Does anyone have any experience in repairing a hole in the deck of the whole be 18? Last year a tree branch fell on the deck of my Hobie and put a hole in the outer layer of fiberglass. I didn't have time to repair it at the time, so I put tape over the crack to keep water out. Today I started sanding down the deck to make the fiberglass repair, but when I got the outer layer tapered down, I noticed that it was detached from the foam about and inch in both directions. I cut out the detached portion with a knife and tapered the remaining fiberglass so I can layer in the new pieces. However, the old polyester resin is crumbling around the edges, and I've noticed that the foam is fairly damp. I don't think I have much hope that all of bonding the new polyester and glass to the foam core, and I'm not sure how large the "wet spot" in the foam core is, nor do I want to tear open my whole deck. The damaged spot on the deck was soft about an inch or two away from the foam in each direction, but then it seemed to stiffen up. The damaged area is right alongside a dagger board trunk, so I'm not too worried about the stiffness of the deck in this area, although I am worried about this moisture causing delamination throughout the deck. Has anyone run into this before? Any suggestions on how best to repair it? Right now I'm thinking of trying to drive the foam out with a hairdryer, and then use CSM and a liberal amount of polyester resin to try and fill and or attach the top layer of fiberglass.
Edited to fix some typos by my phone's autocorrect, sorry for any confusion.
_________________ Mike '79 H18 standard ' Rocketman II' sail #14921 RIP '78 H18 ( unnamed) sail #14921'08 H16 sail #114312'97 H21SC sail #238
Last edited by SabresfortheCup on Sat May 13, 2017 8:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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