a variant of the 1000 pixels rule mentioned above by Concerto, I think that this roughly corresponds to a limit of about 1 MB.
I use a free editing program called Photoscape, which seems to work well.

@Olonne could you post some more photos of your 34 please, including some of the deck?

Alternatively, with Windows 10 if you open the photo with Microsoft Office Picture Manager you can re-size a photo very easily when you click on 'Edit pictures' in the taskbar at the top.

I have a soft spot for S & S 34's - I sailed on a pal's 34 (called 'Morning Flight') from St Maarten up to Maine via Bermuda and Newport 26 years ago, and thought she was wonderful. And another pal had one called Scalpay which he took around the world after he had totally re-fitted her (he had bought her in Antigua in poor condition).

 

[spottydog]

Finally out of the shed and nearly ready for launching.

 

[penfold]

That looks like a timber coachroof, which is not standard as the deck was completely glassfibre. It may be possible this has a wood, not glassfibre deck. Check inside to see it there are timber deck cross beams as this will confirm it is a wooden deck. The SS34's I have known all had a glassfibre deck and this looks very different.

It's definitely not a standard S&S34 coachroof.

 

[Olonne]

First of all, THANK YOU ALL for your super quick answers - this is much appreciated!!

@spottydog What a beautiful looking deck! Very interesting design.

@all - Olonne has a timber coachroof but the running deck and foredeck are glassfibre. I'll be back on the boat this Friday and will unscrew a screw of one of the genoa tracks to check how thick the glassfibre is - a good friend told me that 10mm should be fine to be structurally strong enough. What do you think?

Also, the entire cockpit is glassfibre. You can see it on the additional pictures. (sorry for the tarp on the last pic)

Just for the possibility that some might have information on the boat: It's previous names were 'Ollimel' and before that 'Tinker Bell'.

Dankeschön!

- Lutz

 

[Concerto]

The SS34 was also built in Australia and had a different deck to the British moulded one. The OZ built deck had a coachroof that was flat along the whole length, a bit like yours, but the British ones had larger windows in a raised coachroof for the main cabin. It has been so many years since I was on a SS34, I cannot remember the headroom in the forward cabin. It seems most likely that the original owner wanted more headroom in the forward cabin, so had the deck moulding made with the cockpit and side decks only. This allowed for the wooden coachroof, which looks very similar to a Vindo.

EDit: Just reading this article https://classicsailor.com/2018/02/no4-ss-34/. This shows both coachroofs moulded. I see that some SS34's were completed by Sagitta and it may be this is one of theirs as they liked wooden coachroofs.

 

[Olonne]

@Concerto Thanks for the edit - I came across that article, too. But I don't think my S&S was build by Sagitta since they placed the engine a bit more aft with the prop also being more aft (probably to counterbalance the the joys of berthing the S&S 34 astern haha). My S&S has the original engine and prop position, as you can see on the picture.

Thanks!

 

[Tranona]

First of all, THANK YOU ALL for your super quick answers - this is much appreciated!!

@spottydog What a beautiful looking deck! Very interesting design.

@all - Olonne has a timber coachroof but the running deck and foredeck are glassfibre. I'll be back on the boat this Friday and will unscrew a screw of one of the genoa tracks to check how thick the glassfibre is - a good friend told me that 10mm should be fine to be structurally strong enough. What do you think?

Also, the entire cockpit is glassfibre. You can see it on the additional pictures. (sorry for the tarp on the last pic)

Just for the possibility that some might have information on the boat: It's previous names were 'Ollimel' and before that 'Tinker Bell'.

Dankeschön!

- Lutz

GRP deck and wood coachroof was quite common in the period in UK (Twister for example) Holland (Frans Mass among others used the method) and Scandinavia (HR and Vindo as well as many smaller builders).

Big strength is of course visual as your boat shows. Downside is the joint between the deck and the coachroof with better ones having an upstand moulded in to which the wood is attached rather than wooden carlins either on or under the deck - or both. Keeping this joint watertight can be a challenge. I would imagine your deck is a "standard" deck moulding that includes the cockpit and therefore structural. Good to have a GRP moulded cockpit as wood in its construction can be a nightmare! If the deck is solid GRP water ingress is less of a problem than if it is cored, particularly if balsa was used for the core. Difficult to tell from your photos how the teak is attached. If it is glued then the deck should be sound underneath. However if fastenings either permanent or temporary have been used the water ingress is more likely and you may have a lot of remedial work to do to make the deck sound and fair.

You don't say what your plans are once you remove the teak. If replacing with teak then glued panels is probably the best way to go rather than shaping and gluing individual strips. Avoid fastenings and work out ways in which you can reduce the number fittings that need to bolt through. If you look at many mass production boats with teak decks they do not have fittings going through the teak but mould in raised pads. The teak is laid in panels vacuum bagged onto the GRP. When I laid a teak deck on my boat I did something similar in that I glued raised solid teak pads where things like windlass, stanchion bases and genoa tracks went and laid the deck around them.

Good luck with your project. You are fortunate in having a desirable boat that justifies the effort and expense.

Difficult to see from your photos how the teak is attached. If it is just glued then although it may be tough to remove the chances are the deck underneath will be largely sound. If any fastenings, either temporary or permanent were use then prepare for water having got in. all those fastenings for deck fittings that go through the teak and deck are potential problems. If the GRP deck is solid, water igre

 

[Olonne]

@Tranona Thank you for comment! A lot of information!

I plan to strip the teak and paint the deck. I don't want a new teak deck, since it's complicated to get proper and ethical teak these days. I plan to apply two layers of deck paint and then two layers of International Interdeck.

 

[spottydog]

Ollone what a beautiful looking s&s34, where are you going to keep her. Why do you need to strip the teak deck if there is fibre glass beneath.

 

[Cardinal]

Olonne is a gorgeous boat. What a lucky find. Good luck with your proposed works.

 

[spottydog]

A better view of the deck and cabin

 

[Tranona]

@Tranona Thank you for comment! A lot of information!

I plan to strip the teak and paint the deck. I don't want a new teak deck, since it's complicated to get proper and ethical teak these days. I plan to apply two layers of deck paint and then two layers of International Interdeck.

Good decision. Expect you will have a lot of filling and fairing to do after you have removed the teak. while Interdeck is good you might also consider Kiwigrip vitessemarine.co.uk/kiwigrip-non-skid-deck-coating

Commonly used in these situations as it does not require a perfect faired substrate.