OLD Catboat.

[brdsquib]

As some of you may know, I am working on an old Crosby D-Class Cat. These are the old racing cats that used to compete up in Quincy. She is the last of her kind. I will post some pictures shortly. She's currently 107 years old. The last fella that owned her was not well-versed in how to maintain a wooden boat. I am removing planks and replacing ribs on top of other problems. The new owners want her back to original condition. It's going to take a while. My biggest problem is the epoxy in this boat. Now epoxy is a great thing when it's used in the right method. However, it was not used so in this boat. She sat out of the water for 3 years and dried out considerably. When the fella wanted to put her back in the water, he filled the now larger seams with epoxy. (complete facepalm moment here) So as you might expect, when the boat got put back in the water, there was no where for the swelled up board to go but out. And out they went. I have many planks that are now cupping as a result. All of the seams on the boat are packed like this. The topsides aren't cupping very badly, but the bottom is. I have never dealt with something like this and I am hoping putting this on here I might get someone who has experience with this to clue me in as to how one might deal with this. Do I run a saw through the seams to give the planks somewhere to go or is there something else?

[brdsquib]

Here's my link to Marvel's album!
http://s844.photobucket.com/albums/a...aphius/Marvel/

[Ian McColgin]

Eeegads. Any reason to think the planks will uncup once the stress is off? Or does this job really involve replacing the bottom?

[Thad]

To Ian's question I'd say "yes", but I wonder what the fasteners are, related to plank and timber condition. Sweet shape and a grand sailor though I think CC Hanleys beat Crosbys in their racing days, none of the former exist (as far as I know) so not to worry.

[Ian McColgin]

Those old Crosby's leave Marmalade in the dust. But Marmalade is prettier.

Pease got a 100 year old back happy last year and I think she's due to the Mystic CBA 50th anniversary extravaganza this July.

[brdsquib]

Marvel was refastened and partially re-ribbed back in the 60 and 70s. She now has mostly bronze fasteners with stainless in the butt-blocks. I say partially re-ribbed because from the cabin/cockpit wall forward she has new ribs. Aft is another story. The ribs next to the wall are just about completely rotted away. The rest of them were sistered with ribs that extend to plank 5 and then have knees that attach to the original rib to make the rest of the journey to the deck. At some point I will be pulling the existing deck off and replacing it as the previous owner used a hard brush and removed all the soft wood. The cockpit will likely have to come out to redo the ribs underneath it. I plan on making some laminated ribs to replace the ones that are toast.

As far as the planks go. I think that relieving that pressure might make the planks want to go back to their original shape. They're not extremely cupped, but it's enough to notice it when you look down the side of the boat. We're getting some cedar planks made up for her, but I never though about the cupped planks not going back to their original shape. Something to think about, eh?

[brdsquib]

I'm not worried about any CC Hanley's. I don't think any other cat's will be able to beat something with this sail area. If I understand it right, this boat was designed to crush any competition. I mean, it must look something like Herreshoff's Reliance when under sail.

[Thad]

Wetting will do much for the planks. Thanks for the answer and the project!

[brdsquib]

Wetting?

[Ian McColgin]

Anyway, how to get the epoxy out? If the seams are still V shaped, it could be worth lot's of patient time fine chiseling along the upper and lower edges of each seam and cracking it out. But it's more likely that the seams are really ruined and that in the end you'll be forced to some sort of spline system anyway. If that's the case, it might make sense to go through the tedium of setting up a guide one seam at a time and using a router to take out all the epoxy and some wood.

G'luck

[Thad]

Wetting=putting her in the water. With old planking (I see you have some missing) it is sometimes advisable to put her in for a few days (awash -- different woods take different times to swell) before caulking, so the seams and shapes are as they will be in use.

[Larks]

Have you tried a heat gun on the epoxy in the seams? You may find a bit of heat and a hooked scraper will clean them out without damaging the plank edges if they are still V'd as Ian questioned. I'll be interested to know how you go with the cupping though, soaking her in a bath for a couple of weeks and then refastening perhaps? Though that will no doubt also depend on what shape the rest of her ribs are in. How many are you replacing?

[johnw]

Have you thought of taking the lines off?

[wizbang 13]

Back to original condition for a 107 year old race boat is a new boat. Thousands of hours from now, you may still have a sistered,re fastened, re caulked, cobbled together,(I said MAY)old race boat.
But to get this boat going, I would strip plank her. From the bottom up.

[brdsquib]

So much to reply to!

Thad- I haven't tried wetting her, although she's been out of the water now for just over 3 weeks. The owners don't want to keep her out too long. Although I think she's gonna be sitting on stands and blocks for a little bit. I'll keep that in mind though.

Ian- I have been thinking about using my new Dremel Trio on her but I'm hesitant to use any kind of bit with a blade. One plank edge would come out great, the other would likely have some tear out. The other option for router/dremel would be to use the cone sander bit. I'd probably go through a ton of them though and it'd take me forever. Though that could very well be what it's going to take.

Larks- I hadn't thought of using heat on the epoxy. I'm only hesitant if it'd work where the epoxy is decades old. Wouldn't hurt to try it though. It's gonna be tough to soak her in a bath though given her size and the lack of resources I have available to me. And as for ribs, I think we're looking at replacing about 6 ribs. The ones at the wall are going to be a complete b*tch. It very well may come down to pulling the cockpit out to install them (which wouldn't be the worst thing in the world as it is close to needing replacing anyways).

johnw- Taking the lines would be a great solution. I don't think it's in the budget though.

wizbang 13- I understand what you're saying. It would be great to completely replank her. It would save a lot of headaches and would make any future repairs so much easier. There are a lot of things on this boat that I wish I could do the right way. For instance, the keel. The wood around the propeller shaft (there was no engine originally) is likely bad wood and should be replaced to do it the right way. However, the owners don't want to tear the boat up to replace that. Instead we're drying the hole out and going to fill it with a hose or pipe for the shaft to ride in and fill around that. Quite honestly, there are a lot of headaches in this boat. I just don't have the green light to fix it all the right way.

[Ian McColgin]

With any power tool for reefing seams in place - applies to saws and routers - the various guides that try to take the line from what you've already cut and advance with the tool do not work well. If you want straight seams, you must tack a batten to the hull for each seam. Huge pain. But actually less total work than all the other more messy methods. An entertaining example of the phrase I learned from my Dad, applies to rounding up livestock, especially horses but really all types - "The long way out is the short way home."

[brdsquib]

Hey Ian, You looking for a deckhand for your trip to Pease?

[Ben Fuller]

Slickest system for dealing with seams that needed to be cleaned out was a light battery panel saw run against a batten. The German who showed me this was splining tight seamed boats, Sonders I think they were. He had some blades made up to the precise shape of the spline. Having recently cleaned deck seams back to bright wood, some of the fein tool devices are pretty handy. But then you'd be into splines. Most useful was the triangular carbide abrasive blade which was long enough not to cause problems. Most of the people who do this kind of a thing for a living recommended a router with some guides and a small plate run against a batten.

[brdsquib]

I have a new router that I got for Christmas that has a table on it. I think I am going to use this and lay a batten along side each seam for my table to run against. I just need to figure out what bit will work best I think.

[catboatsteve]

Hi, We did this in Penn. back in the 80's ,used a router to clean up edges and glued new splines. A heat gun is slow but precise and leaves the edges in tack. Routers and saws sometimes cause tearout.

[brdsquib]

Great. I'll give that a try. And that's exactly what I was afraid of with a router or saw. Hopefully it'll work on this nasty old epoxy!

[Ian McColgin]

So long as you've a guide batten, I don't think you'll have a tear-out problem but all that epoxy might indeed make a problem. So do both. Use heat and ease the epoxy out. You'll still likely need to router the seams to get an even slot for the splines to fit, but that should have no real risk of tear-out.

A nice circular saw with a big kerf or perhaps a dado blade might make the job in one go since it could essentially straddle the epoxy and not be subject to being pushed around by it.

G'luck

[tigerregis]

This is the kind of thread that makes this site so bloody good to a very minor player like me. Thanks.

[brdsquib]

Glad you enjoy it! Happy to keep people interested in this art!