CABIN LINER

[ebb]

Kurt:
I think it was on Tony G's site that I waxed adnauseum about filling the space between the liner and the coach sides. The cabin side on 338 is about 1/8", the liner considerably thinner.

When the windows are out you discover the liner can be easily moved in or out from the stiffer cabin molding. The liner around the openings may be considerably distorted by 40 years of clamping pressure.
Essentially we must do everything possible to remove any silicone that was used in the windows. Abrade the inside of the liners ( 36grit sanding belt carpet-taped to thin plywood.) Do everything you can to mechanically remove silicone, it will defeat your remodeling. Epoxy will not adhere to where a silicone toad once squatted. Spread the word....Sand, grind and sand some more.
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Then, I would experiment with squeeze clamps and narrow wedges or shims pushed into the interstice until you discover the ONE measurable sameness all around each window. You want as much as possibe parallel surfaces - inside to outside. The cabin liner (in 338) is considerably tortured and bent. But we assume it was laminated on a fair mold and somebody had an idea of what the setoff was between cabin and liner. Have to find it. On 338 it was/is about 1/2". The single piece cabin liner may have gone in a little crooked at assembly. Liner and cabin laminations are not necessaryly consistent thickness everywhere. Your measurement is outside to inside with the tape. The inside space between the two moldings varies. That's why, in 338, a single dimension spacer would not have worked. But you need consistant finished thickness for a consistant window installation.*

Also the side of the cabin that the window holes are cut out of has a gentle sweep to it. Try not to disturb such a sweet alberg curve by forcing or stuffing it! The cabin side for the most part is pretty stiff, so you are moving the liner to match it. Watch that section between the windows.
[The coaming breakwaters where they are fastened thru the cabin side aft of the windows on 338 produced radical distortions - a sour concavity between the window end and the corner of the cabin. These coaming end blocks are lagged (clamped) thru the hollow cabin side and liner. Anyway, the distortion these pieces make can also distort the fairness of the windows of other Ariel's at that end. ]
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Once you know you can establish equal width on all four window openings mark and take all the wedgies out and stuff foam backer rod down inside each opening. You do this so you don't fill the space endlessly with expensive epoxy (and cabosil and chopped strand.) You are casting an internal waterproofing frame and incredible strength to which you can mount any kind of window you desire. You decide on the width (1 1/2" or 2" or 2 1/2" for example) of your inside frame by how deep you push in the foam rod. Then reestablish your spacer wedges. Your local concrete shoppe has different width soft polyethylene closedcell foam rod for you delectation, Get samples, the stuff is very cheap, to find what works for you.

Stand on the deck and move your eye at a zero angle down the cabin sides. Look for a bump-out, especially that center piece. You may have to span the window openings with a long bendy fairing batten to tame the center section.
You are going to stiffen the whole cabin side considerable. Won't be able to move that center section when filled so easy later.
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Might plan to do one window opening at a time. Do em in series.

Juice with liquid epoxy the inside surfaces in convenient places between the wedges (piece of terry stapled around stir stick) and pile in thickened mishmash. Have fun with the groove overhead. Just dampen the insides or the goop will fall out. Keep the goop below the edge. Let it set. Remove the wedges. You should have the liner and cabin locked in position. Bet you can still custom the groove a little - spread it apart, clamp it closer.

You want the combo filler fairly stiff, not so stiff that you can't push it with a spatula to the bottom of your groove. The liquid first coat can combine with the filler and loosen it so that it will flow out of the overhead groove. So you want to push it in but not mess with it. So don't get it too wet up there anyway. How much water got in up on top of our windows? Use a little fumed silica to stiffen the gel and use just a little liquid to loosen it. On hot days keep the epoxy part A and B in a fridge, or on ice in a cooler. Small batches makes it easy, and cheaper, if it goes off in the middle of. Use slow hardener only.
You should be able to stop when you want and come back to it at your leisure, minimal reprep.

Prime again with liquid epoxy where the wedgies were and finish it flat and level all around. Push the filler in this time until it bulges out, trim the bulges flat while wet. The openings on 338 where pretty consistant - pretty good same size cut-outs by the factory. So file/grind the openings fair as you want after they harden. The 'liquid' priming is important to gain a real bond.
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If you don't mind a little waste. when you have a window opening filled to perfection all round, and it is still wet, take folded paper/rag towels dampened with d.alcohol and wipe all around the opening by cupping over the work with your hand. You will drag out a small amount of your filler. And clean the sides at the same time. This will create a concave surface that will seat later caulking better.

The center pieces between the window cutouts were limp on 338. You play with this to get your established width. Spring clamps, wedgies, spring batten, take your time. It's a wonder that the original windows stayed in place and kept any water out at all. In nearly all cases they didn't!

You are adding a lot of stiff and a lot of amazing strength to the sides - and it definitely will make mounting any kind of window much easier.*
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I found some 18-8 barrel-nuts and some 1/4" pan head 316 machine bolts at McmasterCarr that could make a neat/strong slab-on lexan installation. Haven't done it yet. Going with the slab-on because I'm convinced it's the offshore way to go with our large lights. Have to keep the light and airyness they provide.
Barrel nuts thru oversized holes in the polycarbonate with panhead machine screws will be trey-neat - and may even allow a trim wood frame to be put on afterwards, independant of the lexan, if the polycarbonate overlap can be kept minimal (1" or less?) Trying to find a way to be able to replace the lexan in BoraBora without making a federal case out of it.

Also looking into wet gasket material for the lexan to cabin seal. Peel and stick not tube goop, there has to be consistent gasket thickness all round, imco. Whatever lights you put on the newly stiffened cabin they will have to bend to a mild curve. At the moment a product called Eternabond (a roofing product hopefully NOT rubberized asphalt.) will be be explored.........(Do real men use words like E terna bond?)
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*If you are restoring and will be reinstalling the original window frames, you know the miniature machine screws that screw into even more minature closed threaded sockets in the outer frame are a problem. HERE is the reason why Everett left the cabin side hollow! Each screw could be the same length if he floated the windows in their holes and had adjustable cabin sides!!! Innovation for the manufacturer, LEAKS FOREVER for the owner. As a restorer you can't change things anyway, right? The original windows are not attached to the boat! Clamped is the word. So stiffened cabin sides on an Ariel might turn out to be a close but different thickness - and you'll find yourself cutting a hundred miniature machine screws to fit. I think the sockets are only 1/8" deep.
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Sorry about the excessive detail and being so pedantic. I start small, I do, I do... then I think a first timer might need this observation.... and maybe that observation..... and then it's gotten w a y too phat. oh welll.........

[epiphany]

Ebb - I think it is good not only for me, but for other Ariel modifiers/maker/fixers now and yet to come, to get detail and thoughts like that - keep it up!

[ebb]

sheeeese, ebb shud keep is trap shut.
BUT, Eternabond. Is a new generation double stick mastic/gasket material, so I wouldn't run out and buy it just yet as there will no doubt be others with similar material. The stuff is 'environmental friendly, naturally UV resistant, has a 16 to 35 year life expectancy exposed to weather (1/2 that in the tropics?), 5 year shelf life, pliable, self amalgamates, and can be applied under water.' Can't beat that!
The problem with it is that its bond or adhesive quality is unknown in our marine application. It could be total overkill. Or be worthless. It might have other good uses like under stanchion bases and cleats. And once it gets off the roof it might show up in grey or white color instead of only black.

There are myriad sealing, gasketing foam tapes. They come dry, one side sticky and double stick. The foam comes in many forms, formulas, and densities. Mostly the foam tapes have the glue applied so there can be delamination and the foams can break down. Research imco targets the window glazing industry. Maybe transportation too. Most modern glazing, though, uses channel and extruded foams, few flat tapes. It's a toss up what foam tape might cross over to our low surface energy (polycarbonate) slab-on install on our curved cabin sides.
Haven't found anything yet that'll fry in the sun, boil in the heat, stay sticky
under water pressure with no leaks, and be removable years in the future. There is a lot of polycarbonate in the window glazing industry so that is a good place to keep an eye.

Polysulfide if it was available as a sticky tape that held its thickness well under pressure with no oozing might be the ticket - but it doesn't exist. Using polysulfide to mount any polycarbonate is not possible because the solvents in the rubber attack the polycarbonate. Any tube caulk will get squeezed too thin in a bolt on to curved surface scenario. BoatLife's hybrid answer to marine glazing (the polyurethan/silicone tube goop) could be perfect in a wet gasket form but...

McMasterCarr has black butyl rubber sealing tape* that is used outdoors and is said to be "nonstaining, odorless, paintable - has permanent resilience and elongation properties, won't crack, sag, harden even under severe weather conditions."
It's 1/8" thick and comes in 3 widths. The 1 1/2" comes 16yds for $18.25 (76385A150) I'd guess it could be doubled up if you wished. Haven't used it. One cruiser says he has used this tape* under his chainplates (not on your everyday maintenace list) instead of polysulfide.
He had bad leaks with the poly and just a small one with the butyl. The guy describes his chainplates as moving around alot!

I wonder if the tape can be used in the Ariel's original double frame install?
There just may be not enough surface under the outside frame for the tape to seal good?

The eternal bonding quality of Eternabond bothers me. It could bond too well to the cabin laminate and be a gummy mess like silicone to remove. So it's McMasterCarr's butyl for this fool - can't beat the price - maybe it'll seal under stancion bases too - which really DO move around alot!.......unless somebody knows better.....
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*OK, what I'm describing here is NOT what the skipper used under his chainplates (but what I MIGHT use under the polycarbonate which is exposed to the sun.) He used the Butyl-Coated PVC Foam Sealing Tape which has butyl encapsulated foam, that McMasterCarr mentions "for marine applications". It's operating temp range is lower than the all butyl tape. The cabin and deck can get mighty hot at times. These tapes are narrower. Look it up (75875A663) $10.18, 17yds.
The American Window Glazing Tape Assoc. has to invent a UV gradient system for us consumers. These butyl tapes and most other foam tapes do not mention UV in touting their charms. Or if they do it's never in terms of time.
'Has great UV resist properties guaranteed for 6 months or until the rubber hardens, whichever comes first.'

[ebb]

First test(s)
Got two 50' rolls of dark grey 1" wide DOUBLE-STICK tapes from
www.bestmaterials.com
which is a "discount warehouse" for roofing supplies. I figure that what ever has to spend its life on a roof has to be a candidate for use on a boat. Most products are asphalt. Some have graduated to become rubberized asphalt, and highend epdm and urethanes are being used for membranes. It was from an RV forum, I think, that I first noticed Eternabond. Eternal subject on RV forums are their !^#%*&# eternal leaks.

Eternabond sticks to everything except silicone. My interest in non-tube caulking is that I believe when mounting any kind of flat window or frame to the mildly curved cabin sides on the Ariel we will get hard or 'dry' spots where the caulk is squeezed out to nothing creating possible leaks. Hence: tapes. The assumption is that tapes will hold their thickness under pressure - which may not be the case. Tapes also are a lot cleaner to use than tube goop.

The former coamings on Little Gull were mounted with evil silicone. The area has been minused the rubber with scraping, but no sanding has been done. This became my 'test' area. A section was cleaned and scrubbed with Dow-Corning silicone remover (methylsiloxane), a 2nd section prepped with a potent epoxy solvent reducer, and the third was sanded. Blue Tape used to identify the sections stuck best to the first, ok to the second and hardly at all to the sanded section. Blue Tape is a good quick test to see what's up on any surface.

So, 1" wide tapes represent the width of the caulk I'm interested in. I began unpeeling the ($20 a roll) Eternabond gasket. (1"wide and 1/16" thick.) The side IN has an easily removed clear separator. The idea is to unroll it and press it in place - then remove the top. I left the top paper in place. I tried to bend a piece of this gasket around a corner of a window - the top paper disallows this. If the paper is removed, the material is so sticky that it cannot be worked with. It gets pulled out of dimension, does NOT keep its shape. Eternabond is like chewing gum - but this gum aggressively sticks to the skin, and only if you are lucky can you pull it off. Not my idea of a GASKET. In the form I got it's not a friendly product.

By contast, the other Eternabond product: ($5.25 a roll) "High-Temp Butyl Sealing Tape" (1"wide and 3/32" thick) is the exact opposite. It easily bends around the window corner without changing shape or thickness - sticks, but not aggressively. The slight extra thickness seems right.

The test areas on the coaming seat rise revealed that the miracle Eternabond could not be peeled off from any section. The E. Butyl Tape showed mild adhesion to the solvent prep areas, and came off too easy on the sanded, where the blue tape hardly wanted to stick.

Tried to push the E. gum off with a putty knife. Sticks to the knife, sticks to fingers, sticks to the gelcoat, sticks to self. But it's a disappoinment in that it doesn't stick to self good enough. Nothing is supposed to remove it. Had no trouble at all cleaning it off with naptha. Tested some WM Thinner and Wax Remover (essentially Naptha) and it did just as well cleaning the E. gum off.

My feeling now* about the silicone oil contamination on and in the gelcoat around the windows (and anywhere else) is that the oil is now part of the gelcoat and cannot be removed or neutralized. The gelcoat now has a builtin release agent for any gasket (except Eternabond, and even E. can be cleaned off with naptha). No epoxy is going to stick and I have my doubts about LPU or other eurthanes that have primers that are epoxies. The solution is to remove the gelcoat.

I'm going to go with the nice, docile hightemp butyl tape, see how it goes. Do some butyl longevity studies in Hawaii, French Polynesia, Samoa, places like that. At least taking the windows apart again will not be a federal case. We'll try it. I'll get some of the foamcore butyl from McMasterCarr to check out FIRST. Dang, thought I'd got some....
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* casual glob tests where a dab of epoxy-gel mix is smeared on various suspect sites (around the windows inside) and allowed to set - then a chisel is tapped against the lump - shows no adhesion in shear. The gobs can all be removed wth a lite tap.