Stuck Centerboard in a Catspaw Dinghy

[imported_Glenn]

My centerboard made with white oak boards that are splined together with bronze rods and with a small piece of lead cast in to the board will not go down. The board is painted with bottom-coat paint.

It stuck last year when I took it out to plane it down. It has a brass nipple at the pivot point which was taken out and cut to a length that is the same as the new board thickness. The trunk is 1 1/4" wide and the board is 11/16". Should be enough room but after being in the water for just 3 days, it is now stuck again.

Should I remove it, plane it down even more and then coat it with epoxy to keep the water from swelling it up? The other thought is that my mahogany trunk might be cupped, but I don't think so. Any ideas?? The board is flat...

[Captain Pre-Capsize]

Glenn:

I can't speak directly to your situation but I had the same chronic problem with mine. It was a matter of trial and error. By swinging it up and down it would score the varnish/epoxy coating and that is where I would sand it down. The key was to sand it WAY down because by the time you re-epoxy and varnish you have built it back up to where it sticks.

[ 08-27-2005, 02:52 PM: Message edited by: Captain Pre-Capsize ]

[Mrleft8]

Ah yes.... Had this very same problem last year... The trunk may be cupped a little, and there isn't much you can do about that. What I finally did was.... Get brutal! I did the old take a little off the board, repaint it, get stuck a week later, take a little off the board, repaint it, get stuck a week later, thing. Then I set the thickness planer to take off 3/16"... No more stuck. I also found a very healthy colony of barnacles in the trunk, just out of reach of my bottom paint brush... This year I got a long stick with a sponge rubberbanded to it to reach the nether regions of the C/B case.

[ssor]

FYI there is a paint roller that is about 3/4 inch in diameter and comes with an 18 inch handle. It is called a long john and is used to reach behind the toilet tank and behind radiators and such. They should enable someone to paint the entire inside of a centerboard trunk.