fishy
New member
I would be grateful for any advice after a stressful weekend.
12 monthes ago I bought a ten year old 30 ft GRP boat apparently epoxied from new. I had it surveyed by a reputable surveyor who said it was structurally sound, had moisture levels within acceptable limits and that there was no evidence of blistering on the hull.
When the boat was taken out on Saturday there was clear evidence of blistering. There were two types of blister. The first ones were fairly extensive evenly across one side of the hull. They were small (say 2-3 mil)and uniform in size. When I scraped at them they came off easily and it appeared the gelcoat was unaffected underneath. No water came out of the small voids and there was no strong smell .
In a much smaller and specific square area there were some slightly bigger blisters.On scraping at these some of them were wet and in several places digging deeper it seemed that there were fibres from the laminate which were exposed and wet.There was however no smell. The small place that was affected was on the port quarter. One theory that was suggested by a very helpful local boat builder was that this would have been where the boat might have been shored up when it was out of the water precviously and that the water had got in from constantly damp carpetting etc that might have been next to the hull. In fact the boat did spend a couple years out of the water in the mid nineties and a photo the previous owner showed me did show it shored up in that position.
My questions are; A) Did I ought to worry about the first small blisters and how did I ought to treat them.B)What about the second much smaller area of blisrters where there was evidence of moisture under the epoxy but no smell.C)Do I have any comeback against a surveyor who only 12 monthes ago gave the boat a clean bill of health.
Any advice or ideas would be very gratefully received because I am fairly new to all this .Thankyou .
12 monthes ago I bought a ten year old 30 ft GRP boat apparently epoxied from new. I had it surveyed by a reputable surveyor who said it was structurally sound, had moisture levels within acceptable limits and that there was no evidence of blistering on the hull.
When the boat was taken out on Saturday there was clear evidence of blistering. There were two types of blister. The first ones were fairly extensive evenly across one side of the hull. They were small (say 2-3 mil)and uniform in size. When I scraped at them they came off easily and it appeared the gelcoat was unaffected underneath. No water came out of the small voids and there was no strong smell .
In a much smaller and specific square area there were some slightly bigger blisters.On scraping at these some of them were wet and in several places digging deeper it seemed that there were fibres from the laminate which were exposed and wet.There was however no smell. The small place that was affected was on the port quarter. One theory that was suggested by a very helpful local boat builder was that this would have been where the boat might have been shored up when it was out of the water precviously and that the water had got in from constantly damp carpetting etc that might have been next to the hull. In fact the boat did spend a couple years out of the water in the mid nineties and a photo the previous owner showed me did show it shored up in that position.
My questions are; A) Did I ought to worry about the first small blisters and how did I ought to treat them.B)What about the second much smaller area of blisrters where there was evidence of moisture under the epoxy but no smell.C)Do I have any comeback against a surveyor who only 12 monthes ago gave the boat a clean bill of health.
Any advice or ideas would be very gratefully received because I am fairly new to all this .Thankyou .
