Wood shaft log

[trisha]

I have a 40 year old timber fishing boat and have a soft area of wood in the shaft log which drips water. To be specific it is around the area where the shaft seal bearing is bolted to the timber log. I believe the degradation has resulted from the previous ower fitting an anode. There are no anodes on the boat now.

Can the timber be rebored or refaced to prevent leakage?? How much work is it? The boat is 33ft and weighs approx 10 tons.

Cheers

Paul

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[john_morris_uk]

If the area is localised you should be able to rout/machine/chisel all the rot out and then scarf a new peice of timber into the space. Glue with epoxy or a recorcinal glue and fair the surface off. If you are worried about the structural integrity get a wooded boat building expert/surveyor to advise.

Scarfs are normall a minimum of 6:1. If its a fastening place only thats rotted, bore it out and glue a dowel in place.

If it means covering the whole of the shaft log, do it and machine/bore a new log hole. You might require expert assitance with that.

Make sure you use the same timber as the existing wood so that it expands/contracts at similar rates wih the surrounding wood. Try and keep the grain running the same way as well.

There's nothing much that can't be fixed on a wooden boat - its just that somethings are very very much more difficult than others.

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[trisha]

Thank you John for your advice. I believe the damage was doen in the period when the boat was fitted with anodes. In your experience should anodes be removed from timber boats? I have done so on my boat on the advice of others in the timber boat building industry. When I did have an anode on the keel, it deterioted very quickly and seemed to fret the other metal parts of the boat. Now it is removed things seemed to have settled down. However I am seeing a pitting of the propeller.

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[chippie]

I think a shaft anode would help prevent that propellor pitting without causing problems elsewhere.

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