Category Archives: Boat Work Projects

Ready, Set….No.

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Okay, okay, yes, everyone in the Little Cunning Plan household needed to just calm down; get a little reality check, untwist our collective knickers. And we’ve done just that. Wiser minds have prevailed and I hope ours are among them. After our last post where I ranted about how pissed off I was that the hatches leaked, and threatened to use butyl tape to re-bed them in the cold season, our readers raced to our rescue and gave us a good talking to. We love our readers.  And we love how they bring good ideas to the table. Because I can come up with some really bad ideas when I’m mad. 

One of the comments that made us take a deep breath was this reminder by a reader known by the sobriquet of “Saffy the Pook”. Got to love that. He/She put in writing what we had been talking about, only reading it in someone else’s words planted our feet even more firmly on beloved terra firma:

“Like your exhaust, this is not a job that will tolerate shortcuts or amateur mistakes. Also like your exhaust, it can have serious negative repercussions if it fails at sea under trying conditions. As painful as it may be, commit to doing it right whether that means spending the time to do it yourself or spending the money to have a pro do it for you.”  (Saffy the Pook)

Of course, that is 100% accurate. You’ll get no argument from us, Saffy.  And you express this with such a reasonable tone, too.  When I say this kind of thing, it comes out more like, “WE CAN’T GO TO SEA WITH A *&^$^&* LEAKING HATCH! WHAT IF A BIG WAVE COMES? WHAT DO YOU MEAN WE HAVE TO DO THIS OVER? MY HANDS ARE STILL RECOVERING FROM ALL THE **&^ CLEANING WE DID LAST TIME! I STILL HAVEN’T REPLACED ALL THE BRAIN CELLS I LOST DUE TO ACETONE! CAN WE PAY SOMEONE TO DO THIS FOR US? WHY AM I WHINING IN CAPITAL LETTERS ALL THE TIME???”  Your way is probably better. 

Around the same time, alert reader and friend Lee Youngblood (sailor, yacht broker, photographer) sent us an email with this subject line: “DON”T DO IT!”.  Well that got our attention! He cautioned us about rushing into making a repair at this moment in time, reminding us that butyl tape is only for applications where there is compression between pieces (and duh, we actually knew that and it’s why we didn’t use it in the first place, but I forgot about that in my pissed-off stomping fit).  He also reminded us that cold weather was not a good time for bedding material to set up well.  Lots of smacking of ourselves in the head was happening, let me tell you.

Even when I’m in a rant, the better part of my brain is working the problem and trying to find the least offensive solution, but keeping the primary goal in mind is sometimes an issue. In this case, the primary goal was keeping water out of the boat for the rainy season, not redoing the entire job. So I had started researching short term solutions, wishing that I could find something like the butyl tape we used on the ports in the hull. That stuff is working great! But, of course, getting that off would not be easy, and it would look pretty bad, too. Didn’t anyone make a clear rubbery weatherproof tape with good adhesion? A girl can dream. A girl can waste plenty of time doing the Google on stuff like this, also.foil tape

Then we got Lee Youngblood’s email suggesting we try an old cruiser trick of using aluminum tape. Bingo. In fact, we had some of that on the boat already. Another reader suggested using preservation tape, and that sounded like it would be a winner, too. But we already had the aluminum tape.  Mike used it when he was building the refrigerator box. I remember at the time he was working on the fridge he commented that he loved that stuff and could think of many uses for it. He wanted to keep some on the boat, so we had maybe half a roll left. The stuff we used is called Extreme Weather Foil Tape and it’s basically like heavy aluminum foil with a good sticky backing. Don’t ask me why we didn’t think of using that. Viva, Lee!

I hope you weren’t holding your breath waiting to see if we actually did those hatches right this time because you’ll have to wait until warm weather comes back around. That’s a lot of breath holding. Today we went down to the boat and made her water tight (hopefully) with this stuff. It’s really too wide, so first thing we did was cut each piece into two pieces of equal  width. This stuff is really easy to work with but get it right the first time when you apply it. If you have to reposition it, it’s not going to be nice and smooth anymore. We did all three hatches and are very pleased that they look decent. 

After applying the tape, I went over it with my fingers smoothing it out and making sure that the edge was firmly adhering all the way around each lens. It is easy to puncture this stuff with any kind of sharp edge, so you need to use care when smoothing. Other than that, this tape is dead easy to use and the paper backing comes off easily. 

Anyhoo, I think/hope/pray we’ve got this under control for this season. Add it to the long list of tasks to be addressed at the haul out this summer. Ideally, we’d like to be able to take the hatch lids off to work on them. I think being able to take them home and put them on the bench to work on will help us be sure all the silicone is off, if, indeed, that is the problem. The other possibility causing the leaking is that we didn’t use enough product, especially on the forward hatch. We were nervous about using too much, but may have erred on the side of being too cautious. Live and learn. Perhaps that mystery will be solved when we give it another go.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for bringing your experience to the table!

 

 

 

If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It: Lessons in Being Persnickity

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This post is by way of doing the harsh thing that bloggers of life transitions and of sailboat ownership sometimes have to do: Post about failure. File this under ‘brutal honesty’, and also many expletives and stomping of feet; perhaps throwing a few things for good measure. I’ve never tried that, but I understand how it could be cathartic.

Remembering more relaxing times. Keep this feeling as you read on.

We’ve owned three boats. We thought we were not amateurs at this point, even though we’re always learning. Oh, hubris. What a harsh mistress you are. This summer, because the weather was fine, we got a little twitchy and decided to replace our hatch lenses. It sounds so simple, no? You just remove the lenses, clean up the frames, and rebed in the same stuff that was used in the first place.

Why did we want to replace them? Because they were old and crazed and didn’t let in much light. Did they leak? No. They did not. Did they work as they should? Yes. They did. So basically, the only thing wrong with them was cosmetic. We wanted them to be pretty. We wanted to see through them. We wanted to lie in the V-berth and look at stars while at anchor. Such petty problems to have. I guess we were a little persnickety. Joke’s on us! Now who feels old and crazed? Not the hatches.

The old but serviceable lens. Notice how you can’t see the side of my foot through the thing?

Now it’s the rainy season and we have hatches that leak. That’s right, readers, we are hatch refit failures. #Amateurs #Pissedthehelloff. Somehow, after literally spending hours scraping, using harsh chemicals that probably shortened our lives, and sanding with expensive sand paper, leaks have developed in all three hatches. All. Three. See what happens when you try to fix something that ain’t broke?

Recall that we decided to use industrial silicone to rebed those hatch lenses. It was that or butyl tape, and we couldn’t get any solid information that butyl tape would stick to silicone any better than anything else. The information is probably there, but we didn’t find it for whatever reason. People posted their thoughts. Everyone who has ever bedded anything on a boat has an opinion about the best stuff to use. In the end, we made the wrong choice, or maybe we didn’t use enough of it, or maybe there was invisible silicone left on the hatch frames. Silicone is evil, so who knows? The hatches don’t leak everywhere so probably it’s a silicone residue problem.

Except that this was a total win. Thank goodness.

The feelings we have about this are second only to the issue we had with getting a proper exhaust system for Hiram, our engine. But we rose to that challenge and, I assure you, we will not be beaten by this one. Never mind that we’re getting the house ready and the holidays are bearing down before us. Never mind that Mike has been transferred to another job in Boeing and doesn’t have the time to think about this problem. Never mind that I’m increasing the number of coaching clients I see on the boat because I’ve made a commitment to using Galapagos as my office space until I completely retire. (I’m loving this, by the way.) At least the hatch in the salon only drips a tiny bit, and the drips don’t land on my clients’ heads. I’m grateful for small things.

This weekend it’s going to be un-rainy. Lots of people will be outside enjoying the sunnyish weather. We will be outside too: removing the forward hatch lens once more. It’s the one that leaks the worst. We’re going to do that one, particular hatch and then sit back and observe the results. We’re going to clean the hell out of the frame until our fingers are tiny nubs of skin and bone. So far, we think we’re going to use butyl tape. So that’s the situation on the ground here for the moment. Keep your fingers crossed we do it right this time, and if you think of it, spit three times and turn around.

Because this is the goal.

Because this is the goal.

 

Replacing Hatch Lenses and Battling the Silicone Monster

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We spent the better part of this Sunday the tragic victims of project-creep; that thing that happens when you start a small project and it morphs into building the Parthenon. Still, life cannot be all rainbows and unicorns and we’d already had a rousing good time on Friday night. One night per week of fun is our given allotment. Bunches of friends and family members gathered at the now-famous Dawson’s Bar and Grill (Motto: knife fights are infrequent)  in the grittier part of Tacoma to celebrate my birthday and dance away the pains of being a year older.

Galapagos anchored in Bedwell Sound

Here’s the kicker to that: I’m actually not a year older. I’m actually the same age I thought I was last year. It dawned on me that all last year, while I was thinking I was 57, I was actually an innocent 56 years old. I missed it! I will never have the chance to be 56 in my mind. But at least the pain of another passing year was muffled by the sound of everyone laughing at me as I realized my actual chronological, if not psychological, age.

So because we have the Protestant work ethic and had partied kind of hard for us, then spent the better part of Saturday hanging out with our kids (our favorite activity besides bear watching), we toodled down to Galapagos to spend the night so we could get an early start on self-abuse today and thereby keep the scales of justice fairly balanced.

This punishment is taking the form of removing the old lenses and their silicone caulking from the hatches. That’s right. We’re replacing the hazy and crazed hatch lenses.  The small hatch over the galley was leaking a little bit when it rained. We do not like leaks so it had to be fixed. Mike removed the hatch cover and brought it home and while he was at work at his day job, I spent a useful hour removing the lens and starting on the silicone caulking.removinghatchlense

I will admit to a small feeling of power as the acrylic began to bend to my will because that lens was bedded really well.   Actually, the stupid hatch wasn’t even leaking around the lens. That thing was in the frame so tight nothing could get past it.  It was leaking where the lower frame is bedded to the deck. But whatever. Seemed a shame to put that cover back looking so bad. There was no turning back now. I was right proud of my work but maybe this is why Mike looked a little chagrined when I showed off my progress. He knew what was in store for us.

I took the old lens down to the local plastics place; Keltech, and asked for a bid to have a replacement cut. When I discovered we might be able to buy a replacement AND food this month, we decided to just replace them all. We don’t need to eat no stinkin’ food. Let the creeping begin.

Down at Galapagos, now that I had the routine down on how to get those things out, the removal of the other two lenses was straight forward. Mike was going to remove the hatch covers from the boat, but this turned out to be much harder than he thought and I, not wanting to get sidetracked and grow a monster with yet another head, just started working on the lens above the v-berth, leaving the cover attached to the boat. This worked just fine so we saved ourselves a lot of trouble leaving them in place and went to work.

The first step in removing the lenses is to break the seal all the way around. It’s pretty interesting how Mike and I approach a project like this from different directions. He has brute strength on his side, but I have to use finesse and cunning. For Mike, breaking the seal involves using a series of screwdrivers that increase in size. He’ll get a small one between the lens and the frame by working it in and shoving it at the same time. Then he’ll apply enough pressure and leverage to get a bigger one into the same area. This allows yet more pressure and leverage. It also requires more muscle than I have and I worry I will knick the frame. My way is gentler and is less likely to cause bruising. Of my body.

Using the brute force screwdriver method of removal. No, he did not use the Kroil on this project. That was for something else.

He’s making that face because he is using his man strength to pull that lens out, popping the rest of the seal as he pulls. Swoon!

I prefer to use a straight razor blade to cut all the way around the seal on the outside. Then I go underneath with another blade and, using a screwdriver as a block, I gently tap the blade until it slips between the lense and the frame. Then, using the same screwdriver and hammer I taptaptap on the blade and scoot it across the lense, cutting the seal as I go. After I get the seal cut top and bottom, then I can go in with the screwdriver from underneath and apply force through leverage. In this way, I am never applying leverage to the edge of the frame. These frames cost about as much as our car.

Tapping with the hammer against the screwdriver, to move the blade through the seal.

Now I can tap the screwdriver between the frame and the lense without fear of knicking the frame.

The frame releases the lens with a gentle tug.

Now it’s time to remove the old silicone. You know, silicone is the gift that just keeps on giving. You remove it, then realize there is more. Then you remove that, and discover you haven’t actually made a dent in the total amount of this stuff that exists on your project. Still, it is satisfying to think about having clear lenses on these hatches; lenses that are not all crazed and cracked. Think of the light we’ll have! And we are dead motivated for those lenses not to leak. So we kept at it.

Since silicone resists the attempts of razor blades and scrapers, preferring to cling tenaciously to whatever substrate it’s on, we quickly determined we needed the help of some kind of solvent. We gathered all of the chemicals we have on board Galapagos to see what would work best. You can find all kinds of information on the interweb but we like to entertain ourselves this way. Removing old caulk is boring. So we gave each of these caustic unguents a test.

We had all this on hand.

The silicone laughed at the alcohol, acetone, and lacquer thinner. The thinner worked a bit, but not until we had the thicker stuff off. The LiftOff is a gel that you can let sit for awhile to do its work. It works fairly well, but the Release by BoatLife really got our attention. This was on the boat when we bought her and there was only a bit left in the bottle. Too bad because this stuff really did the trick. I made a pass with the Release by BoatLife on my hatch cover and got most of the silicone off. Then made another pass with the LiftOff when I ran out of Release. We were going to make a trip to West Marine to see if they had some of the Release stuff, but I didn’t want to give up my parking place at the marina.

Here’s what it looks like when you use the LiftOff stuff. The silicone kind of shreds with the razor blade rather than the usual thing where the blade just bounces off of the stuff.

We have all the big stuff off and the frames are smooth to the touch. Too smooth. Suspiciously smooth. It may be invisible to the eye, but we know there is still silicone on those frames.  We’ll probably buy more of the BoatLife Release product but it’s about 40$ for the pint sized spray. That’s right, it has the word ‘Boat’ in the name. Anyone have a tried and true cheaper product to recommend? Maybe something you can buy at the hardware store? Because we want as much of this stuff off as possible, even though we will stick to a silicone based caulk when we rebed. We kind of have to. These frames are probably ruined for any other kind of caulking.

Then there is this:

We have 4 of these ports on the boat and they have seen better days. The one in the quarter berth leaks so we’re replacing that one and the one in Mike’s shop. Anyone know what this black stuff that looks to me like butyl rubber might be? It’s crumbling off, it’s so old. The acrylic is beveled and sits against a thick rubber liner against the hull. Then there are many screws into the rubber liner and wood, then the seam is covered with this stuff. I have some ideas about using the black Lifecaulk when we replace these, but wondered if anyone may know if this might be some kind of tape?

I believe we see the problem here.  Some of these screws were way over tight and cracked the acrylic. There were several cracks in this one.  The screw holes were countersunk and the screw heads fit into them exactly. We can’t understand why they had to be so tight.

Like this.

Here you can see the thick rubber liner behind the lens. It is in good shape and we are leaving this in place. 

Tomorrow we’ll go order the new pieces and cross our fingers that it won’t take them too long to fill the order. Stay tuned.