I have a few cracks in the boat, some of them probably happened during transport. I'm not sure how to go about fixing them. The worst problem is the crack inside the daggerboard hole. I have checked for leaks with soap and airpressure inside the hull and there are lots of bubbles from the crack in the daggerboardhole and from the largest crack in the hull.

It would be of great help to have some pictures and maybe a video of a similar repairjob.


This crack is not leaking, but the fiberglass is flexing underneath.

This crack is leaking alot and about 25cm long. It is possible to push through the fiberglass.

Leaking crack inside daggerboard hole.

Probably just a gelcoat scratch, the fiberglass looks intact.

Contact Steathmarine for advices.
Actually I have seen worse. Most likely you have to cut an access port in the hull to do the repair. If you have expierence with fibre class repair, you can do it by yourself. If not take the advice from someone with that expierence who lives nearby, better not from the internet... Where are you living?
Good luck.

Cheers,

Klaus

Here is a nice serie of pics how someone opened his hull to do lamination job from inside:

http://themanshed.net/photo-gallery/?g2_itemId=24&g2_page=2

I'm not sure but isn't that guy a member here?

On the hull there are two layers of fiberglass/epoxy sandwiching some foam.

You have to repair the two layers and replace the foam. Start by sanding the outer layer, remove the broken foam and repair the inside layer. You will have to remove quite a bit of material to give you enough access. Once the inside skin is repaired replace the foam with a mix epoxy/light filler and then rebuild the outside layer.

Finish up by spraying gel coat. And sanding. And more sanding.

Don't ask me how I know

As for the inside of the daggerboard case I suspect it is a single layer of fiberglass. You problem there is access. I've heard some stories of fixing such a problem by creating a small vacuum in the hull and dripping epoxy so it is sucked into the crack, hopefully sealing it. Probably worth a shot.

There was quite an extensive write up on repairing a Stealh, I think it belonged to Davefarmer a frequent writer on this forum.

The dagger board case is the hardest repair of all and the quickest way of repairing these is to remove it completely from the hull and replace with a new one, no matter which way you seem to attempt a repair it will create a problem like not allowing the board to slot in. Stealth marine will sell you a dagger board case and its a simple matter of delaminating the original from its hard points in the hull and bonding the new one in ( making sure you expand the new one with a taped board in place ).

Look in the composite aircraft forums for tips on repair like putting in backers, using adjacent or the opposite hull for formers and chamfering the edges at 40:1 etc.

By any chance was it trailered on a conventional trailer with rollers on rather than carpeted cradles,I have seen similar damage to a Stealth by the hard rollers localising the load to much over rough roads, the rollers eventually completely punctured the hulls.
Best of luck

I am the other owner of this boat.



Guess you are right. We put in pillows to cushion it though.


We have now sanded down to the inner layer of fiberglass, and discovered the crack goes all the way through and has turned 90 degrees on the outer crack. Is it possible to fix it from the outside or is an inspectionhole necessary.

It is hard to judge this by pictures only. If it is not too big and the curvature not too strong, you can choose the approach in the attached picture.
You may need the opening for the dagger board case. But as suggested in the other post, thaer may be different approaches. Hence I think, that an email with pictures to Stealthmarine would give you the better advices.

Cheers,

Klaus

Hei hei Andlier and Sindrulf,

listen: You never sand alone ;-)

See my boat after a visit to the nice Texel Island in the North Sea some days ago:



I'm going to finish it next week hopefully. Good luck to you.

Hadet Bra, Uli

Wayne's got a great memory! I tore up a daggerbd well, and the transoms too. I got pics if you want, but it seems to me that you're getting some pretty good input here.

Dave

Thanks for all the input! We're finally on the water again after a lot of sanding, fiberglassing, epoxy, and painting. Ended up repainting the whole bottom of both hulls with two-part polyurethane paint after fiberglassing the damaged areas, the poly should be stronger and more resilient compared to gelcoat.

The sad part of the story is that we still have a leak-problem. Been on the water a couple of times, it's not as bad as before, but a couple of liters of water inside the hull after an hour or so. Really annoying problem, think we need to bring soap and blower to the beach to check for cracks again. I suspect the daggerboard case, this is the only part not painted with polyurethane. We only epoxied the cracks many times and crossed our fingers. Daggerboard fit is tighter, but still easy to get in and out, should be possible to epoxy some more.

From experiance if the bottom of the dagger board case has been broken, then almost certainly the top of the case at the front will also be damaged, the water seems to be forced up the case and any leaks at the top will also allow water to enter. As stated before, its sometimes easier to simply replace the whole case.

Be careful on pressurising the hulls and testing, a very little pressure is a huge force and one needs to be careful not to split the hulls whilst under pressure.

A lot of the Stealth owners have also drilled a small 2 - 3 mm hole through the top pintle and through the hull to prevent a vacumn being formed when the hot air in the hull from sitting in sunlight, is then cooled by immersing it in cold water. The vacumn then pulls in water even through the smallest of pin holes.