On Board with Mark Corke

PYI Mini Floor anchors

  I wrote some time back about PYI anchors and indeed installed some on my own boat to hold the cabin sole in position so was excited to learn that my good friends at PYI have come out with a new product called the mini anchor which is aimed primarily at the OEM market. The basic principles are the same as the original product but instead of having the bayonet style latch the smaller anchors screw together and need to be undone with a screw driver rather then using a quarter dollar coin as it is possible to do with the larger versions.

 

As I was unfamiliar with the new anchors I thought it best to have a trial run so that next time when I want to use them I have the confidence to install them without fear of messing things up. You don't need a lot of tools but you do need to be careful in your marking out or the parts won't line up and the results could be disappointing this could be especially frustrating if you are using them on expensive teak and holly sole plywood.

 

The anchor consists of three parts The screw part that is held in place in the sole or other panel and actually screws into the bottom half, that,s the larger of the two bits that you can see in the picture and finally the flat locking nut that you only need if you attach the female part to something like an aluminum floor member. Lastly the other bit is the tool that you need to screw the female part into the boat. As this was a trial run I was able to do this at the work bench and therefore use a pillar drill. A hand held electric or rechargeable drill work just as well but be sure to keep in perpendicular to the surface.

 

The next step is to mark out where you want the anchors to be placed. This is definitely one of those time that you should check twice and drill once. Aim not only for a neat appearance but try to ensure that you will not be placing the anchors too close to an edge or worse still be drilling into a cable or pipe hidden from view. This was just a trial for me so I did not have any of those worries, but be neat. Mark the drilling centers with a crisp pencil mark, if installing into a pre finished cabin sole then I would have stuck a piece of masking tape down and made a mark on that.

 

The male part of the anchor is retained within a sunk cup and this needs to be a good fit as the anchor is simply a push fit. A 9/16^th bit is exactly the right size I found. A Forster bit would have been better but I did not have one of the of the correct size so I want ahead and used a standard twist bit which I made sure was sharp. I used some tape to mark the depth that I needed which is the depth of the cut and no more, refer tot he drawing and you will see how this insets into the cabin sole.

 

This shows the completed counterbore for the cup.

 

Next using a 10mm bit I drilled a clearance hole for the screw part the remainder of the way through the panel. Note that I am using a ½ inch ply here which is ideal, thinner ply stock could be more of a problem as the cup will be very close to the underside surface of the panel.

 

Here is the completed hole as I insert the male part of the anchor into place. The 9/16^th hole is snug fit and required the use of a few hammer taps to seat the anchor correctly flush with the surface. A scarp bit of wood between the anchor and hammer will protect the chrome finish.

 

How it should look when it is correctly installed.

 

I used the same 10mm drill to bore for the female part of the anchor. I was only drilling into softwood which has some 'give' when screwing in the anchor if boring into something tough like teak then a 10.5 mm drill would be a better bet. Make sure that you drill deep enough so that the anchor won't 'bottom out' before it is fully screwed in.

 

 

Chucking the insertion tool into a cordless drill I drove the anchor into the wood.

 

The female part of the anchor in place. It is very snug in the wood but you could use a little dab of epoxy if you were ever worried about it coming out, but I did not think this necessary.

 

The two parts can then be fixed together using a small screwdriver.

 

The completed anchor which is very neat and rattle free. If I were doing this for proper on a sole a little piece of strategically placed hatch tape under the board may be a good idea to prevent any squeaks.

 

TIP

 

If after marking out the sole drilling through with a 1/16^th bit will mark both the sole itself and provide a guide for the where to drill into the supporting structure.

Blakes seacocks

 I thought readers may be interested in this picture of a Blakes seacock that I cut out of a boat today. The sea cock was no longer needed,although  it was working perfectly it was simply surplus to requirements and as such it had to come out and the hole in the bottom of the boat patched. The picture above is of the seacock dismantled so that you can see the inside and as you will see there is absolutely no corrosion or any other problems. Most seacocks these days are of the ball type but Blakes are of the tapered kind and as such they have a large bearing surface, the elongated slot lines up with the pipe when they are open and a quick ninety degree turn of the handle shuts of the flow of the water. Although you cant see it in the picture they have a grease nipple so they can be easily greased and kept in tip top condition. One thing that is often not often mentioned is that because they are tapered they can be reground with valve lapping paste should they start to leak a little. This sea cock is 12 years old and although I have seen many of these seacocks that are much older there is absolutely no wear or corrosion. So there you have it then; three cheers for Blakes seacocks. Incidentally Blakes also make the excellent Lavacs toilets which are similarly robust just like the seacocks.

 

Zinc time

 

 

Up here in the North East at least, some boats have already been pulled for the season and others will not be far behind. This is just a friendly reminder that one of the chores with the boat out of the water is to change the anodes on the boat. I like to change mine at the end of the season at the same time as I service the engine at the end of the year ready for the coming winter and also it is one less thing to worry about come the next season. Remember that for a zinc to work it needs to make good electrical contact unlike a boat that I looked at recently where the shaft anode was the wrong size for the shaft and someone, presumably the owner had wrapped plastic electrical tape around the shaft to make it larger so the anode would fit!

 

Actually this year I found that my zincs did not get eaten up as much as the previous couple of years. I am not sure why that is but none the less you can see here the difference between the old and the new. No guesses for which is which.

Neat idea

 

 

 Here is a neat idea indeed. Incorporated into the galley sole of just about every Beneteau is a handy little dustpan. If you spend anytime aboard you will know just how much sand, grit, hair and other detritus ends up on the cabin sole. A little plastic tray built in as shown above means not having to stow a separate dust pan only the brush. The access plate is lifted out, the junk swept in and then thrown over the side or into the waste bin. On some boats the tray also lifts out to give access to the galley seawater intake sea cocks. Simple and efficient, I only wish more boat manufacturers would come up with cheap but effective ideas such as this.

 

Garboard plugs

 

This sequence of shots shows the stages necessary for installing a garboard plug into the bottom of a boat. One would think that drilling  hole in a boat is the last thing that you would want to do but in fact this can save damage to your boat during the winter lay up season. Garboard plugs used to be very common on wooden boats and in fact still are on traditional craft. The idea of a garboard plug is similar in principle to drain plugs that you see fitted into the transom on many sailing dinghies and other small craft. When the boat is out of the water the plug is removed and any water collecting in the bilge is free to run out of the boat. The thinking is that fresh water has killed many a decent wooden boat. Sea water is something of a preservative but fresh water will, if left in the bilges soon rot the bottom out of a wood boat. With a bronze garboard plug installed this can be removed when the boat is out of the water and any accumulations of rainwater will be free to run out. Providing the boat is properly limbered and the garboard plug is installed in the correct area very little water can accumulate and if there is no water then it cannot freeze in severe weather. All of which makes total sense. Anyhow this boat is a small motor sailer and is of fiber glass rather than wood but the rationale still holds good. You do not have to put antifreeze in the bilge in the winter and water cannot collect so the boat will remain dry.

 

So the first step is above and consists of drilling the hole with a suitable hole saw after checking very carefully that you are drilling in the best place and not into a fuel tank or some other vital piece of equipment.

 

Next the anti fouling is scraped back around the hole.

 

The garboard plug is then installed after using some suitable caulking such as 3M 4200. Do not use 5200 or you will never get the fitting out if you ever have to without damaging something.

 
After drill suitable pilot holes the fitting is screwed into place with bronze screws. On no account use brass which are too soft and will dezinctify  in a very short time and waste away.

 
Clean up the surplus goo with a clean rag and some denatured alcohol or acetone.

 

Finally screw in the tapered plug until just snug. Job done, just remember to remove it come the winter lay up time.

 

 

Top tip - getting rid of pencil marks

 

Here is a tip that you might not know about. If you are setting out work with a pencil and you make a mistake or other wise need to remove an errant pencil mark from a wood surface use alcohol. It takes pencil marks off in a jiffy, the alcohol evaporates almost right away and it will not damage the workpiece  at all. Erasers work fine some of the time but they leave a black mark often which you still have to get rid of, sanding with a piece of abrasive paper often scratches the surface and is hard work, alcohol simply rubs the mark away.

Beckson hatch upgrade

 

 
The original sole looking aft.

 

When I built Mallard my gaff rigged cutter I was never quite sure how to finish off the sole of the cockpit. On the one hand the cockpit needed to be water tight but on the other hand I also needed to have access for essential maintenance to the stuffing box and primary fuel filter. The other problem was that the cockpit sole was very close to the water line so rigging up the drains so that they would be self draining also became something of a headache, on a larger boat with more free-board the sole is higher and the water can run through drains and exit the boat above the waterline. This was not possible on Mallard so in the end I connected both drains to an inch and quarter sea cock in the bottom of the boat. This worked well enough but it meant that the sea cock had to remain open even when I was not on the boat and this made me nervous not least because if the clamps let go or the sea cock failed water would flood in and the boat would sink. I thought about the problem for several years not quite sure what to do. Finally I came up with the solution that you see in the following pictures, the old sole was completely removed and a now marine plywood sole installed. Two Beckson watertight hatches were fitted to allow continued access to the area under the cockpit and the drains were routed to a self contained sump pump which keeps the cockpit dry and means that the large sea cock can be dispensed with allow me to sleep easier at night.

 Of course every boat will be different and if the hatches are installed in a cored fiberglass deck then I would recommend scooping out some of the core after the cut out has been made and filling with a thicken epoxy to prevent water from migrating into the core material.

 One final point and that is to carefully think through the install before you go cutting into anything; will the hatch interfere with anything above and below decks, will it weaken the boat and do I have the necessary skill set and tools to enable me to complete the installation in professional manner.

 

Here's how I went about it in words and pictures.

 

 

Step one was to remove the old drains, which were big, mostly because they incorporate a non return ball valve to prevent water from sloshing back up into the cockpit.

 

The next step was probably the most time consuming of the whole project for me, it was certainly the messiest. Using a Fein multimaster I cut out the existing sole but left the bearers in place as I would need these later to support the new sole.

 

Once the old sole was out of the way I was able to accurately measure for the new half inch marine plywood that would make up the new section. I then cut this out with a circular saw with a fine tooth blade but I could have used a jigsaw. To allow a little room for the epoxy and also to make sure that the ply would not get jammed in I allowed an eighth of an inch clearance all the way around.

 

Teak treatments 14 months on

 

Regular readers may think that they have seen this board before and they would be right. It is the weathering board of teak treatments that I have been using for long term tests of various teak oils and other treatments. I initialy put these samples on this board 5 years ago and since that time the samples have been left out to weather.  I have to say that things have not changed that much since I bought you an update way back in January of last year and the findings that I came up with then still hold good. I have reapplied the treatments in accordance with the manufacturers recommendations once per year as written on the can or bottle and it has been a very interesting experience to see how they compare side by side. If you were to look at each one in isolation you can definitely see a difference from plain untreated teak but put them side by side and the difference is marked. Not only is the color different from sample to sample (I should add that the teak all came from the same log and was cut at the same time) but interestingly the grain is raised rather more on some than the others.

You can read the blog posting from a year ago by clicking here and the results as written then still hold up with no revision necessary.

PYI floor anchors

 
The tools above are those required to install cabin sole anchors into the cabin of a boat. The anchors themselves are those funny looking things in the middle of the picture. Available from PYI they are at once a neat solution to the age old problem of how to secure floor boards into a boat so that they will be both secure and at the same time easy to get up should the need arise. Of course you can use screws or bolts to hold the flooring in position and it will certainly be secure but not at all easy to remove in a hurry should they need to be lifted.

I have just installed some more of these in a boat that I have been working on and am as much  amazed this time as I was the first time that I installed them some years ago. Basically the anchors work by having a bottom half that is screwed into the rib or other supporting structure under the sole and a top half with a bayonet connection that simple pushes down and half twists to lock it into place. Once installed the only tool needed to remove a section of sole is a large coin, a quarter works but an old fashioned British penney is larger and better suited for the purpose. With some hatch tape under the sole squeaks are non existent and if properly installed the top of the anchor is totally flush with the top surface of the sole. Available in either brass or stainless they area neat answer to an age old problem. The full specifications, prices and a step by step of the process which I described some time ago in words and pictures can be down loaded from the PYI site by clicking here. But I suggest to do as I did and have a go at installing an anchor on a few offcuts first so you fully understand the process before attacking the sole in your boat.

 

Boat polishing

 

There seems to be an idea out there that glass fiber boats are maintenance free and that they never need polishing, nothing could be further from the truth. A clean and shiny boat not only looks better but a coating of wax will repel dirt and water and protect the gel coat finish.

 

Exactly how you go about bringing back that showroom shine will depend to some extent on the condition of the boat before you start. If the boat is badly oxidized and has not been polished for several years then you will want to perform a three stage process which is outlined below. If the boat is only a year old then you can probably get away with just a coat of wax. One sure fire way to tell is the boat needs the full treatment is to rub the palm of your hand across the topsides. If the boat feels rough to the touch and you have a chalky residue on your fingertips then the full treatment is in order.

 

Getting the boat back to that just out of the mold look is a three step process compounding, finishing and waxing. Unless the boat is very small or you have a lot of time on your hands you really want to get hold of a polisher like the one shown above. This machine typically is capable of running an eight inch polishing pad which can either be lambswool or foam. These machines run at a fairly slow speed, the best have a variable speed that can be adjusted between 0 and 3000 rpm.

 

After washing the boat and allowing it to dry, the boat is compounded to remove the dullness and oxidization from the surface. I have had good results with the 3M Imperial compound. This is applied sparingly directly to the surface of the boat and then with the polisher set to about 1800 rpm is worked into the surface. The polisher can get away from you so you need a firm grip but you should not apply much pressure, allow the tool to do the work. Keep the pad moving in a sweeping motion until the color is restored. A second application and treatment may be required for surfaces that are really neglected.

 

Stage two is application of the finish and here again I like the 3M Finesse-it. To avoid cross contamination either use a clean buffing pad or reverse the one that you used for the first step, compound left on the surface will spoil the finish. Apply the Finesse-it to the surface of the boat with a soft cloth or hand held buffing pad. Aim for a uniform coating. Slow the speed of the buffing machine down a little and buff the boat to a high gloss. This part is truly amazing, the boat will start to gleam before your very eyes. Work lightly and keep the pad moving until all the swirl marks have disappeared.

 

To maintain the shine and protect the surface the final part is waxing. It probably makes sense to stick with products from the same manufacturer so that you know that they will be compatible. 3M make some stuff called Marine Ultra Performance wax which works pretty well but almost any wax that contain carnuba works well I have found. The wax does not really increase the shine over and above that achieved with the Finesse – it product but it does make sure that the boat stays shiny and protected. The wax can be applied using the two rag method one to apply and another to polish off. But if you have used a buffer for the preceding steps then it makes sense to use it for the final phase. Apply the wax by hand with a soft cloth using a circular motion then buff of with the polisher fitted with a foam pad.

 

I like to polish and wax the boat at the end of the season, it will have a protective layer during the winter and a light dust and final polish is all that is required before it is ready for the water once again come spring.