Galley sole removal and grinding started

I cut the cabin sole where the new aft bulkhead for the forward cabin will go. I plan to make this a structural bulkhead glass ed to the hull rather than sitting on top of the cabin sole. You can see a little bit of the remaining cabin sole next to the grinder. Luckily the stringers are in good shape. I will just need to beef up the glass work.

 

You can see both stringers in this view. I cut the sole so that there will be an access hatch right where the vacuum hose is. The new stairs will come out further and cover the hole there. The sewage treatment system will go in between the two main stringers. The divider bulkheads will strengthen the structure. But first I need to finish grinding and then apply 4 layers of glass work over the stringers and hull bottom  to reinforce the stringers.

I found a through hull located right at the bottom of the bilge way up under the generator. The previous owner had replaced the sea cock with a cap screwed onto the though hull. It would be interesting to hear the reasoning behind the placement of that one....
I removed the though hull and will glass the hole up.
There was another though hull forward of the head to supply seawater to the head. They had used a plywood backing block which has rotted away. I may need to cut more cabin sole up to be able to repair that one. I not sure that I even want one there. I plan to use fresh water for the heads or maybe both, but I could get the seawater from one of the AC cooling lines. The fewer holes in the hull the better.

Stringer Rebuilding and Galley demo

This post covers a couple of day sof  work...because I am usually too tired to post every night.

Started off with finishing the rebuilding of the rotten stringer. Here is the new plywood screwed, nailed and glassed to the top and bottom wooden beams. First I coated both sides of the plywood with 2 coats of resin to seal it. Then I did the same with the beams. Next I filled the bad spots where I had dug the rot out of the lower beam. The plywood is glassed on with 2 layers of 1.5 Oz. mat between the beams and the plywood. It is screwed into the top and bottom beams every couple of inches as well.

 Next I applied 2 layers of 1.5 Oz. mat to back of each of the original pieces I cut off the stringer and then screwed and nailed them to the plywood. They are nailed through the plywood and into the beams every 3 inches or so. I will be glassing over these pieces so I wanted to make sure they were well fastened to the beams. I will remove all the screws you see in the middle areas. They were used to make sure the glass pieces were well bonded to the plywood. It not very pretty at this point, but once I grind all the rough spots down, fill the few gaps and then apply two layers of 1.5 oz mat with 24 Oz. Roving over them they will look great. Oh yeah and be a lot stronger than the original work which was two layers of mat with 1 layer of roving in between. Final glass thickness will be
3 - 1.5 Oz mat + 1-  24Oz Roving +  2 - 1.5 Oz mat + 1-  24Oz Roving +1- 1.5Oz mat + 1-24Oz Roving.

But first I needed to remove the old freezer and cabinet from the galley area over the stringer. I want to be able to wrap the glass over the top of the stringer, which means you have to be able to get to both sides of the stringer.
Tomorrow I will continue with more cabin sole removal to expose all of the stringer in this area. They did not do a very good job of leveling the stringers up before they glassed them in so they had to add strips on top of the stringers...Lucky for me, now I can remove those strip from the center stringer which will give me the room to wrap the new glass work over the top of the stringer.
That's all for now.

Back to the rot

Started the day by pulling all the old wiring out of the engine room to get it out of my way. So now it is all in Chad's head (bathroom). Then I ground the remaining bits of acoustic ceiling tiles and glue off the forward engine room  bulkhead. Removed the last little bit of the cieling and really old fiberglass insulation.
That's when the real fun began. My plan is to build an aerobic waste treatment system and holding tank in the bilge running forward from just under the generator at the forward end of the engine room. It will have 3 processing chambers to "digest" the effluent followed by a holding/batch tank. The water from the treatment system will be chlorinated as it passes into the batch tank. When it is full, or periodically it will be pumped out. I have work with these systems down in the islands and usually you use the water coming from a single chamber tank to water the garden. The Aerobic system removes all the noxious odors usually associated with holding tanks. Holding tanks are anaerobic systems which produce methane.....
So where was I...O yeah down in the bottom of the engine room cutting out the bulkhead where it goes down into the keel.

Looking down into the engine room and the hole I cut in the bulkhead.
Can't get any lower in the boat.
The light is right where the bulkhead use to go down into the keel.
When they built the boat they put the stringers in place then put the main bulkheads in place and glassed the whole mess with 2 whole layers of 1.5 oz. mat. Not even close to what is required.
It would have been far better if they had glassed the stringers in first and then the bulkheads. The joints where the bulkheads meet the stringer is a hard one to make water tight...and it is sure to be under water in the bilge.

That is how we ended up with this, the 1/2" ply that connected the upper and lower members of the stringer completely rotted out on the bilge side of the stringer. Luckily for me the starboard stringer and the outside of the port stringer are fine. Funny thing, it was the port stringer aft that rotted out too. I guess the guy did a better job on the starboard side than on the port....
So I am drying out the teak wood members. Then I will replace the rotted ply with 1/2" Powerply which is treated against rot. Then start glassing the whole thing up again.....

Interesting view. You can see all the way up to the chain locker. Whole lot of space you can not easily get to to clean......

Started moving forward

I finished up fairing the edges of the taping on the floor structure and port fuel tanks this morning. Then I moved the generator out of the way this afternoon. That little monster is HEAVY, I knew it was not light but it surprised me just how heavy it was. Had to rethink my strategy for moving it.





 I ended up setting my rolling scaffolding up with a beam across the top rungs. Wrapped a chain around the beam and hung a 2000Lb. come-along from it. Set the chain up so that the lift was slanted slightly towards my destination. When I lifted the genset it swung to under that location. It took about 5 moves to get it in place, all nice and tucked in ahead of the port fuel tank out of my way.

So her she sits till I am ready to put her back in place. I need to seal her in there somehow to keep the grinding dust off....good luck with that.

This is the last section of the old "sound" shielding. All the wires are coming from the breaker panel. I think I have come up with plan to make this much more organized by running a couple of large diameter Seal-tite flex conduit. It will bundle the wires together and provide an extra layer of protection.

Progress inspite of it all

Life has been interesting and very consuming lately. Which means the progress on the boat has slowed....I also have been doing a lot of designing trying to figure out the best way to fit everything in. I have managed to finish the fuel fills, covers and fuel exits for both portside tanks and pressure test them both.

Here is a shot of the port side taken today. The blue air hose is connected to front fuel tank to pressurize the tank to 3 PSI. The tank held the pressure for at least an hour, that's when I left.
The Plywood "walls" are aligned with the cabinets etc above them in the saloon. They also create separate compartments for various uses. The Air conditioner for the saloon will be under the floor where the cup is sitting now. There is a dividing wall that goes in between it and the fuel valves. To the left in the picture or just aft of the AC will be the heat exchanger water heater. It is located below part of the galley cabinets. The space at the forward end of the tank will be a deep storage area located under the settee. Good place to store large bulky items.
I guess my next project is to move the generator all the way over to the port side and then start on reinforcing the main stringers and build the black water tank in the bilge forward.

Moving Right Along

Working on finishing the port fuel tank, one step forward and two sideways...then another step forward..

I started assembling the tank fittings for the engine fuel supply and the fuel polishing system. Here is a view of the inside where the lines come in. The two that appear to go to the left are the suction lines for the engine fuel supply and the fuel polishing. The fuel polishing line goes all the way to the lowest point of the tank. I am hoping it will catch any water that gets into the fuel......The engine suction line ends a little higher up than the suction for the polishing system. The line that moves off to the right is the combined return line. I only need one return per tank. It will be very rare that the fuel polishing system will be running on the tank that is being used by the engine.

My plan was to get the valves on the tank suction, return and vent fitting and install the fill line to the deck plate so I could seal the tank up and pressure test it. That's where we went sideways. The fuel fill will be in the froward outboard corner of the compartment that will hold the heat exchanger water heater. This heater has a coil of copper pipe running inside it that carries cooling water from the main engine, so when the engine is running it heat the water. You can see the though hull fitting which will go in the tank top right where it is standing. It is upside down in this picture. Will I figured I had better glass the bulkhead in first. So off I go to cut and install the bulkhead....

Here it is, all cut to fit, face veneer ground off where it will be glassed on and two coats of resin both side and all edges. Of course this was about 3 hours later.
OK so now I am ready to glass it in......

Except...those 3 little wires sticking out of the top right where I need tp glass....
Off we go to get the soldering iron and wire etc. to extend the existing wires so they will reach beyond the glass work.

Finally. Here is the bulkhead as viewed from the aft side. It is glassed on to the tank top, hull side and underside of the side deck. This will add quite a bit of strength to the hull. Unfortunately I some how forgot to take a picture of the area where the sensor leads are. Tomorrow.

So remember the fuel fill fitting that started this whole detour off?

Here is a shot of the location where it will go, right

where the two black lines cross. So it only took a day of work to get to it.

Top all glassed on

Here it is in all its glory. All cut to size, corners rounded and glassed with 5 layers of 1708 Biax tape.
The two darker areas with the holes are where the piping goes through the top. There are four holes; Supply line and return line for the engines, Supply line for the fuel polishing system and the vent.

Close-up of the glass work at the front outboard corner. I spent a total of 5 hours glassing that day. All the outside corners where glassed one after the other so that there is a strong chemical bond at the various joints.

Here is a shot of the inside of the joint between the flange and the top.
It came out very clean here, but there are some areas where there is a lttle hanging glass work I need to grind off. Oh Boy more grinding...and this time I will be lying on my back with my head and shoulders stuck into one of the compartments of the tank. Sure glad I made those large.

Top on the Tank

So there it is, all glued on to the flange using 2 layers of 1.5Oz. mat. I ended up having to cut it in half at the dividing bulkhead. It was just too big and awkward to get it in place due to the floor beams which could not be removed.

 

I almost forgot to put the level sensor tapes in before I put the top on. These are 2" wide copper foil tapes used to sense the fuel level. The engineer at the manufacture of the sensors recommended that I put 3 tapes in with a 2" space between two and a 1-1/2" space between two. Some times the sensors work better with less gap and sometimes better with a wider gap. Since I will not be able to check which gap works best until after the whole project is done, I put both in.
I glassed over these with a layer of 1.5 Oz. mat and a layer of 8 Oz. cloth. Forgot to take the pictures today, so it will have to wait until tomorrow.





Hopefully I will be able to complete the all the glassing of the outside edges of the top tomorrow. I also have to install the contacts for the level sensors and finish glassing them in. It just never ends.

Sneaking up on completion

of the port side fuel tank. Had to go to mom's this afternoon, but I was able to glass the two top

flanges on the baffles. They are exactly at the same height as the flanges around the sides of the tank. Tomorrow I will trim the edges up and fill the depression in the middle. Then that part will be ready to glass the top on.
The next steps are to cut the top to fit and make the two areas where the bulkhead fittings for the fuel lines will be installed.
Then I can glass the top on and it will be done!!!
Except for the plumbing part....

I took the opportunity to glass up the 4 little holes at the back corners of the top flange.If you look closely in the very corner you can see the different pattern in the cloth.

Baffles Glassed in

It has been rough working conditions here lately. It is either too hot and humid (106 heat index) or raining cats and dogs. Without the tent over it I would be spending all my time bailing the boat out.

 

Here is the forward baffle glassed in on 3 sides. The tan color you see is polyurethane foam which I used to make the fillets for the glass work. Tomorrow I will grind the edges smooth on each piece. The next step will be to build the flange at the top where it meets the tank top. right above the lettering in the picture.The blue and white you see on the baffle is leftover gel coat, I made the baffles out of glass I salvaged from another boat I cut up. No sense in throwing good solid fiberglass panels away.

Here is a closeup of one of the joints. I am having some trouble with the new resin draining out of the vertical glass work before it sets up. You can see a few light spots near the top of the glass.

This joint was done with the Vinyl-ester resin and I had no problems with it draining out. The old resin I was buying in the 5 gal. bucket did not give me any trouble either. So I think I am going to pick another 5 gallons up to finish this work. It is more expensive but a lot easier to work with. I still have lots of glass work to do that is horizontal, where I can use the new resin.

Back to work

Had a nice vacation in the woods of the Blue Ridge mountains. Got a little zip lining in, a rafting trip and some tubing on the smaller rivers. Took a week after returning to get back to work on the boat.
Anyway here we go.

Last Friday I put the form work together to lay up the flanges to support the top. The underside of the white pieces are high gloss formica so the glass work will not stick to it. the four pieces you see hanging down are to clamp it to the tank sides while I do the glass work. You can see two of the clamps on the left two pieces.

Today I was able to glass all the flanges in. It took about 2 hours of pretty intense work for each of the two tank sections. I always try to glass the four sides in in one session to they bond to together better. As you can see in this photo not all the corners are covered completely. A little grinding and then I will be able to close those little spots up. Tomorrow...hopefully

Then this afternoon I started on the two baffle plates. These are cut from reclaimed fiber glass panels. No sense in throwing away good solid fiberglass only to lay up more.
So I got them rough fitted and ground the back side down to clean solid glass. The other side is gel coat which I will grind the surface of in most and all of it off where I have to glass it in to the boat.

Feels good to be making progress again.

Back to Work

Seems like I have been busy doing everything but work on the boat the first part of this week. But I back at it with some help from Chad. I cut and spliced the top for the port side fuel tank. Then we glassed both sides of it.

We layed up 1 layer of 24 Oz. Combomat, 1 layer of 1.5 Oz. mat and 1 layer of 8 Oz. Cloth. I did it that way so that the finished surface would be smoother and require less filling and sanding to get a smooth surface. I am very pleased with the results.


















Here is a shot of the seal on the plywood which I used for the core of the top. You can see it quite clearly though the 3 layers of glass. That is the mark of good glass work.

After sanding all the edges of the taping I did in the interior of the tank I got to work on the preparations for glassing the top on.
My plan is to glass a lip onto the top of the bulkheads and the hull side which the top can rest on. When ready to put the top on I will wet out 2 layers of 1.5Oz. Mat on top of the lip all around then put the top on and press it down onto the wet glass. Then it will be glassed on the outside like the starboard tank was.

This is a shot of the underside of the form for the lip.
The main advantage of this method is that it is a lot easier to complete the inside of the tank and make sure the access covers seal well with the top off. On the starboard tank I put the inside bulkhead on last, thinking that I could glass every joint inside and out that way. I was able to reach the inside corners of the inside bulkhead though the access ports. But it was a real nightmare and then I had trouble getting the inside surface around the access port even so the covers would seal.
So this time the top goes on last.

Inside Bulkhead glassed in place

No much progress today. Only got a couple of hours in before having to go to town for supplies.
I did get all the joints between the 3 bulkheads and the long interior bulkhead glassed in on the inside.

I thought I had taken a shot of the whole thing, but no.....So you will have to put up with a couple boring shots of glass work.

So next step is to glass the outside bottom joint where the inside bulkhead meets the hull bottom on the outside of the tank. The foam is already in place and will get pretty beat up if I don't glass it.
Then I will fit the access covers to the bulkhead. Then it on to the flange to hold the top on.That should take us near the end of the week. I have to take a day off tomorrow to do some other work.

Progress on the Port Fuel Tank

Made good progress on the inside bulkhead for the port side fuel tanks. Started the morning grinding the rough spots off then released it from the Formica and cleaned all the edges up. I was very pleased at easily it came free from the Formica I had layed it up on.

The bottom surface which will be the inside turned out very smooth.Here it is with the inspection port covers in place. After lining the covers up where I wanted them I drilled 1 hole though the fiberglass at opposite corners. Then I threaded those two holes in the aluminum and put the studs in. Returning to the bulkhead opening I inserted the two studs in the holes I had drilled to hold the plate in exact alignment. Then I drilled all the rest of the holes though the fiberglass.
 



There are 30 holes in each plate. The method I use to align those holes makes sure that they are all lined up right. The first holes I drilled though the plate are smaller than the bolt diameter. I enlarge the first two corner holes to 1/4" so the studs will fit though tight thus holding the plate very steady while the rest of the holes are drilled. The final size for the holes in the fiberglass is 5/16" there is not very much room for error. if the plate were to move even a little while you were drilling those holes it would not fit when you have all the studs in. Been there done that....
After drilling all the holes though the bulkhead, I cut and glued the gaskets on to the plates. Then I threaded all the holes in the plates ready to bond the studs in. The cordless drill comes in very handy when threading all those 120 holes in 4 plates.

So here is the inside bulkhead in place with all the foam strips in ready to glass. I am putting the top on this tank last. On the Starboard tank I put the inside bulkhead on last, thinking I could get better bonds on the top with the inside bulkhead off. But fiberglassing the top on from inside the tank and then having to glass the bulkhead on though the inspection ports was a real nightmare. I got it done with good joints all around but swore I would never do that again. I have a better plan, which you will read about as I proceed.

  One of the inside corners with the polyurethane foam fillet in place. I found these a whole lot easier to make than the resin and saw dust ones are. The strength is in the fiberglass not the fillet.

Hope to get the inside corners all glassed in tomorrow.

Inside Bullkhead of Port Fuel Tank

Chad and I were able to layup the inside bulkhead of the port fuel tank this morning in 2-1/2 hours,
record time. It sure was a lot faster and easier with his help. This finished product came out much flatter than the first one did. I had trouble getting the joints in the glass work to layout flat before the resin kicked. There was just too much glass to work to get it done in time. Went much better today with his help. I had him wetting out the glass while I worked the air out off it and laid more pieces in.

My ideas for the mold worked out well too. This is the bulkhead with the sides of the mold removed. The glass came away from the masking tape OK and the tape came off the wood easily as well, so there was a backup for when the glass stuck to the tape.
The Dark areas you see are the joints in the top layer of glass. The layers overlap where the vertical sections meet the bottom and top cords. There are 4 laminates of 24 oz Combomat and 1 layer of core mat in the middle. Really a bit of overkill considering that each section will be glassed to either the hull, one of the other sides of the tank or a baffle which goes in the middle of each tank. But I wanted the thickness to get some stiffness around the edges of the inspection ports so the gaskets will seal.

I finished glassing the forward and  middle bulkheads in as well. So I am ready to glass the inside bulkhead in when I have it ready. My next step will be to clean it up around the opening then drill all the holes for the bolts to hold the covers in. With any luck I should have the inside bulkhead glassed in by the end of next week.

Moving Right Along

Making good progress on the port fuel tank. I can not get over how much easier it is to work without the Cabin sole in. Trying to save myself the work of removing was a mistake. Just hope putting it back in does not prove to be a complete pain in the ass.

The forward Bulkhead clamped in place ready to glass. It takes a while to get everything lined up right. I thought I had the foam in line but it turns out that it is very hard to get the foam in so that the bulkhead lands on it completely. I ended up unsticking it in a few places to move it to get it right.
So that is glassed in on the after face of it. I won't bore you with more pictures of the glass work. They have been added to my collection for posterity.

Next came the dividing bulkhead which you see here in place and glassed in on the after side of it.

The aft Bulkhead went in first and it has been glassed to the hull on both faces. I still need to glass the forward faces of the dividing and forward bulkheads. Maybe I will get to it tomorrow after I finish laminating the interior wall up.












I re-assembled the mold for the interior wall of the tank. I replaced the wax paper release idea with waxed high gloss Formica. I am hoping that it will give me a  smoother surface. The wax paper seems to wrinkle regardless of how careful you are. We will know tomorrow....
















It took several hours to cut all the pieces of fiberglass to laminate it up. The big openings in the middle make it difficult to build without a lot of waste. I ended up cutting pieces to fit in around the openings.
There are 4 layers of 24 oz. Combomat and 1 layer of Coremat for a total finished thickness of 7/16". There are something like 57 separate pieces of glass and Coremat.
It should take 2 to 3 hours to laminate the whole thing up.

Finished to afternoon up by drilling all the holes on the cover plates...all 96 of them. So they are ready for the next step which will be to use them to bore the holes in the wall around the openings.
Then I will thread all the holes in the plates and install the 1/4-20 bolts.

Have sailboat racing both days this weekend and doctors Monday morning. So not much progress on Monday.

Progress on the Port Fuel Tank

I spent the morning getting plywood and more fiberglass. In the afternoon I was able to get the first side of the forward bulkhead glassed and the aft bulkhead cleaned up, place in position and two sides glassed.

I have been having trouble getting the bagging plastic to layout smooth on the glass. It always seemed to leave areas where it did not stick. Then the areas where it did stick would draw the resin from those areas. The finished result was not as smooth as hoped.

So I tried something new today. I let the resin harden all the way so it was stable but still tacky on the surface.

Then I applied the bagging cloth which still stuck to the surface. I was able to work the surface to get the wrinkles out a lot more than before. Hopefully it covers the surface tight enough to exclude the air so I will get a tack free surface. We will see in the morning.

I was able to position the aft bulkhead in place and get two of the edges on one side glassed in while I was waiting for the glass on the forward bulkhead to set.
With the salon floor being removed this tank going  to be a lot easier to work on than the starboard tank was. On the starboard tank I had to crawl into the engine room with all the materials and then work in there with no head room.....Should have had my head examined!