Listees:
I have a serious but perplexing problem resulting from the long-distance
haul of my 1975 C-27. I need your advice.
The boat was hauled from North Carolina to Boston in mid-July, essentially a
return home for the boat and for us. Somewhere along the way the boat was
damaged. When the boat arrived it was lifted off the flatbed and put in the
water. It immediately began to take on water--lots of it. After taking it
out of the water, we discovered a crack at the extreme aft end of the keel
at the hull (at the point where the hull begins to curve down to shape the
narrow end of the keel--perhaps an inch or two down that curve). The crack
was only several inches long around that aft end, perhaps four inches long
in all, sort of shaped like a "u". The leak showed at the inside at the
extreme aft end of the bilge in the passage (under the interior deck)
between it and the engine compartment (boat has an A-4). While the pump kept
on top of the leak, it did so only barely.
A few words about the delivery: The boat had been located on the extreme aft
end of the trailer. A power boat was placed on the front. The inside of the
boat was an absolute mess. Things that I had carefully stowed were strewn
about the boat. Items stowed deep in the after quarter berth were all over
the salon floor in the forward part of the boat. It was an amazing sight
that got worse when the water seeped up from the bilge. Clearly the boat had
a very rough trip.
When the boat was first on stands, I was able to ply out some resin from the
hull crack and thought maybe I could make a temporary patch to get it across
Dorchester Bay to my yacht club. I used Marine Tex. The fix looked good, but
as soon as the hydraulic trailer begin to lift it from the stands and
blocks, it cracked with a "snap." It had returned. After a short haul on a
hydraulic trailer to the club, I removed the broken Marine Tex, opened the
crack up as best I could, and we used West (resin, filler) and some cloth
and fashioned a repair. When it was sealed on the outside, using a
flashlight, I was able to locate what seemed to be a crack of sorts in the
bilge in that passage leading to the engine compartment, where it seemed the
water had come in. I poured resin into it, hoping it would seep down.
Today, when we lifted the boat off the stands to put it in the water, the
same thing happened, a snap, and then a 1/8 in wide, several inch long crack
appeared. This work was done by someone with a great deal of experience
using West resins.
What is going on? The bilge looks fine. Four years ago, I employed the
Catalina Direct keel bolt upgrade and installed ss lags. I did this only as
a precaution because the original bolts looked, well, rusted, but no worse
than other Catalinas. My bilge has always been clean and dry. I see nothing
amiss there now. There is no Catalina smile on this boat an no other
external indications of a problem anywhere along the keel.
Jon
C-27 1858
