Pearson Vanguard, #142
"Coqueta"
Hull/Deck Joint
| The Hull-Deck Problem | Anatomy Of The Joint | Removing The Toerail |
| Filling The Cracks In The Joint | Grinding Down To Bare Glass | Laying Glass |
| Fairing Into The Hull | Priming The Boat | Pretty Painted |
I hope that the following commentary on what I discovered and did to repair the leaky hull/deck joint on Pearson Vanguard #142 (Coqueta) serves to help anyone that is contemplating the same “Upgrade” (it was a poorly designed joint if you ask me and this shouldn’t have to have been an upgrade). As some read I am sure that it will be obvious that I am a rookie at fiberglass boat repair, but I feel that what I have learned and done certainly adds to the body of knowledge regarding this quirk in the construction of the Pearson Vanguard.
I noticed the problem of leaks at this joint the first time I was inside the boat before it was purchased. The inside of the hull in the galley was full of streaks that served as evidence of water running down the inside of the boat repeatedly over a long period of time. After talking to some people and subscribing to the Vanguard Owners’ E-mail list I found that what I was witnessing was not unique to only #142. The leaky hull/deck joint was a point of stress for several Vanguard owners.
Anatomy Of The Joint (Sketch of Joint)
The joint between the hull and deck is formed where the deck (with NO vertical flange) sits down on the vertical edge of the hull (NO horizontal flange there). IF there was any sort of glue used where these two surfaces touch it was NOT present when I first exposed the joint. Inside the boat, there is what seems to be a couple of layers of tabbing running along the joint connecting the deck to the hull. I remember someone speaking of the space behind the tabbing being filled with some sort of resin filler. I saw no evidence of this. It may have been true on hull #1, but I bet you that those guys at Pearson did it once and then said, “Screw this! It takes too much time.” Now. You ready? Here’s the real shocker. The tabbing was run after the bulkheads were in place and therefore right where the bulkhead meets the hull/deck joint there was nothing between the bulkhead and the deep blue besides a caulked or not caulked piece of half-round stainless that covered the joint on the outside. I found rot in all the wood in the galley area. The entire galley had to be removed and luckily I was able to repair the rotted areas of the bulkhead behind the galley under the companionway.
There was quite a debate via the Vanguard Owners’ E-mail List as to the exact anatomy of this joint. I have been in the joint and know how it is constructed on #142. If Pearson hadn’t changed the manner in which they joined the deck to the hull from something different before 1964 or to something different after 1964 then all Vanguards have the hull/deck joint constructed in this manner.
It would have been impossible to do any part of this portion of the work by myself. Whether one is able to extract the screws or must cut the rail off, it is a two person job. I received this help from my brother.
We first gave it the ‘ole college try to extract the machine screws that had been through bolted to the deck. I was down below, often contorted, with an open end 7/16” wrench and he was up top with a big flathead screwdriver. The first few came out like they had been oiled and just put on. It was a mean joke for the machine screw gods to play on us. After the initial tease I was able to get the nut off and the screw wouldn’t spin out of the rail or they just broke. We would literally battle with some screws for 30-45 minutes. Madness.
I decided to use a Sawzall. I cut the first screw midship where there was a notch cut out of the bottom of the rail as a drain. I got the blade started under the rail and zipped it through the caulking to the first screw and it would “pop” as the blade went through the screw. I then zipped the saw blade through to the next screw. As we got farther away from the starting point the blade had a hard time “zipping” through the caulk. One time it would go up into the wood, another time it would cut down into the deck. To alleviate this problem my brother started prying/holding the loose portion of the toerail up behind the sawblade. We began to fly. We got the rail off the entire boat in less than 30 minutes total. The side rails had been constructed in only two pieces of teak joined by a very nice scarf. One side had been damaged before I came by the boat and as we were removing that section it was too damaged to handle its own weight and broke. The wood was going to need to be replaced so that didn’t bother me much at all. The stern rail was two pieces as well, but it was removed intact. The bow portion had a bolt running through it and the chainplate at the stem, so they had to be removed together.
Filling The Cracks In The Joint
| There were many places along the joint where there was
nothing but air between the deck and the hull. I mixed up some epoxy and
West System high density filler and used a putty knife to put as much of
the thickened resin into each of the open cracks that I could. I was able
to smooth out the resin mixture well enough such that sanding it wasn't
necessary before continuing on. |
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I prepared the joint for the laminate by grinding to bare
fiberglass. I exposed a 2” width on the deck all the way around the boat
(except at the stern where I made it was ground as wide as was the old portion
of rail there) and 4” down
the hull
all the way around the boat. (I ended up grinding a little farther down
the hull before it was all over.) We decided to NOT fair the laminate into
the deck, but to have the laminate come onto the deck and have that edge
be truncated at a final
width of two inches. We decided to have successive layers of laminate
finish down the hull to a width of 4 inches. It was at this point that I
received a fantastic wealth of advise from the owner of #268. This was the
first time that I had done fiberglass work and his advise proved to be
invaluable. I
rounded over the edge of the deck with a ¼” round over bit in the router.
This was necessary to have the fiberglass conform to the turn from the deck down
to the hull. As the router got to the portions of the hull that slope back
under the deck (forward of the head and aft of the cockpit) I had to hand sand
the round over. The slope was allowing the router bit to get too far into
the fiberglass.
I suppose it is because this is the first time that I have
entered into such a project that I have missed on a few opportunities to
document what has happened. I have missed chances to photograph things and
just never thought to write down what I have done thinking that I would be able
to remember everything. I really can’t remember if I used polyester or
epoxy resin. If I had to bet, I would say it was polyester resin. I
wish a little that I would have used epoxy just for the overkill. I like
overkill. That way I don’t have to worry about it.
I laid down three layers of glass over the joint. I was
planning on having a final width of 2” on the deck and a final width of 4” down the
hull. Note in the picture that I had marked the 2” and 4” on the deck and
hull with a pencil. I used a speed square and held the pencil at the
appropriate spot on the square and pushed it around the boat marking the
line. The first two layers of fiberglass were
biaxial cloth tape (it was
4” tape that I cut to get the 2” strips) and the third was mat. The layers
were 2”, 4” and 6” wide, respectively. The first layer of biax only had 1”
of its width on the deck. The 2nd layer of biax and the
mat had 2” of their width on deck. I would laminate all three layers along
a section of deck at a time. I cut and laid out more than just the strips
of glass for the whole section that I planned to do. That way I always had
glass ready if I were to have some mixed resin left over. I cut the
different layers to different lengths (30”-36”) so that the seam formed between
two pieces in layer #1 was never directly below a seam formed from two pieces
in layer #2 or #3. I always wet out the glass on a board first, then carefully
placed it on the joint. Wetting out the glass on a board BEFORE placing it
on the joint was essential in efficiently getting the fabric to conform to the turn from the
deck to the hull. I did this a few times by myself, but when the
1st mate was there to help out (she loves mixing resin) it went much
more smoothly, and faster. It makes fairing much easier if you are very
consistent with the amount of resin you are putting into each piece of
cloth. As I placed layers 2 and 3 I was very careful to have the “deck
edge” of the glass strip right on the line that I had drawn on the deck before I
began. Then when the layers had become green (not tacky anymore, but still
a little soft) I used a straight edge and a
box cutter to trim the inboard edge of the 3 layers up on deck. This gave
a very nice ¼” or so “ledge” on which to place my toerail when the time
arrives. It is very important to get the glass trimmed while it is
green. If you wait until the resin has cured, you may need a dremel tool
and lots of time to get the “ledge” cut straight.
When I began fairing the new laminate down into the rest of the hull I had no idea what an arduous task it could be. I started by using a homemade fairing board (4½”x30”) and 80 grit paper to sand fair the new edge of the deck, forward and aft. Here I only sanded about the top 3”-4” of the hull. If that area wasn’t smooth to begin with then any attempt to fair the new laminate down into the hull would end up being just as wavy as that edge. I spent a lot of time just sanding the width of the board forward and aft all the way around the boat. There were a couple of spots that I hadn’t paid close enough attention to the amount of resin in the glass and they were either thinner or thicker than the surrounding laminate. At those spots I faired them by pulling cabosil/epoxy putty up the side of the area with 6” of a Thalco squeegee. I learned real quick that you don’t want to use cabosil as a fairing putty that is going to need a lot of sanding. After too much sweat and sore shoulders I tried and came to love microballoons. What a difference the lower density filler made in ease of sanding. Sometimes you have to learn the lessons the hard way. After I was sure that the new laminate was fair forward and aft I began to fair it down into the hull. For this I mixed my own fairing putty using microballoons, a splash of cabosil and epoxy. This was spread using 8” of a Thalco squeegee. After the fairing had cured well enough to sand I sanded it using that homemade fairing board and 80 grit(120 might have been enough). Then I went around the boat again fairing what I could see had been missed and followed up with the board and 120. There were a few places where the fairing putty came down the hull enough to be spread on top of old paint. The paint had been scuffed up with 80 grit and I was assured by several fiberglass veterans that it should cause no problem. The whole boat was then boarded with 120.
Holy cow! I thought I had it well faired until we
primed. I was just amazed at how much I had missed and could now see with
primer on the boat. At this point I went back around the boat
fairing and
filling with Awlfair. Using this product was very easy. Not only did
it mix and sand easy, but it was a different color than the primer and made it
much easier to see spots I had missed while sanding. After that
first day of priming and filling I sanded the entire hull with the fairing board
and 120. That was rough, but I feel very good that I did it that
way. She has a very fair hull
now. We primed again and sanded two
more times. These last two coats of primer were both prepped with 240
grit using the fairing board at the hull/deck area and an electric DA on the
hull.
Here she is painted. Amazing what a little paint will do!
Contact the owner. He loves to talk about his boat.
snail mail: Les Rogers e-mail: lrogers@steds.org phone: (772) 453-5331
Classic Refurbishing
646 15th Ave
Vero Beach, FL 32962