Complete Bottom Repair on Sagacity

[Patrick]

I purchased a 1997 CP27/2 #169 Sagacity (Formerly Steadfast) two years ago and have enjoyed her immensely ever since.  This winter, instead of keeping her in the water or in storage, we decided to fix her peeling bottom paint and get a bottom job done.  This thread is to share the pics and progress of the rebuild of the bottom of CP27 #169.

The Problem
I knew at pre-purchase survey time that she had more issues (blisters) with the bottom than the seller, broker, and surveyor had led on.  As a racer, I have a very keen eye for smooth lines and these pics showed me the issue.





Fast forward two years, it was time to address the problem.

Offload the trailer



Sandblast
The yard hired in a sandblaster who cleaned off the bottom paint revealing the more of the damaging blisters.  End result?  We should have removed the gelcoat and skipped sandblasting...





Remove Gelcoat
So there is a really cool $3k tool that removes gelcoat quickly and cleanly.  I've got a video of it being done but I can't load those up here.







Moisture Readings
Once the gelcoat was removed, the boat was tested for moisture.  Anything below 4 is good.  There are some really high numbers that correspond with visible areas of fiberglass damage.







Bad Keel
The keel is the worst.  The video here highlights the severity of the issue.





The rudder is now on order as it is too expensive to repair, completely waterlogged, misshapen and probably 50 lbs heavier than it should be.

More to come....

[Tim Gardner]

Cool Pics, Patrick!  Upload the video to Photobucket and send us the link.  I think I've  seen a paint stripping tool that looks like a hand held power plane used for this need.

TG

[relamb]

Don't know if this is the tool used, but I expect that it was something similar.  Wow it cuts quickly!  There are some videos at the bottom of the page.
I have a house built in 1888, it would almost be worth it to get one of these to strip the old housepaint!
http://paintshaver.com/marineshaver-pro/

[Patrick]

Don't know if this is the tool used, but I expect that it was something similar.  Wow it cuts quickly!  There are some videos at the bottom of the page.
I have a house built in 1888, it would almost be worth it to get one of these to strip the old housepaint!
http://paintshaver.com/marineshaver-pro/

This is the tool that was used - GelPlane Pro

[deisher6]

Hey Patrick;
Thanks for the photo's, information, and taking the time to blog them.  Looking forward to the rest of the story. 

Hardly ever hear 'racing' and ComPac 27 used together in any context!

regards charlie