1972 E27-Fixing Everything

[sastanley]

Cajun, in tearing apart at various times my own pulpits and stanchions, I have found that it is generally stainless screws and nuts, but I have on occasion found aluminum backing plates, that are sometimes threaded, instead of nuts/washers, most notably, on the stern pulpit of my Catalina. I've been able to remove and re-bed every one so far, but sometimes you need to squirt a good penetrate and let it sit...especially on those dissimilar metal bonds (SS bolt/screw into a aluminum threaded plate).

Also, almost every bolt was chopped off (with a hacksaw??), so the threads are buggered on the end and you need a wrench to get them off...or...if you don't have a helper, I clamp a pair of vice grips onto the nut, and then duct tape it to the underside of the deck so it hopefully doesn't crash into the boat when I get the bolt/screw out.

[ndutton]

. . . . . or they bolted all the deck hardware on before joining the hull and deck

100% of the builders I worked for installed all the deck hardware prior to mating the hull and deck.
edit:
And 100% of the hardware was thru-bolted.

[toddster]

100% of the builders I worked for installed all the deck hardware prior to mating the hull and deck.
edit:
And 100% of the hardware was thru-bolted.

So you're saying I should give up on finding the trained monkey?

That reminds me of the exception that proves the rule. Or something. Ericson seems to have installed the hatches, both forward and companionway,with wood screws set into the upper deck skin. Albeit fairly thick portions of it. The connection was getting a bit brittle after 47 years. Replacing those with through-bolts required drilling a lot of access hole in the liner which then had to be plugged or covered with trim.

[sastanley]

Replacing those with through-bolts required drilling a lot of access hole in the liner which then had to be plugged or covered with trim.

Those cabin liners are a blessing and a curse aren't they?

[CajunSpike]

Found a pic of the rail attachments in one of my videos.
Anybody want to place a bet if its straight into the glass or bolted?



Going to try to find out tomorrow.

[ndutton]

Put me down for thru-bolts. If Ericson cheesed out like they did on my pal's engine stringers (see Build Quality thread in the off topic section) you may have machine screws tapped into an aluminum plate in the deck laminate. I'm really doubting it though.

If it's done right, it'll be thru-bolted with a stainless backing plate. Knowing Ericson I'll slightly modify my bet to thru-bolts with fender washers, split locks, and regular hex nuts, all ¼-20.

One other thing I see in your picture is absent fastening slot alignment. Back in the day all we used were slotted fasteners and every piece of deck hardware I installed had the slots aligned to the hardware, a First Yacht Quality touch. Linear gear like tracks had the slots aligned with the long dimension, rectangular gear had the slots aligned with the nearest edge, for round gear such as your rail mounting feet the slots were aligned to the tangent of the nearest edge. It's a minor thing and adds nothing for strength but an experienced eye notices it.

[toddster]

Through-bolted with 1/2" or 3/8" washers. BTDT.

When i tried to install backing plates in some of those places, I ran into the problem that the underside is curved - e.g. the outer bolts actually come through a fillet at the edge of the deck, so there is no flat surface for a backing plate to bear on. I punted and at least stuck some fender washers in, where they would fit. Maybe a backing plate could be installed with a heaping pile of thickened epoxy filler?

[CajunSpike]

And the answer is:
1 and 1/4" stainless bolts with a flat head, 7/16 stainless nuts and regular steel flat washers. Two of the legs were accessible by removing ventilation hoods, on the back edge of the transom. Another leg could be gotten to by sliding into the rear berth. There was a precut hole in the inner lining, giving access to the nuts.
The last leg was accessible thru the cockpit storage locker. Was able to get all the nuts off except one.
The storage locker leg had 1 bolt where the slot was not square. Could not hold backup to get the nut off since the nut on that particular bolt was stuck. Could not grab the bolt top with a vise grip either. Probably going back tomorrow and cut the bolt head with a dremel to get it off.

Did take the boat out for a couple hours but the wind direction and speed led to a lot of unpleasant hobby horsing. There was enough bouncing to make the drawers fall/pop out of the cabinetry and hit the deck.

Tangled the furler rope when replacing it so when I tried to pull out that sail, it got hung up.

Main halyard also got stuck 1/2 way up. Had to drop main, untangle it, and go up again.

[Administrator]

A marine tech friend told me that you could get a rough sense of the age of a boat by looking to see whether Phillips head screws had been used in the deck hardware.

The slot alignment on my own boat is as per Neil's comments in an earlier post.

Bill

[CajunSpike]

Just when I was about to give up, since the remaining nuts/bolts would just spin with 1 person, somebody friendly appeared out of nowhere and offered to help. I must be living right.

Got the last three bolts off with his assistance.

When lifting the rail off the boat, one of the broken legs came off in my hand. I just broke off the opposite end to make it easy to load into the car.

Got it home now. Also found one of the other legs has a cracked weld on the hull end. This thing must have taken a pretty big hit at some point.

[ndutton]

A marine tech friend told me that you could get a rough sense of the age of a boat by looking to see whether Phillips head screws had been used in the deck hardware.

The slot alignment on my own boat is as per Neil's comments in an earlier post.

Bill

Your friend is absolutely correct. During my tenure in the industry which pretty much covered the 70's I never even saw a Phillips head fastener. Our screw guns had driver bits with collars to keep the screw heads centered.

[JOHN COOKSON]

Bill or Neil

Maybe I'm missing something here.......
How can you be assured that the holes in the rail mounting feet will line up with the existing holes in the boat after the rail is welded in a shop? Especially since the pieces are loose now.

TRUE GRIT

[ndutton]

A welding jig can be easily fabricated to hold everything in alignment. Off the deck measure the distance of the three holes for each leg from the outboard mounting hole of the transom leg, also the distance between corresponding mounting holes for all four legs. Lay out the dimensions on a sheet of plywood and screw all the pieces where they belong before welding it back together. Not only will this align the rotation of the foot pads but also the dimension between the broken legs. The pads will probably need to be shimmed on the jig to allow for deck camber.

[CajunSpike]

Awesome idea Neal.

I was thinking, if you put a correct sized rod inside the rail, at the broken joint, this will force the pieces into their pre-break position and alignment. After that its only the leg in/out position to get right.

The machine shop I use has been open for ages and is owned by an old time guy. He knows lots of tricks.

I love to hear all ya'll thoughts and experiences on stuff like this, in any case.

[ndutton]

Welding tends to shrink, deform and deflect the project so holding the feet in alignment pays off during installation.