Once the dust had settled we started the process of mapping out the repairs. The surveyor we had used didn’t use a moisture meter. He tapped around the deck and cabin with his small ball peen hammer. There were small pockets of de-lamination in the cabin sides he told us. That didn’t seem too bad I remember thinking. But the survey was long done when we started pulling off the deck and house fittings. Off came pad eyes and fairleads, winches and jib tracks. It was clear there was significant moisture in areas, when the port jib track came off we had to catch the drippings in a large pot.
“There are wet ones and dry ones” another local surveyor told us. It was pretty clear to me that I had a wet one. I drilled a number of test holes through the inner skin. The side decks were wet, especially to port although most of the cabin top was dry. The forepeak was the worst. The deck had been saturated repeatedly from the gaping unsealed holes for the samson posts (bitts).
It wasn’t long before it was apparent that the head and side liner of the interior had to go. We stripped it off and pulled a lot of staples. We marked and stored each piece in turn.
The large windows were a total loss. They had leaked and been resealed a number of times judging by the different sealants we encountered. They had funky plastic frames. Out they came.
Out came the bronze port-lights forward. Off came the butterfly hatch and it’s frame..
We knew the chainplates and maybe stanchions were leaking. Off came the ceiling strips in the salon and v berth. Now we could see what was going on. Off came the chainplates and to our local fabricator to create replacements. Lots of odd whitish layered hard material came down from where the stanchions were bolted under the cap rail. Had to chisel a bunch of that out of the way before I could see the glass underneath.
It wasn’t until later I figured out that these must have been the remnants of aluminum backing plates of some sort. 30 years of salty moisture with some electrolysis thrown in totally oxidized them.
Off came the companionway cover and guides and off came the handrails. The fiberglass laid over the handrail bolts was wet underneath when chiseled off. We took off everything we could on the cabin top and removed just a few items in the cockpit.
The original surveyor did encounter an odd cant to the mast step under the sole. The fiberglass wrapping the wood was cracking on the port side. Once at the yard I contracted with a local group to replace that piece.
While that was progressing we started drilling and epoxy filling all the bolt and screw holes. Measured the windows and ordered a set from Bomon Marine www.bomon.com
For more adventures with Amathea please visit http://www.amatheia.net/
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