Venture of Newport repairs

Well, it has been a few days since I have done any updates for the sailboat.  I've actually been sort of busy with it, so lets get started.

When I had bought the boat, I noticed the bow eye was loose, upon further inspection from the inside I noticed that the wood backing plate had all but disintegrated and the bolts on the bow eye were actually right against the hull.

Here it is from the inside, there was no wood at all left. Thankfully, the bolts had not worn their way through the bow of the boat itself.  I had a ton of suggestions, from replacing the wood backing plate, to just installing an aluminum pipe - which was a good idea.

The problem is, I didn't have much room to work with.  that little hole in the front would barely let me get my arm in.  I tried to dremel out the old fiberglass that had at one time covered the wood plate, but even with the extension tool I couldn't angle it right.  I even used a drill, to try to drill out the old fiberglass and that didn't get me anywhere.

So instead of removing the old fiberglass shell, I just filled it up with Bondo hair.. Well first, I cut a small piece of aluminum, and drilled a couple of holes in it so the bow eye could fit through.  While the Bondo was still curing I tightened everything up.  This should hold pretty well.  It is messy looking though, not something I am incredibly proud of.  Reaching in there was a real PITA though, and I didn't have very much time to make it all look pretty.

And there it is, much tighter now, I can't move it at all.  I have to wash off the remnants of tape that I had used to keep it in place though.

For some reason, the original owner had cut this hole the boat.  I still had the original piece, so it was an easy fix.

I just used a bit of tape, and a 2x4 to support it in place.  Then from below I fiberglassed the original piece back in.

Fiberglassed in.

A little messy, but here it is.  The hardest part was stripping away the old paint.

My rudder needed some work as well, the wood support had rotted out a bit.

I scrapped out most of the rotten wood with a butter knife, this is just a picture of while I was working away at it.  Strangely, and thankfully the wood portion that had rotted away was only about an inch deep.. then it hits another piece of wood, that was in excellent shape.

A little bondo hair, to replace the old wood that had rotted out.  It dried really fast, I would have liked to shape it a bit better than this.  It's okay, I'll just sand away the excess later on.

While I was doing the rudder, my wife bought a Kodak Play Sport for $25 at office depot.  So, here is my first attempt at a video.  Please don't mind my messy garage.