and another
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and another
here's the rudder, no worse than others, what is the recommended course, sand and paint, or fill the cracks?
here's the hull
the prop and depth finder
Good beer!
Easy stuff first. Sand and pint the rudder. The cracks will fill when it gets wet.
But, you're right. The "house" over the lazarette is pretty ugly. A nice 8hp 2-cycle Nissan, Yamaha, etc. should eliminate the need. for such a thing. :p
Yikes! I thought MY rudder looked bad. You've made my day.
There are literally hundreds of articles on the internet about blisters.
We don't seem to see that problem much on our boats, probably because of the construction and the fact that most are hauled every year.
The advice ranges from "forget about it" to getting a $5000 professional shave job. I'm not sure what the current thinking is on this problem.
But, there is probably nothing worse than doing a repair and having it fail.
Here is one series of articles, if you scroll down.
http://marinesurvey.com/#Articles
Fininshed with the prep work and started painting.
Just 27 more coats to go
Tom: There were several questions there, and I think several of them remain unanswered.
I am familiar with the rudder problem. My original issue delaminated vertically into three pieces and I replaced it rather than take a chance. Solsken sails on the Great Lakes and I didn't want the rudder to fail at the wrong moment. That is one of the failures that sailors dread. My new rudder is a single piece of mahogany with the rods from the original rudder inserted horizontally through it. It was made by a pro carpenter and fit like a glove when installed ($750). Another alternative is to sand your rudder, using it for a form and cover it in several layers of glass. Before you do, however, make sure that the connection to the rudder post is super secure. If that is OK, I would NOT remove the rudder from the post before doing the fiberglass overlay. And do not fiberglass the rudder post.
As for filler, I would caution against epoxy for filling above the water line because it is too hard to sand. It harder than the gel coat, so when sanding, the surrounding gel coat comes off first. The polyester fillers (available at West or other suppliers ) are easier to sand without destroying the surrounding area and cheaper than the 3M product I filled in blisters and cracks with the stuff and it worked like a champ. (If you want to know what I use, let me know and I'll get the product name for you). As for Bondo, Mike is right. Many marinas do use Bondo, because it is cheap and they don't care, as long as the repair gets out the door - but it don't use it. Use marine stuff as Mike suggested.
Below the water line, do not use polyester because the bottom sealer will pull away from it after it is in the water. Moisture from the inside passes through it, I think, and pops off the bottom sealer. Use epoxy instead to fill in bottom problems.
As for the hull sealant, I used the inexpensive West house brand. It is made by the Interlux industrial division. Be sure to put on enough coats to build 10 mil, at least. Also, make sure to get down to the gel coat before you put it on.
As for bottom paint, I am on fresh water and use the Interlux Micron with Biolux. It is a multi-year ablative (shedding) paint. Lake Michigan is not that bad, but Racine Harbor is notoriously famous for buildup. It almost seems they are using the harbor to build a weapon of mass destruction. It has worked pretty well for two years (I'll need a new coat this year), with a minimal build up on the sunny side of the boat when moored (the dock side being in the shade).
As for how you tell what the original color was, sand down the paint in a spot until you reach the underlying resin from the glass. Your last barrier/color before that is the original color. As for what the original colors were, Bill would probably know better, but I suspect they were white, red, blue and black.
I think that covers your questions. Good luck.