the marina dropped my boat

[Jaffloat]

My beautiful Dulcinea (below) was dropped a month ago. She has suffered 11+ cracked frames and 14+ compromised planks, the keel has partially separated from the boat. She was a 28' S&S built in '61. Teak BWL.
I am now looking at replacement boats and am seeing much larger boats with cedar hulls. Why was it used? cost? What, if any is the downside of Cedar as a hull material for a 30+' sailboat?

(i tried to attach a picture but this teckky stuff is beyond me!)

[skuthorp]

Ouch!!, I am sorry, what a tragic waste. I hope you find another boat soon and that the new year is a happier one boat-wise than the last.

[Yeadon]

wow, I'm so sorry. Must be heartbreaking.

Keep ahold of that jpeg ... someone will be along in a moment, I'm sure, to let you know how to post the photo. I'd love to see the boat, before and after.

[Jaffloat]

http://homepage.mac.com/jaffloat/.cv/jaffloat/Sites/.Public//dulinea%20on%20mooring.jpg-thumb_194_194.jpg

OK the picture of Dulcinea.

[George Schuld]

I'm very sorry to hear about your boat disaster. Quite sad. There are several cedars that are used for boat planking. Red cedar, atlantic white cedar, northern white cedar, and port orford are the most common that come to mind. Here in New Jersey, atlantic white cedar is by far the most common. It is the "local lumber" around here and has great qualities. It is light in weight, very rot resistant, and the planks swell together very tightly if planked well. It is a very soft wood though. Copper rivets are by far the preferred fastener for Atllantic white cedar IMHO for any sizable craft. We have restored several 75+ yr old cedar planked boats and as long as the fasteners were copper rivets, the planks were in excellent condition. Personally it's my favorite planking material. Cedar planking is fairly prone to splitting if the boat is left ashore for to long on stored in too dry a place letting the wood dry out too much. Otherwise, it is good stuff.

Hope this helps,

George

[boylesboats]

Can you take them to the court?
Somebody ought to owe you a boat or a proper repairs

[djn]

What a drag Jaffloat, did they have insurance? Did you? Where do you live? Good luck finding a new boat. Cheers.

[Ian McColgin]

Very thoughtful for a builder to put cedar above the water, where the lightness can matter, and teak below where weight does not matter and resistance to worm does.

I take it that your insurance has the first rights for sueing the yard but even with full settlement you may have further rights, especially if there was negligence in the drop, and/or if the insurance settlement does not reflect the full value of the boat. It is true that the boat is likely totaled as even the wood that does not appear damaged now may be prone to rot in the next year or so due to the crushing damage.

G'luck on your next boat.

[Jaffloat]

I thank you all for your kind words and advice. I live in Northern NJ. The marina has been very nice about it, they have turned it over to their insurance company and hopefully we will come to an amicable settlement.
What I am getting re the Cedar is that it is ok but not the best and to be careful of how it was fastned.
If i see a boat with cedar fastened with S/bronze screws should i walk away from it?

[bob winter]

A real shame, it is a beautiful boat. Is it beyond repair?

[Chan]

S/bronze is an excellent and very common fastener for cedar planking.

[htom]

How horrible!

[Ken Hutchins]

Their insurance is required to "make you whole" replace it with an identicle boat or pay to repair it.
Do not settle for less.

[Paul Stohlman]

Sorry man, what a bummer.

Around these parts, we see Alaska Yellow, Western Red, and Port Orford. They are all great for different reasons. More important would be the care with which the boat was built and maintained.

[George Schuld]

Jaffloat,

Sorry I wasn't very specific about my preference in fasteners. Here's my long version. Silicone screws are very functional fasteners. They hold well and can give a reasonable service life. IMHO, there are a few disadvantages to them though. Silicone bronze screws tend to weaken over time in an underwater enviornment. Typical service life around NJ is 15-25 years. When you have a boat that is from the 1960s or earlier, most likely it was refastened at least twice. It makes a big difference how well the refastenings were done. Unfortunately, many of the "refastening jobs" that I have seen were of the cheap and easy method. Basically people just put new screws next to the old ones and not disturb the old ones. Very fast, simple, and relatively cheap. The problem with this method is that it puts twice as many holes in a plank of soft material and puts twice as many screws onto frames that are usuallly relatively small steam bent oak frames. Doing this makes the chance of splitting the frames greater. Plus leaving the old fasteners, sometimes two or more sets of of fasteners in the plank to continue to deteriorate is not healthy for both the planking and frames. I have been involved with restoration work on dozens of cedar on oak boats, and unfortunately I have rarely found refastenings done correctly.
The ideal refastening of bronze screws IMHO is to carefully remove the current fasteners, and replace them with fresh ones. Well that sounds well and good, but it is never that easy. Usually boat owner waits until their fasteners are totally deteriorated and falling apart before having the job done. If the plugs were put in with paint, varnish, mild glue, they tend to come out relatively easy ...if they havent already popped out that is. If they were put in with epoxy which hold much better, but they will need to be drilled out. Lots of fun. Then the badly deteriorated screws are very weak and are easily broken at the shaft or the heads stripped. Screws also by the nature of the wedge shaped head of them tend to pull through the soft cedar if not put in carefully making them even harder to remove. Not a good deal.
Copper rivets have some nice advantages. Copper deterioration is generally not a problem. I owned a twin engine boat from 1930 with cedar on steam bent oak fastened with copper rivets and both the planking and fasteners were perfect. The only fasteners that needed replacement were the screws in the stem and the screws in the transom (silicon bronze). Copper rivets have wide flat heads and fairly thin shanks. They are typically inserted in predrilled holes and countersinks (in larger boats anyway) and then a "washer" is inserted over the nail, the excess is snipped off, and the remnents if the nail if peened over the washer to functionally create a bolt effect. The wide flat heads on both sides make pulling through either the planking of framing very unlikely. The thinness of the shank causes minimal strength loss to either the plank of frame. All in all good stuff. If I had my pick, I'd choose copper rivets any day.
Because riveting is a more time consuming process to perform when building a boat, you will find that with few exceptions and a copper riveted boat will be a very well built boat of high quality. This is not to say that boats fastened with screws are inferior, not at all. But seeing copper rivets on a boat are as far as I concerned is a good sign.
If you were to find a bronze screwed boat that you are interested in, you will definitely want to find out when the last time it was refastened and how well it was done. If the screws are 20 plus years old and there are quite a few "extra plugs" around the original fastener plugs, expect having a major refastening job to be in your near future. A very qualified boat surveyor specializing in wooden boats would be a valuable asset to you. Many of the surveyors are USELESS when it comes to wooden boats, so please pick carefully.

George

[nedL]

I consider cedar VERY desirable, and definitely consider it a plus (esp. the Jersey white cedar - scarce as hen's teeth now). I grew up on Sandy Hook bay & it's rivers and used to find derelict small boats that had washed up ages ago. The white oak ribs would be completely gone and the jersey white cedar would not have a soft spot anywhere, the stuff is almost rot proof! I'm doing some restoration work with it now, it is so light that you can pick up a 2x10x12' with one hand. It is beautiful to work with and also quite surprisingly tough.

[nedL]

George, I sent you a PM, but I've got to know, what kind of Jersey built boats have you worked on??

[djn]

My boat is 1.75" cedar plank on steam bent oak frames on 9" centers. All the planks are origanal from 1958. I don't know what they are fastened with though.

[Jay Greer]

Carvel planked boats can absorb a lot of abuse and still be repairable. Your experience with the unfortunate yard accident and your "Dulcinea" is truly sad! But, before writing her off, I would think that a competent boat builder might be able to set her straight.
Of the cedars for planking my own favorites are Port Orford and Alaskan Yellow. Eastern White is another choice but is not so easy to obtain on the West Coast. Some builders use Western Red Cedar for
planking small craft and for epoxy saturation construction. Even though Red Cedar is very light, Herreshoff used it for locker doors and other interior components,I would not consider it for planking a larger vessel as it is also quite brittle, easily split and easily dented.
Jay

[Bob Cleek]

I presume you have had the boat surveyed and appraised? Be sure and do that. DO NOT depend on their insurance company's surveyor!!! Go get your own surveyor. (The cost may well be compensable as well.) Get the best WOODEN BOAT surveyor you can find. (Many surveyors don't know squat about wooden boats, although they will tell you otherwise.) Get a really experienced surveyor and a few brokers who specialize in wooden classics to give you valuation appraisals. (Concordia, Cannell, or guys like them back east.)

Expect that the insurance company will tell you your boat was old and decrepit and nobody wants a wooden boat anyway, so it's value is low. Sure, they will be nice as can be until your boat has gone to the landfill and you can't prove her value as easily. (This isn't the yard's fault. Once they make a claim, they have no control over what their insurance company does to you.) Don't cave in to a low-ball offer! They will back down if you show them you have the documentation from experts to the contrary.

BTW, you had a teak bottomed boat. They OWE you for a teak bottomed boat... not one built of less expensive wood. There's nothing wrong with good cedar, but it isn't teak. Each has its advantages. We aren't talking about the best planking material here, we're talking about the value of the boat. Once they pay off, you can buy whatever you want. Until then, demand they pay for the best, which is what you had. At $16-18 a bf for teak and maybe $5-6 for cedar, it is going to make a big difference, or should.

[jerry bark]

I agree with bob cleek, hire a surveyor now. If i needed a wooden boat surveyor for this kind of thing i would call some of the big wooden boat brokers on the east coast and get them to tell you who they use. Then fly him, or her, in.

do not allow the boat to be moved until you have signed over the title, and don't sign it over until you are square. they will have to pay for storage as well until the claim is settled.

do not hesitate to let them talk to your attorney, or tosuggest that they might need to.

also, if they start telling you that you have to settle within such and such time call your attorney and let him talk to them. they want you to settle for the least you will accept, which is fine really, as long as you know what the correct amount least should be.

good luck,
jerry

[nedL]

I need to add that I don't in any way mean to imply that cedar is superior to teak for planking (esp for a bottom). I meant from a 'local' wood perspective it is good.