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!

Started Port Fuel Tank Bulkheads

I cut out the 3 bulkheads this morning. Then I was able to get two of them glassed on both sides this afternoon. Not much to look at.

Here are the two of them glassed on one side with the vacuum bag material over them. I put this plastic over them to try to get a fully cired surface. If you leave the resin open to the air it never really cures to a non-sticky surface. You have to add wax sol to the final coat of the resin. The wax rises to the surface during cure and coats the resin to keep the air out. Only problem is that the wax has to be completely cleaned off before you can get any more resin to stick. I will be glassing these into the hull so I need them to be wax free.

Finally Started Port side Fuel tanks

Finally decided that I am ready to start the fuel tanks on the Port side. I will more than likely find out later that I was not really ready but here goes anyway....

Looking down into the hole where the tank will be.
The 3 Light colored bands are 1" thick PVC foam that has been cut to form fillets and a buffer between the hull and the fuel tank bulkheads.It is sooo much easier to work with the salon cabin sole and beams out.

The next step is to make patterns for the bulkheads. Here are the 3 patterns which I originally made for the starboard tanks but was able to use for the port side with just a little modification for slight variances in the interior hull shape. One would expect the sides of the boat to be the same shape. Interesting in that the middle and aft patterns were not tall enough on this side of the boat.....I am not interested enough to check to see what the problem is. As long as both tanks fit. I'm good.

I also spent part of the day wearing out saber saw blades by cutting fiberglass disks to laminate together to make backing blocks for the seacocks.

So it was a good day, made progress on several fronts which is good. Hopefully I will be able to continue tomorrow with the tank bulkheads and get these tanks underway.

Good progress today

Made good progress today on the glassing work.

In the morning I was able to glass the whole length of the inner starboard stringer where I had done the fillets yesterday. I mixed up some really fine grinding dust with some resin to "paint" over the rough fillet before glassing. It worked like a charm. The finished product looked really good, even if it is not apparent in the picture.

Then I cut out some fiberglass pieces to make proper backing blocks for the seacocks. What is or was in the boat was not satisfactory. Here is one of the pieces I cut out. My plan is to fiberglass several together to get 3/4" or better  thickness. Notice that the backing block is much larger diameter than the seacock.

 Here is example 1 of not a very good install.
They have used a piece of wood and I'll bet you that they drilled the bolt holes all the way though the hull. So I can look forward to more concealed rot and rusted bolts.

Example 2 of how not to do it. Notice that the backing block is the same diameter at the base of the seacock. Part of the idea of the backing block is to spread any loading on the seacock out to more of the hull. If the seacock gets stuck, like from not being closed for years it may take a fair amount of force to free it. Have not checked bolts to see if they go though all the way. It seems that each of these seacocks was installed by different people at different times.





Then in the afternoon I was able to put the final layer of 24 oz Combo-mat over the outer port stringer.

It turned out to be a larger job than I thought. So what's new, right. Wrapping the heavy glass from the hull  up, over , down the stringer and out onto the hull on the other side was not as easy as it would appear. You have to keep it tight to the existing structure or there will be bubbles which is not good. This is especially hard at the corners.  I will have to do it differently on the starboard side, as I do not have as much room to work in. I may try two layers of lighter material which will be easier to wrap.

I am tired and sore from all the awkward positions doing the glass work, but I am happy with the progress. I am almost ready to start the port fuel tank. I am really glad I am taking the time to get all this re-enforcing work done while I have the room to work. I was in too much of a hurry on the starboard side which makes doing the work harder now.

One foot in front of the other...just keep glassing

Time to celebrate. The Grey Water Tank and the Port side Stringer Tabbing Re-enforcement are done!!!

Still needs to be painted but the glass work is done. I have the cover done as well.Little more work in the aft bilge to make a pocket for the little bilge pump then I can paint this area.
















This was the last joint inside to be glassed in, so now both tank bulkheads are tabbed into the stringers inside and out. As usual I took pictures of each joint. I won't bore you with all of them.

Here is the last  section of the port stringers to be re-enforced. I still need to add 2 layers of 24oz Combo mat to the upper sections of this stringer. I had to cut the existing covering open to dry out the stringer. I "glued" it back in today with resin and matt. It was is heavy enough either....Oh boy more glass work. I am thinking that I will wait until I move the generator, then I will have better access to the inner stringers.

Back to the starboard side. I decided to form the fillet at the bottom turn from stringer face to hull. They did not do this and the glass really needs to have a radius not a sharp corner at this turn. I usually do the fillet when I do the glass work, but there is so much (11') per side that I decided to make it easier and do it in two steps. This is the side that I have to crawl into to work....




The heat is really wearing me out. I have to be fully clothed, long pants tucked into sock and long sleeve shirt over tee shirt with sleeve tucked into gloves trying to avoid getting covered in grinding dust which itches like crazy. I have a paper suit which protects you well but does not breath at all so is even hotter!!!
Onward!!!

Grey Water tank .....and more grinding and glassing

Let's start off with the looks like progress part. The Grey water tank which I decided to build into the bilge for 2 reasons (1) It is low enough for everything to drain into it including a "drip" pan under the stuffing box and (2) it will act like a coffer dam to keep the forward part of the bilge dry if the stuffing box does leak into the bilge. My original idea was to just put a small pump behind the grey water tank to drain the dripping from the stuffing box, then I realized that if I made to top of the tank low enough I could just drain the stuffing box into it. I will still add the small bilge pump just in case....it is a boat after all. The box is roughly 24" long X 18-1/2" wide X 15" tall which is 29 gallons.I do not want to store the grey water just have enough buffer in case the pump gives trouble.

So here is the tank, at least what I got done of it today. The inlets and outlet will be plumbed though the fixed portion of the top. I have a macerator pump which I plan to use to pump the tank dry. Macerator pumps have a set of stainless steel blades that cut up anything in the water it is pumping. Hoping this will take care of the hair in the tank problem.

The left shot is of the exterior of the aft wall and the one on the right is of the interior of the forward wall. The light colored band you see at the upper right of the right picture is a piece of aluminum angle which I have glassed to the stringer side. It will be completely glassed. You can see both of them in the first picture. They will provide support of the removable cover. I will install 1/4-20 studs in them to hold the top on.

So that was the interesting part. Yesterday I spent the morning removing a poorly installed 1-1/2" dia sea-cock and through hull and a grounding plate.


 
The seacock was the type with 4 mounting bolts as well as the through hull, but who ever installed it drilled the holes for the bolts all the way through the hull. The problem is that one of the bolts leaked to the wood backing block, but sealed at the seacock, so the stainless steel bolt rusted and the backing block rotted while everything look fine inside the boat. Stainless steel will rust if it is kept wet and no oxygen can get to it, like when the bolt leaked into the backing block...

I will replace the backing block with a fiberglass one with the bolts drilled only though the backing block.
I just about removed all the through hulls, I think there are two 1-1/2" in the engine room and two smaller one up forward. All will be removed and properly reinstalled when I am done.....


Then I got to finally glass the last of the four engine room bulkheads to hull joints. I had saved the aft side of the forward bulkhead to starboard hull joint for last. Note to self, should have done that one BEFORE I built the starboard fuel tank in. I am glad that I decided to leave 24" of space at each end of the tank. Now you can get to the though hulls that exit the sides of the boat above the waterline. Before there was only about 16" which was enough to see the though hulls, but not enough to get to them to work on them.

There it is all it's glory....
The light spot in the lower right picture is the hole for the generator exhaust which I need to put back in.

I also glassed the rest of the outer stringer on the port side. I did take pics for my collection but I won't subject you to them. I am very nearly ready to start on the port side fuel tank.

Well I had a massive post in progress when Firefox decided to crash......great.
So note to self, only short posts, as I just figured out you just post the non-completed work then add to it and update it. Kind of like saving your work every so often so you don't lose it when the machine crashes.
Where were we... oh yeah more fun grinding and glassing.

These are the core pieces from drilling the limber holes out. I took this shot to show that the stringers were solid with no rot at this time.
I am trying to keep a photo record of this whole process for future reference. Of course organizing all these pictures is another whole job.

I had to drill a new limber hole in the inner port side stringer just ahead of the main engine. the existing on was poorly located. I found water in this stringer which is not good. However the wood was fine, so I removed part of the outer fiberglass skin in this area to see if it will dry out. Then I will re-glass it.

One of the many limber holes ready for the glass reinforcement. I glass right over the hole then cut the hole in the cured glass work. The dark area is filler around the limber hole to make the surface flush with the rest.

The next step, after more grinding of course, is to re-enforce the glass-work connecting the stringers and bulkheads to the hull. This is a before glassing shot, I have all the grinding done at this point Yeah!! 

Here is a closeup of the back corner after the glass work is done. I have taken pictures of every joint I glassed, I won't bore you with all of them. But they become part of that photo record I mentioned earlier. Many of these spot will be very hard to get to when the boat is complete.
This one for example will be under the muffler for the main engine.

Here is the aft end of the outer stringer in that same location. Like I said I took a picture of every joint I glassed. The stringer and bulkhead to hull re-enforcement is 4 layers of 1708 biax tape that is tapered from the joint out on each side. The first layer to go on is 4" wide, the 2nd is 6" wide, 3rd is 8" wide and the last is 10" wide. this creates the most strength at the joint where you need it and tapers the thickness of the glass out.












Today I finished grinding, yeah more grinding,the joint between the aft face of the forward engine room bulkhead and the hull and stringers.

Here are two shots of the completed glass work. The one on the left is hull side to bulkhead and the one on the right is hull bottom to bulkhead between the stringers and outer stringer to bulkhead. I still have to do the inner stringer to bulkhead and th whole ting on the Starboard side. But that is the last one to be done. So I am getting closer, it is just slow work having to grind the old very uneven and painted over glass work in preparation to add the new glass work. The bond between the new and old glass would be very weak without all the grinding.
Onward!!