Archives for May 2011
Adding a seahood to my Pearson 28
13 May 2011 | Pearson 28-1 Restoration, Sailing | 2 Responses
While working on the chainplates, cabin top handles and traveler I also constructed a seahood for the sailboat. Some folks call this thing a turtle and maybe it has other names as well? On my boat it will serve a few purposes. It will help keep water from working its way into the cabin through the companionway hatch, it provides a mounting point for a small solar panel that I wanted to find room for and perhaps most importantly it will make it possible for me to install a water tight dodger on the boat whenever time allows.
In building my seahood I closely followed the project documented by David Brown here. I only had to make a few changes to adapt the seahood to the way it mounted to my boat. One change was that I built the seahood so that it retained the aluminum strips that Pearson installed originally. These strips will keep the sliding hatch from exposing the wood in the seahood which would allow for rot in the long-run. I also embedded nuts into the seahood so that I could through-bolt it from inside the cabin. I also added too much fiberglass to the seahood but at least it won’t crack or budge if an elephant wanders onto it..
Construction started with the woodwork:
Then I added plenty of fiberglass roving, mat, biax and cloth:
When I was tired of trying to fair out my glassing mistakes I added plenty of coats of paint:
I have a small solar panel that is primarily for keeping the batteries topped up while I restore the boat. It will similarly be handy for periods when the boat is stored and should enable me to take the larger panels down to avoid theft or storm damage etc. I set the panel up so that it pivots on the sides since the boom/mast will prevent it from charging well in a horizontal position. I also raised it up a little to keep it cool and so that my will feet fit under it when I am doing things like flaking down the main.
With the seahood painted I could finally install it and get it out of the cabin so that I could work on other projects. It was also nice to have the little panel off of the stern rail so that I could pull all of the transom hardware for rebedding, though that is for another post.
Traveler Repair
12 May 2011 | Pearson 28-1 Restoration, Sailing | No Responses
When I first acquired the Pearson sailboat that I am restoring it’s broken traveler seemed like one of the larger problems on the boat. Maybe it seemed like an important problem because it prevented the proper use of the mainsail on what I imagined to be a boat that was in decent condition. After all, the boat had just sailed down to Beaufort NC from the Chesapeake Bay, on the outside (in the Atlantic). The sense of how important the traveler problem was and how expensive it would be to fix gives me a decent indication of how little I understood the condition of this boat and what it would take to restore it. Unfortunately I was blind to the largest and most expensive problems that this boat had.
Fortunately restoring the traveler was easy, affordable and satisfying. I was able to source a new Kenyon I-Beam track from Rig-Rite. A local aluminum fabricator at Jarrett Bay was able to re-weld the broken base and the remaining cleanup, install and sealing was nothing new for me. A little epoxy in the enlarged holes, some drilling and sealing with Butyl, and of course sanding and cleaning and the traveler was back on the boat and ready for lines.
At the same time I replaced the cabin top handles which took more work and was close in cost to repairing the traveler. I also pulled and inspected the chainplates before reinstalling and resealing them thoroughly (with epoxy and butyl, my favorite sealing combination).
2011 Spring Boatyard Life
12 May 2011 | Coastal Living, Sailing | No Responses
It’s been a great Spring here at Bock Marine. Most of my time has been spent working on my Pearson 28-1 but I’ve also enjoyed visiting with friends, the occasional bike ride and a little time on the water. Here are a few photos from a sailing trip on Ciganka, a steel Ketch that spends most of it’s time in the Bahamas. You can also see Peter Hampton, who came down from Toronto, as he shapes a piece of steel that we used to extract the through-hulls on my boat. Finally there is a photo of the crane that fell off of its sinking barge and into the ICW channel shortly after I arrived in March. Deconstruction and extraction of the crane and barge turned into a long undertaking and was interesting to observe.
