Blind Panic

[Kristal]

Getting some cleaning and a bit of trivial maintenance done on Crystal, I have just found something that made my blood run cold. You must bear with me on my boat construction ignorance here.

OK, the horizontal bits of wood that form the shape of the hull - the big thick ones, rather than the little ones in between - frames? Well, Crystal appears to have them all doubled throughout the hull. They are doubled together with dirty great square-headed bolts. One of these bolts, it seems, is getting frighteningly rusty - the paint has flaked away, and the bolt, whilst still maintaining it's shape, appears to have more than superficial rust. All of these bolts appear to be losing paint, and some have superficial rust, some a little more than superficial.

I presume the best course of action is to strip out the boat and locate any of these bolts that I can find, give them a good wire-brushing, and repaint, perhaps with some rust inhibitor first. I'm more worried that there could be a reason for it, other than the damp and salty environment - it couldn't be electrochemical on an interior bolt, could it?

I know relatively little about Electrolysis, having few electrics and no in-built 240v system on board, but thoughts of a thread a while back about fastenings causing their surrounding timber to soften has now increased my heart rate.

Frantically stripping out bits of furniture,

/<

 

[Mirelle]

Don\'t panic just yet.

Panic not.

I don't think you mean that her grown frames have been doubled; I think you mean that she was built with double futtocks.

Now, if these were put together with iron bolts, those bolts, being in oak, will most certainly rust.

Ignore the bolts for a moment and probe the timber adjacent to them. if it has gone grey and spongy, you have an electrolysis problem. if not, you don't.

More or less.

The enthusiast can knock these bolts out one at a time and replace them with bronze, as part of a big refit. But remember that an inch or iron makes a foot of rust.

 

[Kristal]

Re: Don\'t panic just yet.

Aha. I have just checked the survey: I should have a) done this first, and b) actually done something about it earlier, as the survey report indicates:

Clean off superficial rust then repaint ends of frame futtock bolts and some stringer bolts, as well as hanging knees beside cockpit.

I had missed this off of my running maintenance list. So that's what futtocks are...

They should be formed from Canadian Rock Elm, I think, but presumably the same applies as far as rusting. Not a job for me, though, I think - for now, I will put some Jenolite on it and repaint. The wood around the bolts offers as much resistance to a bradawl as I would expect.

Thanks for that reassurance!

/<

 

[Mirelle]

Re: Don\'t panic just yet.

No, the CRE (Canadian Rock Elm) is used for the bent (steamed) timbers between the grown frames - which are certainly English Oak.

Beware of CRE - rots at the drop of a hat (or the drip of a drop, anyway!)

 

[Kristal]

Re: Don\'t panic just yet.

Ewww. Right, okay, I'll keep an eye on that - I know a couple of those have been reinforced previously.

I really must figure this stuff out, it's been nearly two years...

 

[ray275]

Re: Don\'t panic just yet.

I am glad that I am not alone with terminology! There must be some way of finding out what the uses and specific names for these "fittings" are on an old boat -sorry -classic! I acquired Prescilla K last year and it would be nice to find one bolt without rust! I am chopping out all dodgy timber and coat each bolt/fixing with rust remover from Machine Mart (recommended by my son a Mini Restorer) Any fixing that is bad I am replacing. The bolts you speak of I have replaced with A4 stainless as it is above the waterline. Hard work but enjoyable these Classic Yachts.

 

[burgundyben]

We share a level of ignorance.

Fear not, we share a level of ignorance.

My poor huntsman was raced in her early years and nearly smashed to peices on the Cowes Torquay. Each time I find something wrong (about fortnightly) I go through a cycle of panic, asking around, sorting the bits and bobs, doing the job.

I'm quite good at replacing dezinc'd screws now.

I have been pondering asking this forum what a futtock is and now I know, I still have no idea about a stop water or a tingle.

 

[Mirelle]

Stop waters and tingles

A Huntsman is most unlikely to have a tingle (a lead or copper patch, bedded in summat soft (preferably not rice pudding!) tacked on over a leak.

Whether, being hot moulded (brilliant form of construction, imho) she has stopwaters (a softwood dowel, cut with the grain running across it, placed so that it is on the line of a scarph in the centreline members (stem, forefoot, stern knee, deadwood, sternpost, horn timber) and swells up when wet so as to stop water wicking up the line of the scarph and causing a leak) is more than I know! If you've got scarphs in your centreline structure you will have stopwaters, but they may be invisible being placed in the planking rebate.

 

[Kristal]

Hard work

I hear you, guys. Sailing terminology, deck fittings etc. I'm fine with, but construction terms are quite another thing. Fortunately, some of the venerable contributors to this forum are never far away.

As for hard work, I haven't worked hard enough this year, and looking around on Crystal is showing up a number of jobs I have yet to do - so much so that I'm now considering changing my current sailing plans for the following two months, and spending all the weeks I've taken off on out-of-water maintenance.

Crystal desperately, desperately needs her topsides painting and woodwork varnishing, and it's not something I'm very happy with doing afloat (obviously, for the first one!). Seeing as the brightwork is all going to be done with Coelan, it needs to come back to bare wood. Therefore, if all goes to plan, I will draw up a schedule to hopefully get all the jobs done by the middle of October, when she returns to London for the winter.

It's going to be busy!!

/<