Recent content by Keith 66

Round the corner in Sharfleet there are a couple of wrecks on the south side near the old sea wall, Another interesting one on the south side of bishops marsh at opposite end to Darnett fort, dont know what it was but quite a large fine lined wooden ship.

Went to a presentation at the Beecroft gallery in Southend on the shipwreck of HMS London, Fascinating day with talks & displays of artifacts. The London was commisioned by Oliver Cromwell for the Royal Navy & sank in 1665 after suffering an accidental gunpowder explosion. Steve Ellis lead diver...

Landowners / farmers on East side of Stangate, Chetney Hill & Barksore marshes do not like yachtsmen & you will likely get chased off. I have visited Burntwick many times & never been chased off yet! As far as Deadmans Island is concerned It is reputed to be "off limits but i have never seen...

Take a walk through most boat parks & you will see derelict end of life boats, in our club i estimate 30 - 40% are at that stage. The covid pandemic & following cost of living crisis has hit many people hard & Many owners are now old & unable to accept that their boat that cost them 12k twenty...

Looking at the photos it is obvious that the keel itself is rotten. This renders the boat uneconomic to repair. Difficult but not impossible. But it looks like a glued clinker boat, What is the rest of the planking like? If its delaminating all over the place it isnt practical to repair. Epoxy...

One thing worth remembering, If you try tapping plates in fibreglass the tap will go blunt very very quickly & then jam & snap off. I know this from personal experience, That boat still has the broken off tap in it there was no way it was ever coming out. Epoxy cast threads are quick easy & strong.

On that Twister the machine screws were 5/16" (8mm) & about 3" long, they were just tapped into the grp filler so no metal plate as far as i could tell. So you might just have to cut them off & redrill between the old cut off stubs. If you are using a grinder to cut the bolts or the track cover...

looks like someone has cut out the interior moulding for some reason, possibly had waterlogged foam under it? Repair looks pretty good but we need to see the outside really. Obviously ran out of flo coat!

I have done this job before several times, last time on an elderly Twister, A decent impact driver with a screwdriver bit ground to fit the slot exactly. If you try & tighten & undo several times. I also used an air powered impact driver, You will snap bits & have to regrind them. If that fails...

Usually you would work from the outside inwards. Ok the planks are light but the sheer number of fastenings & difficulty of getting at the inner layer always makes it a hard job. The worst diagonal boat i worked on was a 40ft Morgan giles motor yacht, It came up the slip leaking badly, we took...

If you want to remove an inside plank first you have to get at it. That means gutting everything out of the boat including any stringers & frames, bulkheads. If centreline structure is suspect you have to replace that too. Working from the inside piecemeal is always going to be a bodge. First...

It wont end well, Lots of people will tell them to slather it in epoxy & the epoxy retailers will be rubbing their hands in glee. The reality is that in double diagonal boats the rot travels between the skins from sheer to keel. If you want to uncover one plank on the inside you have to take...

About 10 years ago our local boatyard changed hands, At the time i remember one of the staff saying that 30% of the boats in the yard were abandoned, thats a lot of income lost. New owner replaced them with caravans & houseboats, much more lucrative! Walking through our club this morning I...

Problem with old grp is that it is often contaminated with antifouls such as Tbt (still around on many long abandoned boats) Also unreacted peroxide catalyst (oxidising agent) that stays in the laminate, grind the grp up & this makes the filler powder prone to spontaneous combustion. The energy...

When i worked down Leigh old town i broke quite a few wrecks up on the beach at Southend & a few subsequently. Its hard heavy dangerous work, If the boat is grp horribly dusty too. Several days in a respirator itching like fury with the dust. It isnt something that you should ask club volunteers...