Got into the hull this weekend… Being a one-time hurricane write-off, i knew there were repairs to be checked out. After sounding the hull with a hammer, it looked like there was only one area that was showing any cause for concern. The whole bottom had been barrier-coated and bottom-painted, but on the starboard side of the deadwood some of the bottom paint was looking a little crackly, so i suited up and ground off all the paint with a 40-grit softpad.
Having done this on cars and boats before, i wasn’t too shocked to see the usual multi-coloured patchwork of fillers, fairing compound, and patches. After all the paint was off, i dug further with a chisel, chipping off any areas of filler that looked at all loose. There are plenty of dents that were filled, and my impression is that a few were not sanded or prepped well enough before being filled/faired. There are only a handful of spots where damage actually got into the core; the core in these areas was repaired well enough, but the fill and fibreglass mish-mash they used to fair out the damaged outer skin in these ares was too dry. i think this must have been from a single batch of poorly-mixed epoxy; the questionable area covers about one batch’s worth of goop.
The dents can just be froperly faired; the skin is still intact, and the underlaying core foam is solid with no signs of delamination. The fill areas over the patched holes will need amore serious treatment: i’ll grind them back a little more, tapering them into the surrounding skin, then apply a few layers of ‘glass patches to assure outer skin integrity.