My boat developed a touch of smile on the port side of the keel, along with a bit of a crack near its aft edge. The crack very slowly leaked antifreeze from the bilge when on the hard.
So I opened it up and I found what might be a manufacturing defect. The crack was into a porous resin-starved part of the skin, admitting water into the aft portion of the keel stub, which seems to be an enclosed box filled with blue stuff. The blue stuff was cracked and soggy. (I’m presuming the blue stuff is polyester resin with filler.) See pics for the exciting details: https://www.icloud.com/sharedalbum/#B0h532ODWJEHCio I’m trying to figure out the best repair plan. Do I: 1. Just build up patches over what is currently there without worrying about the internal structure too much? 2. Remove all the filler, find water route between box and sump and seal it, tab in and build up structural reinforcement, and then patch over all that? 3. Something in between those options? Even more confusing is that my boat is not constructed as drawn in the manual. It looks like someone (factory? an engineering revision?) expanded the box forward, engulfing what looks like part of the aft sump divider. The good news is that the keel bolts all look great, there’s no leaks I can detect along the joint except at the aft end, via that box of cracked blue whatever it is. - Tracy (I hope this doesn’t come through twice… I accidentally submitted it from the wrong email address the first time.)
