[Public-List] Dinghy attack...

[Gordon Laco via Public-List]

Hello gang.

So here we are in the middle of June... It¹s unseasonably cool out here on
Georgian Bay but blowing the dog off the chain.  Why am I not sailing?
Because I¹ve decided to attack my Boston Whaler Squall dinghy once and for
all.   I¹ve written in the past about my attempts to force it into a weight
loss programme, but as with all of it¹s ilk, it¹s been getting heavier and
heavier.  Twice I¹ve drilled its bottom full of holes and parked it over
gentle heat in my warehouse... I¹ve kidded myself that it¹s gotten lighter,
but I know not really.

This winter was the second try.  I assembled six people (including myself)
to turn it over so I could repair the drain/evaporation holes and found that
six of us couldn¹t turn the thing over without great danger and distress.
It weights a ton; well not really but far more that it¹s supposed to and not
much less than when with great difficulty we got it into the warehouse last
fall.

I decided it was time to replace it.  Towing the thing is like towing a beer
barrel... It makes more wake than SURPRISE does and I just can¹t stand the
speed having it astern knocks off us.  At anchorages I much like rowing and
sailing it, but it¹s just too heavy.

I¹ve spoken with Boston Whaler Corp a few times and was much impressed at
the friendly efficiency their Customer Service Manager showed.  I gave him
my boat¹s serial number and he was able to tell me it was first sold in 1966
at ŒDallas Marine¹ way over in Texas.  How it got from there to Parry Sound
where I bought it I¹ll never know... But one thing I do know is that it¹s
absorbed a lot of water during its fifty years of life.    Boston Whaler had
no specific advice to offer about how to drain the boat but they did say
categorically that their foam does not absorb water... What water is in the
boat is in the spaces created by delaminating between the foam and the inner
and outer skins.  I recall from high school physics that a cubic foot of
water weighs 62lbs...  And the boat is clearly over 100lbs overweight
(probably much more) ... Where could all these delaminating spaces be?

Well, they¹re wrong.   The water was not in any voids caused by
delaminating.

Yesterday, Caroline and I took a rotary saw to the bottom and cut two big
banana shaped pieces off the bottom, port and starboard of the keel.  Sure
enough, the pieces of bottom skin tore off very easily ­ they¹d delaminated
from the foam core ­ but guess what, there was no pool of water to spill
away.  The foam was saturated. The hundreds of pounds of water in the boat
was in the foam.  We spent the rest of yesterday and this morning carving
out the soaked foam... We reckon more than 200lbs of it.  Fantastic.  The
foam had the consistency of watermelon.  It was that wet and soggy.

Well the boat is all carved out now ­ we¹ve mined and tunneled through it
following all the wet foam we found.  I¹m sure there¹s more, but the areas
left are all small so keeping in mind that a cubic foot of water weighs
62lbs, there¹s not room for much water left in the places we haven¹t dug
into.  And, my wife and I were easily able to pick up the boat to move it
around ­ I think it¹s 1/3 the weight it was.  Yahoo.

So now I¹m going to stiffen the bottom banana sections with roving and
epoxy, put a few tabs and false ribs of wood bridging the empty spaces in
the boat where the soggy foam was, then slap the bottom back on.  I¹m going
to cover the whole shebang with cloth and epoxy, paint it, and have my
lightened Squall dinghy back.   We had thoroughly removed foam, wet and dry,
from the after half of the boat when it occurred to me that if I left
Œflying buttresses of good foam in place, we¹d have the shape of the bottom
again.  Well like the comic said Œtoo soon old, too late schmart¹.   I¹ll
have to build a former of some sort in the after part to support the bottom.
Whalers are basically foam boats with a thin skin of glass inside and out...
With the foam gone I¹ve got to give the boat some strength back.  No
problem.

I¹m going to put three inspection ports into it¹s bottom so I can pump out
any water that makes it¹s way back in... And repair the place the water was
getting it.  Yes we found it.  There is a nifty little locker in the stern
seat with a drain that leads into the main part of the dinghy¹s false
bottom.  Some time in the past whatever the tube connected the locker with
the outlet disintegrated (we hardly found a trace of it) so whenever there
was water in that locker most of what drained out went into the foam.  I¹m
putting a couple of brass nipples in with a piece of vinyl tube and presto,
no problem.

Gord #426 Surprise