Keel REFIT finished & Holiday Preps
Probably one of the most important things of a sailng yacht is the keel and the yard in fact managed to do all the required repairs to the hull and the keel just in time and – also very important – to put this fine piece of lead ballast back in place – fastened with some brand new keel bolts. Good job by the yard! It not only looks great, but also gives a lot of confidence for the years to come. The last time the keel came off was 1996 and we purchased Rolling Stone in 2003, so we had absolutely no idea about the conditions especially of the bolts and the wooden structure 30 years later. It turned out, that keel, bolts and the wood were in a very fair condition (see 2023 for more details). As the keel issue and everything connected with it was the job of the yard our part was limited to prepare Rolling Stone for the upcoming sailing season, which was planned to start mid of June. Frank and I met at the end of May at the shipyard to do all the required preparations. As the yard had removed the glass fibre around the keel area, we had to re-apply a new watertight barrier (once again glass fibre in epoxy resin). Also we had to apply new anti-fouling paint to the whole underwater hull and last but not least the ship had to be cleaned from head to toe after 2 years ashore and a lot of dusty work. Of course, and as always, it turned out that it was by far more work than initially thought, due to a “little” surprise.
Also we had left 2 big holes in the transom, where once the „pipe containers“ for the MOB poles were located. We had to remove them to be able to mount the new toe rails. We then made the decision to remove the starboard pipe permanently and to shorten the second one and go for an inflatable buoy in the future. This is because the existing rigid poles have a length of approx. 4 m (!) and the “container pipes” cost considerable space under deck. Also the poles are missing a MOB light, so they won’t really work at night. However, this meant that we had to close one hole completely and to adequately set in the shortened pipe and make everything look fine again. I have to admit that it was more or less a quick & dirty repair for the next 2-3 seasons and in this respect it looks quite good.
Surprise, Surprise,..
During assembly of the keel bolts the yard “suddenly” recognized that they had to remove the support of the sink, to properly fasten the nuts of the keel bolts. This wooden construction had unfortunately suffered a lot from 50 years of humidity and a non-destructive disassembly was simply not possible. In fact, most of the brass screws and nails (!) were totally rotten and the wood in no better condition but see for yourself. So, they just ripped it off, which of course was the only way. However, we had to build a new support. Altogether we spend 3-4 working days to organize adequate material (teak wood), design a detachable support and to rebuild this part. Also, we took the opportunity to re-fit the whole area under the sink and put it back in shape.
