Nail sick.

[burgundyben]

If someone said a boat was 'nail sick' what would you take it to mean?

 

[skipmac]

If someone said a boat was 'nail sick' what would you take it to mean?

Assume it's a wood boat and the fasteners holding the planks to the frames are corroding or the wood around the fasteners is dry rotting. Either way, the planks are no longer well attached to the frame and the boat needs to be refastened. Bronze screws are the proper choice. However could be a lot more expensive than you would guess. I looked at a 40' wood boat once that needed to be refastened. It's been a while so the exact number escapes me but it was several thousand USD$ just to buy the screws. Nothing included for time or labor.

 

[wombat88]

If it is clinker they are referring to the copper rivets that have wasted as has the wood around them, like Skipjac says. Refastening is the solution and takes so much time that you have to do it yourself...and you need two people.

 

[sarabande]

Oak timbers and hand-made iron nails and clenchs, especially if sheathed in copper. The nails just evaporate.

 

[burgundyben]

The comment was made to my about a clinker folkboat, it was leaking after a hard beat on a choppy day.

The responses above are exactly what I thought people would say, I thought it would be interesting to discuss it.

 

[sideshowbob]

More likely depends where it was leaking!

 

[burgundyben]

More likely depends where it was leaking!

I think the bloke said something like 'its effing leaking like and effing sieve all over the effing place'

 

[Tranona]

I think the bloke said something like 'its effing leaking like and effing sieve all over the effing place'

Probably 'cos its knackered! Old well used (and probably abused!) clinker sailing boats do that even if they are not suffering from nail sickness.

 

[Topcat47]

If it's done with Copper clenches, it may be possible just to refresh them. Way back in the 60's when the navy still had some copper fastened ships boats, it was fairly routine.

 

[Freebee]

A comment often applied to slate or tiled roofs where some of the tiles are seen slding down the roof, due to nail sickness, meaning steel nails have rusted away leaving the tiles to slide off.

 

[wombat88]

The solution is Gorilla tape. If our forefathers had Gorilla tape they would have used it. I have used it to tape seams very effectively indeed it was very hard to get off at the end of the season when the time comes to doing the job properly.

There may be other primate tapes available but since gaffer tape is no longer what it was I have to resort to a brand.

Boat can end up looking like something out of Daktari...

 

[fisherman]

Just an indication, about six years ago Luke Howell told me the bronze (screw) fastenings for the Pilot Cutter he was building cost £3k. I'm renovating a fifteen foot oyster punt and have spent over £100 on rivets.

 

[Prasutigus]

Mine is 60 yr old, pitch pine on oak. She has been sailed hard. (And I am continuing that tradition..)
Fastened with iron rivets. There is surface rust on the inside washers, due to condensation/sloshing bilge water over the years, but the actual rivets are not wasted in the middle.

I would refasten with iron rivets, rather than write off the boat because of the crazy price of non-ferrous fastenings.
Just get rid of the old fastenings, by any means neccessary (eg holesaw and juniper plugs) then crack on.

I am not sure about replacing iron with copper, iron will last another 50 yrs surely?
(Plus you will get new and 'interesting' issues with nobility etc. if you go non-ferrous)
The fly in the ointment might be that soft iron is unavailable.

By which time most treeboat sailors will be pushing up the daisies anyway.

 

[burgundyben]

Mine is 60 yr old, pitch pine on oak. She has been sailed hard. (And I am continuing that tradition..)
Fastened with iron rivets. There is surface rust on the inside washers, due to condensation/sloshing bilge water over the years, but the actual rivets are not wasted in the middle.

I would refasten with iron rivets, rather than write off the boat because of the crazy price of non-ferrous fastenings.
Just get rid of the old fastenings, by any means neccessary (eg holesaw and juniper plugs) then crack on.

I am not sure about replacing iron with copper, iron will last another 50 yrs surely?
(Plus you will get new and 'interesting' issues with nobility etc. if you go non-ferrous)
The fly in the ointment might be that soft iron is unavailable.

By which time most treeboat sailors will be pushing up the daisies anyway.

What is a juniper plug?

 

[Topcat47]

Can you actually get iron nails/rivets these days?

 

[sideshowbob]

What is a juniper plug?

Am guessing you would need to go to a blacksmith?

 

[sideshowbob]

I think the bloke said something like 'its effing leaking like and effing sieve all over the effing place'

I know that Folkboats leak paraticulary badly along garboard and first plank up especially around the mast step. I saw one that Nick Gates at Emsworth had to work on a couple of years ago. He refastened and I think he may have added s/s bracing in the bottom of the boat. I know they are lightly built and just work a lot due to the loads. May not necc' be nail sick just lightly built and a little too flexible. He is on this forum so will no doubt have a view..............

 

[Prasutigus]

What is a juniper plug?

Greetings,
Juniper is a species of tree, and its timber has been used for thousands of years for fastening wood sailing boats, in the form of tree nails, or trunnels etc.

 

[Prasutigus]

Can you actually get iron nails/rivets these days?

That is a good point. Mild steel doesn't last at all, especially what's coming in now from China.
Iron is easy to work, and really does last a very long time; the evidence is all around us in our maritime and industrial heritage.
I haven't looked into the subject recently, maybe copper or bronze is now cheaper than actual iron!

The previous owner of my boat had a couple of keelbolts replaced, in real wrought iron. There is only one place in the UK to get it, and having the bolts made cost him a pretty penny... but they will last half a century...

 

[DownWest]

I work a bit with wrought iron. Nightmare... The gates are from the turn of the last century and are entirely screwed or rivited. Welding is tricky and not strong.
But, for nails or bolts in a boat, probably very good. It does not rust like steel and since much of what I look at is well over 1OO yrs old, Corrosion is limited.