My roof LEAKS everywhere!

yachtShoestring

yachtShoestring

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www.yachtshoestring.co.uk
Hello,

I'm the proud owner of a 1969 Wooden Folkboat, amazing wooden hull with no leaks, however the cabin roof !!!

I'm trying to workout what the material used is before I start to patch up all 12 leaks i can find. It looks like a canvas covering with a painted finish, but this may be a synthetic ?

What i'd like some advice on is... Whats a good substance to do some 'patch-ups' with, and if it is canvas with a painted on finish, what paint should I use for touch ups?

MANY thanks in advance for any help!

Tony.

www.yachtshoestring.co.uk
 
With twelve leaks I would consider re coering the coachroof anew .Its probably canvas orgially set down in wet paint then painted over.If yopu dont wat to get involved with epoxie and somekind of glass scrim I would renew with the traditional paint ad canvas;this should be faily straightforward.One thing to remember woodewn boats are for workig on NOT sailing!!
 
http://www.whaleys-bradford.ltd.uk/product.htm?productID=448

This is the stuff. Comes in 108-inch wide, meaning that coachroofs on most boats up to 40' won't need a seam. There are chandlers who sell this for really outrageous amounts, you know.

In trad yards they kept a slops bucket for old paint and all the ends of tins went in (in the days before polyurethanes) and they'd use the resulting goop to stick down the canvas, maybe throwing in a bit of White Lead to thicken it up and some Raw Linseed to keep it tacky longer, depending on the weather and the size of the job. Your first problem is you probably don't have slops bucket. Some people recommend using just the White Lead (if you can get it) and Linseed but a better (safer at least) solution is probably to buy some cheap exterior gloss and use that. Just don't get rapid-drying stuff, you'll need all the tack time you can get.

You liberally slap on the goop as quick as you can-- rollers on sticks are good. While the goop is still wet you stretch the cotton over the area as tight as you can and tack it around the edge. Clearly it is better if you can work from both sides, and the right way to do jobs like this is to stretch the middle of the short dimension first and then the middle of the long one and work out to the corners. Then you wet the cotton with hot water and it will shrink a little to make it all nice and tight and even while you and the several chums you have conned into helping enthusiastically roller it down from the centre out. The goop should just bleed up through the fibres evenly over the whole job and there must not be any voids or dry patches. (If you don't do this it will soon lift.) Once down and rollered you paint it with very well thinned white or cream paint. You can do this while the underpaint is still tacky, further bonding the lot together. Don't plaster on thick paint, it won't help the cotton stick and it will fill in the texture. Once dry give it a couple more coats of thinned paint and refit the deck hardware. You can easily do a Folkboat in a weekend.

Like most trad techniques this is not a permanent solution. Done well and the paint freshened annually, it will last a good long while, but it will have to be done again some time in the future. Many excellent boatbuilders would just use epoxy and light woven glass cloth, which you then paint (as the epoxy will degrade in UV.) The trouble is that when you do have to redo the covering, canvas will rip off pretty easily; epoxy will last longer but when it does fail, and fail it will, it'll fail in patches and some will be left sticking like the proverbial to the blanket.

I've tried both techniques and whatever the pros and cons, either is a sight more messy, annoying and guddlacious to actually do than to describe. Ever seen a fly on fly-paper.......? Anyway, use plenty of protection on anything you don't want covered.
 
Thanks misty56, I think after looking it at i'll try a simple re-paint first, -with an international interdeck paint, just to see if it works as a short term solution until I get a bit more time in the summer to re-cover.

- Did manage to sail her from Milford Haven to Neyland during sunset on friday evening. Very enjoyable.
 
Misty56 has described my deck and coachroof which has suffered over the years, mainly around fittings where the penetration of the canvas has let water. It doesn't take long for the leaks to turn marine ply to pulp, so dealing with the problem promptly will save time and cash in the long run.
I patch with woven glass cloth and epoxy. One day I will take the bull by the horns and strip off the deck completely, but as that means taking off all the capping quadrant, toerails, handrails, windlass and the mast plate etc, etc it will wait for a while yet.
I have used International Interdeck in the past but have now gone over to common-or-garden Sandtex, a water-based acrylic. It goes on easier and is a lot cheaper. Time will tell if it will be as durable, but the Interdeck came away in sheets anyway.
 
If it's just a temporary repair get some Emergency Roof Repair.
It comes in a tin and is a kind of brush-on mastic with glass fibres in it. You can apply it in the wet so drying out first isn't an issue. When it dries you can overpaint it.
I got a tin from a Wolsey builders centre, but I think the Big Sheds have it.
If it's just for a short season it's a quick,effective and cheap remedy.

Screwfix have one by Thompsons, but there are loads of makes. Wickes do one.

p41910_l.jpg
 
One caution I would have with using the traditional method is if the top is planked rather than a continuous sheet.
I did mine once very carefully as described, but then on a very hot day the planks shrank and left long cracks in the canvas. Some covering that didn't stick so well would have been better, or else a modern flexible covering of course.
 
Chapelle talks in "Boatbuilding" of laying canvas in paint, if the paint is weak enough to part before the canvas splits, and talks of laying the canvas dry, and then painting it after it is nailed. This allows the deck to work without hazarding the canvas.
He is talking of course of cotton canvas and oil based paints. I have heard that thick but cheap bed sheets are good, as the weave is open enough to soak up the paint.
 
Folkboats don't have a huge coachroof - strip it back and see precisely what's wrong underneath. Until you have that information - you are sticking pins into a fog.
 
I would consider the products used to seal damp areas in bathrooms etc. These are basically a fibreglass like scrim which is laid over wet acrylic paint [its actually thicker than paint] Its then over painted with the same product. When dry just paint as normal with oil or acrylic paint. I have used it on my fishing vessel as have other fishermen. Its ideal for timber boats which suffer leaks where the cabin meets the deck etc. Allows for movement Cheap and readily available.
 
I agree with Old Frank, strip it back and see what the root cause is! I’m doing Billy Mizzens deck at the moment, what looks like a reasonably sound, covered deck can hide a myriad of sins, especially if its been ‘quick fixed’ in the past!
 
I suggest leaving it,1.gives you somethig to think about.2.It wouldnt be a real wooden boat without a leak3.you could be sailing and if you rip off the covering its bound to rain and your wish you hadn/t started!
 
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I suggest leaving it,1.gives you somethig to think about.2.It wouldnt be a real wooden boat without a leak3.you could be sailing and if you rip off the covering its bound to rain and your wish you hadn/t started!

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Fitting a new deck would definitely give you something to think about! In my case I keep thinking why the last owner didn’t bother sorting out the leaks properly… And now what was once a well fitted and sound deck has now in parts reverted to compost.

In my experience if you tackle the job on discovery and set about doing it properly, in the long run you’ll enjoy more time on the water and less time chasing leaks with the sweet smell of decay wafting up your nostrils…

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First, congratulations on your choice of vessel. She is one of the newer ones at a mere 40 years old but not bad despite that. I think if your coachroof is leaking you want to fix it properly. My plywood coachroof is simply very well oiled, not covered with anything and does not leak at all.
 
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One caution I would have with using the traditional method is if the top is planked rather than a continuous sheet.
I did mine once very carefully as described, but then on a very hot day the planks shrank and left long cracks in the canvas. Some covering that didn't stick so well would have been better, or else a modern flexible covering of course.

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In that case I think I would use a white lead/ raw linseed oil goop with NO paint in. The logic is that raw linseed never really cures on its own (though it does harden through time) but the chemical driers in paint will cure it. I would apply the cloth, leave for say a week under loose cover just to let the linseed firm up, then paint. The paint should prevent the volatile fractions in the linseed from evaporating and retain plasticity in the goop while not penetrating deeply enough to cure the linseed underneath (this is the same reason why you should always paint old-fashioned window putty.)

I do have to say that softwoods shrink an amazing amount when they dry, so I think you would also need to make sure the underlying planking was properly sealed to help stabilise the moisture content before starting.
 
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