Mon.
15 Feb, 1999
We cleaned
everything out of the boat today: cushions, sails, life preservers, rudder,
tiller, anything that wasn't screwed down. I spread the sails out
on the grass in the front yard to let them air out. They've been stowed
inside the boat for a while and had gotten a little musty. I'm storing
them inside the house while we work on the boat.
Then we scrubbed the boat down
topsides. Looks better.
Another thing I did was to rip
out all of the stuff that was glued to the interior hull: sort of this
heavy vinyl wallpaper. Since the decks had
been leaking so badly, this wallpaper stuff was soaking wet. Really nasty.
It looks (and feels) a lot better now, although I still need to remove
the adhesive.
Those aren't cracks around the
starboard portlights: it's a branching fungus.
(Oops! Correction, those ARE cracks. See
20 Mar, 1999 Log Entry).
I took some pictures of the interior
while I was at it. These are the backing plates
for the chain plates where they attach to the sides of the cabin top. Beefy
enough, I'd say.
This is the bleeding
overhead cabin liner. All that water leaking in around deck fittings
has really soaked the balsa core, I fear. The liner is severely blistered,
and when you pop the blisters, they bleed red liquid. I guess some of the
laminate has dissolved, hence the red color. Anybody have a more accurate
explanation of this?
My plan is to remove all deck
hardware, maybe ream out the bolt holes a little extra, then let the whole
thing dry out for a while. Maybe that will be sufficient, maybe not. We'll
just have to wait and see.
The original mast was broken
in Hurricane Hugo, and the new mast would not fit the original mast step,
so it was replaced. Apparently, the mounting holes didn't all line
up either, so they through-bolted the aft edge
of the step.
Problem: The old
mast step had the mast wiring running up through the middle of the step,
right? Not the new step.
Solution: Drill
a new hole through the cabin top beside the step and run the wire through.
New problem: Water runs
unimpeded right through the new hole for the wiring.
This is one wet boat!
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