Log of Alberg 30 #262 on 14 March 2019

The bilge problem may be a characteristic of Alberg 30's. Blue Teal #284 had the same problem which was addressed by Tim Lackey by putting the sepearated piece back in place and covering it all with a layer of glass. See the start and finish of work done on Blue Teal #284.

• Applied first coat of Awlwood to the companionway hatch, lower companionway board, forward hatch, icebox hatch, spinnaker block pads, and fuel fill pad ... one and one-half hours.
• Drove to Smith's Marina arriving at 2PM and working till 5PM.
  • Sanded the underside of the aft deck where the aft mooring cleats are bolted to the deck.
  • Sanded and acetone'd the bilge to the extent that I could reach. Bilge is very deep. Hard to sand much of the flats. Sanding the side walls was much easier.
  • Cleaned the same area with acetone.
  • Cut 4" x 4" backing plates from Current Composites from 1/4" thick G10 fiberglass. Easily done using a Bosch diamond grit jigsaw blade.
  • Drilled two holes, catty corner from each other, in the backing plates and ran string through the holes.
  • Mixed a thick mixture of West System 105, 205, and collodial silica to bind the backing plates to the underside of the deck.
  • After spreading a layer of epoxy on the back plates, pulled them hard against the underside of the deck with the string and tied off the string to maintain the position of the plates. In doing so, thickened epoxy oozed strongly through the four holes in the deck that are used to bolt the aft mooring cleats to the deck.
  • Removed the oozed epoxy from the top surface of the deck.
  • Smoothed out the underdeck squeezed out thickened epoxy to form a fillet between the underside of the deck and the backing plates.
  • Two hours elasped time at this point.
  • Installed epoxy and fiberglass covered 1/4" plywood insert in the sump area of the bilge.
  • Cut three pieces of VectorPly 1708 to close off the sump in the bilge. One 12" x 12" piece to form the bottom of the sump and run up the sides of the bilge. One 6" x 9" piece to cover the forward end of the bilge, forward of the sump. One 24" long trapizoidal shape to run from the flat area aft of the sump, down into the sump, along the bottom, and up onto the flat forward.
  • Test fit the pieces.