Another Surprise Found While CUTTING UP OUR BOAT | Learning the Lines

Repairing a boat is always full of surprises. All you can hope for is that the job will take about as much time and and about as much work as you expected, but typically it will always take longer, be harder, and be more expensive.
In this video, I finish the repair of the aft section of our Corsair F-27. I also start and complete the repair of the bow section, but come across a surprise that I didn't expect.
What do you think? Leave a comment below.
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Learning the Lines is a channel about us, an average couple in our 20's, with big dreams to be sailing the world by the time we're in our 30's. We're not afraid to jump into anything, put in the work, and learn as we go. We started out with Somnium, an O'day 272, moved onto Freebie, an Endeavour 32, and now are focusing on sailboat tours and working full time as teachers while we save up for our next boat.

[@smash7777-]

Who would give this a 👎? Just shows what type of world we live in today. Good informative video, keep the videos coming buddy. 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍 😋

[@mitchellmcpherson8489]

The trailerable boat is so smart, you eliminate marina costs, except during passage, but to be able to bring it home and make repairs or upgrades at your leisure without a third party involved, really great, love your work ethic and look forward to another yacht repair!

[@jastbrown]

Just wanted to say that I enjoy your programs more and more each time I watch one! Jordan, you and Randi have been growing into your roles continuallly, always improving.. whether it's as spokepersons for folks selling their boats or buying your own boats.. redoing your boat.. starting your family with Randi and the little one. You appear to be doing everything right and I wish you all the best on your journey.

[@MrAndrewClaycomb]

The Total Boat paint stripper works great! Just remember to put it on thick. After letting a coat of it sit on the bottom of my boat for a few days (the boat is an hour away from my house), I take a paint scraper, and scrape the paint off, rather than sanding it off. No respirator, I catch the chips on a tarp so easy to keep tidy, and it’s relatively quiet. There is some clean up sanding required, but it’s so much easier than sanding off several coats of bottom paint.

[@frankmoore3598]

Don't know why I felt the need to take a shot of tequila when he said " thickened epoxy " 😂😂😂😂

[@emanuelrephaeli6992]

😂

[@brianpetersen3429]

Great progress!

[@jamesknape2883]

For stripping bottom paint on my Corsair 31. I used a paint scraper with a good sharp carbide blade. Way faster and cheaper than chemicals.

[@robertkendall1037]

Great progress, can't wait to see how you refit the interior.

[@mp6756]

I'm definitely not a qualified option on epoxy glass work not by a long shot. I did however replace a the stinger system on a 25ft power boat years ago. I learned the hard way leaving to much epoxy resin in the lay up causes the repair to be brittle and prone to cracking. About 1/2 way thru the job I was corrected by a pro. I changed up by using a fin roller and being absolutely sure to not leave any excess resin. Every stringer that I left excess resin in the lay ups de laminated in the first extremely heavy weather trip. The properly done portion of the repair is still intact 12 years later. The same resin same glass just no excess resin made all the difference in the world. It might not be a big deal with modern resin but I think it is important. Plus you save a ton of money

[@lancedaniels]

Thanks for posting and sharing. Nice to see how the glassing went. Looks good!

[@CajunWolffe]

Well, Randy, I believe that repair will "float your boat."

[@miketee2444]

Next time you are in a situation like this lay a couple planks across the opening. Cleaning with alcohol then laying plastic to stand on is an option also.

[@jefflove7791]

I like to wet out the glass on a piece of cardboard, I think this helps reduce the amount of epoxy needed. I would also suggest putting in the filler as a separate step and sanding it smooth before the glass. I’m enjoying following your project!

[@yonatanbenavraham6598]

Glad you didn't listen to the naysayers, great repair work and use of peal ply. Glass in tabs under the floor with press in nuts then attach the pieces you cut out with flat head stainless screws into the tabs with press in nuts. They will not react with the aluminium because they are separate and have no metal connection. An easy way to get under the floor and next to the hull. Please check your amas really well and repair them like your main hull, they will have damage if the main hull has been damaged. Just a warning, if the main hull has been damaged the amas also have had damage. I have sailed and repaired F-27's and other Trimarans along with catamarans since 1970. Get yourself an electronic device to stop hull growth. They work well and just turn it off out of the water. I usually have one layer of epoxy impregnated with copper powder under any marine paint I put on the bottom. The barnacles will never go through the copper powder coat but I use ablating bottom paint and also the electronic anti fouling and I never ever have to scrap my hulls

[@scyz2807]

Nice to see the progress being made.

[@awbskymac8149]

You are doing a great job, keep it steady and thorough , don't be in too much of a hurry - don't listen to negative people. I wouldn't be in too much of a hurry to replace the floors that you cut out. Just have a think about it before rushing into it. Obviously, they are structural and you need to have something that retains the strength. Maybe some cross members glassed in and removable floor bolted to tabs would allow access and retain strength. Don't give up, your videos are tremendously interesting to most people.

[@ThoughtfulWander]

Great job keep rolling!

[@johnbuschman8815]

Very interesting project, love watching. The video you did on the history of these boats was great. Thanks.

[@michaelscott4766]

Interesting video, thanks, and I enjoyed the transformation of Jordan into John Lennon..

[@evananderson1455]

I love these videos. I've been staying with friends and sailing their F28 all week in Miami.. this are, Biscayne Bay specifically, is a lovely place to sail and Corsairs are just awesome boats..idk if I'll ever be able to go back to monohulls lol

[@Xpyburnt_ndz]

Like putting a jigsaw puzzle together! Nice job! Sure it will be better than new now!

[@chrisskillett8218]

Good video 👍🇬🇧👍🥳

[@sailingcitrinesunset4065]

Nice video.

[@roadboat9216]

Great video. Thanks. Very educational. My only complaint is that you will show a 3 day repair done it 10 min. Ha ha. It looks sooooo easy. But we all know that it’s a lot of work! You a gonna have a blast with that boat when you are done!

[@roryderbyshire4630]

Bob's your uncle? What happened to fanny's your aunt. Ha Ha Cheers Rory good job well done

[@timtrampenau3050]

How great is it to be able to work on your boat by stepping out the back door (gotta love trailer sailers) 👍 Bob’s your uncle!

[@LearningtheLines]

It's the best!

[@brianmileti868]

👍 😃

[@brianmcgrady2674]

While the floors are up, you should take advantage and build or fit water and black water tanks, especially if your planning to cruise with kids in her.

[@MrZZeroG]

It really doesn’t matter what you fill the void with as long as it isn’t soluble in styrene (like styrofoam). The way sandwich core construction works structurally is to separate the glass layers. This creates tensile force in the outer skin during a flexural bend - think about bending and “stretching” the outside skin and compressing the inside skin of the bend (outside of the race track longer than inside). Double the thickness of the core increases stiffness by ~7-8x. As long as one gets a good bond with glass/core and it doesn’t delaminate, the advantage of a polymer core over balsa is basically one of no breakdown of the core if skin is breached by water. Hope that helps.

[@normancook4620]

Syntactic Foam does not use foam it's made up of hollow materials like glass balloons

[@matthewsellers82]

What you say is true to a point, however, some cores (for example marine plywood) are structural and others (lightweight foams or even cardboard) aren't

[@MrZZeroG]

@@matthewsellers82 yes, but the structural component of an core (outside of glass), doesn’t change the flexural modulus that occurs primarily in the skin. He’s dealing with balsa and other than adding weight, putting plywood in that wouldn’t significantly alter the the repair. Many use plywood in the boat industry if weight doesn’t matter, but mostly because it’s a lot cheaper than Divinycell and it does add stiffness. That’s often used to skimp on glass (stiff but weak). I had a 60k sqft composite mfg facility and we made parts up to 20x40ft. Sandwich core construction can get expensive if one isn’t strategic about building for design loads on large parts. A common way to increase stiffness and reduce strength is decrease glass ratio by using to much matrix (epoxy/polyesters, etc..). On the other end of this cost spectrum is the carbon/carbon composite work we did on rocket nozzles or filament wound cases and in those we created 100% carbon composite structures using phenolic prepregs/tapes depending on application. In aircraft structures we used skins that could keep higher volume shapes via ribbing - eliminating the core all together. It’s used in automotive, but I’ve not done that work before. It’s identical to many aircraft applications without the QC. What all of these have in common is that the structure (glass/carbon) base is engineered to pass the load to the skin and it’s the tensile force capacity of those fibers that does the heavy lifting. My point was his repairs are done well. He did a great job of paying attention to the right things (water content/surface prep/secondary bonding) and i wanted the alleviate worries about the core, which doesn’t matter in this application as it’s a trivial amount of weight. If he used glass microspheres (or any filler) it doesn’t matter that much other than matrix cost.

[@manfredschmalbach9023]

The peelcloth is supposed to sit bubblefree and overlapping all glass by about an inch or two, to make it "peel'n go" without the need to still sand the edges of Your repair before You apply topcoat (which You apply to bring another high quality layer between the bilge water and that balsa). I would probably have ripped out a bit more balsa over the former repair and laid a layer of glass over it from inside just to make sure there ain't no former bodge jobs messing with my new balsa, but given the boat-yoga (welcome to elder fiberglass boats ;-) involved to work down there it looked OK.

[@Schaneification]

Paint all the glass you can, put hatch's were you can . It is Storage plus you can check for Water

[@Tanrestednready]

👍

[@redmunchkin]

It is easy to fix voids by drilling two small holes into it and injecting epoxy into it with a syringe.

[@nitzansneh5552]

Nice job. Just a question. Why inserting new balsa? Balsa is great in building large sections or a complete hull, but for a 2’ crack repair wouldn’t it be better to glass it all the way from the damaged area? This could add an improved structural strength.

[@tomvoorneveld]

It *seems* you are repairing the cracks *between* the bulkheads only. This leaves the damage in the hull-shell where the bulkheads meet the shell. I strongly suggest to cut the bulkheads where the cracks are and then laying the glass over the total length, restoring the bulkheads thereafter. Now there's likely a weak point that will start to become flexible over time.. Epoxy can't deal with that...

[@rustysteel8714]

Too late, TV. AND just think of the STRESSES the outriggers will exert on that longitudinal cracked, patch-work, of a hull. 🤔 A lake or bay is the only place I'd day-sail her after repair. Offshore , with kidos yet?... NEVER! Jordan paid @$10k (?)... I suggested he sell it for @$5k ...if EVEN possible....take the loss..... and ask Randy for FORGIVENESS.... 😉 It's content for the channel, at least. .. "🎶He got it wrong🎶" this time. JMHO.

[@LearningtheLines]

Tom, I've inspected the bulkhead areas, they're fine, at least from what I can see. It's easy to say "just go cutting into everything" when you're not the one who has to put it all back together. I'll be inspecting the exterior laminate from the outside, because if I find wet balsa it's going to be easier to repair it from the outside in the bulkhead areas rather than to cut out the bulkheads which are perfectly fine. Another reason why I'm leaning towards the bulkhead areas are fine is that if you think about it, the bulkhead areas are much stronger so they wouldn't suffer the same damages as the areas I'm repairing here that have no internal support at all. It's a balance. You can't just go cutting up the entire boat, especially with a boat constructed like this, because ultimately any repair you do is bound to add weight, something you want to avoid.

[@jacko5668]

If you sealed the leaks, removed all the mold and sterilized it you could probably make beef jerky in it.

[@stallion78]

Dang that looks like a nightmare

[@michaelflorio9091]

You might want to consider making those floor openings you removed removeable in the future, rather than permanently re-installing them. I realize they may be structural, or necessarily sealed for the safety/buoyancy of the boat, but those issues can be solved by some innovative thinking.

[@TheOldGuy]

Since you have the "bilges" open, do you think it would be a good idea to slap a couple of coats of paint on them?

[@LearningtheLines]

I've been debating this. I might. The issue is all of the bilges aren't open. There would still be a large section unpainted.

[@rustysteel8714]

@@LearningtheLines Don't paint! 1. It will look like you're hiding something. 2. You won't be able to see how well the repairs hold up after she hits the water. 😉

[@jamesmorris1604]

Hi, just curious which catamaran you liked better between the Manta 42 MK II and the Voyage 430 43?

[@Dreancaidi]

Would you explain why you chose Epoxy instead of Polyester resin for the glassing?

[@joshuacook3069]

i do not understand why you did not string a tarp up over the boom for shade & rain protection.

[@unclemuir]

The best part of repairing fiberglass is if you screw up you can grind it away and do it again.

[@fxpthl]

Hey Jordan! Where were your “girls”, Randi & Morgan? Missed seeing them. I am a bit confused about the balsa stringer “repairs”! How can epoxying in those many tiny pieces add strength to the stringer? I understand the multi layers of the different cloth, but not the need for those tiny pieces. When did you name the boat?

[@LearningtheLines]

Hey Edward, they're always around but when I'm working on a project like this I'm careful to not get them or the house contaminated with fiberglass dust or epoxy for their own health. So projects like this will be just me. When I'm done working I disrobe outside and go straight to the shower to keep the house clean! Haha. As far as the balsa goes, it comes in a sheet of pieces held together by a little bit of fiberglass. It's already cut up into little squares, I just reoriented them to fit my repair. When all the voids are taken up by balsa, glass, and thickened epoxy it becomes very strong. I'm not an engineer so I can't go much more into detail than that.

[@stephenmurray9850]

I don't care. I am so jealous... You have a boat and I don't .. the end... lol

[@dmase1501]

It's "ground away"

[@JP-lz3vk]

"Winter has struck here in the Florida Keys with temperatures only in the high 70s..." ha ha. Let's annoy the viewers by saying how wonderful it is where I am...

[@justtocomment6261]

During your intro, when you said desperado, the phrase from the song came to my mind: desperado, why don't you come to your senses. I sure hope that that it is not necessary.

[@brianmcgrady2674]

use a small board as a platform over the opening. I would suggest doing the large area in one piece but do the layers in stages, and use polythene and tape and a vacum cleaner to suck the air out to get the atmospheric pressure to wet the glass and penetrate the layers. It will give you a better finish and the work area will remain covered with polythene so you don't need to worry about contact. With the amount of londitudenal delam, Id say she was dropped from a lift or crane.

[@Imightberiding]

I was wondering why he didn't just use a board or two as a working platform. One full complete piece pacing the layers would have been far superior to smaller patches with a cold seam across them. *Edit: Wanted to say the vacuum & taped poly is a good suggestion.

[@RaiseHull]

I seriously don't buy the osmosis story for the damage in the back of the boat.

[@smash7777-]

Why? Just curious..

[@matthiasvonmutius9264]

I would really inspect the damages under the bulkheads. This looks bad, specially the connection to the repaired parts. You have to put Gelshield or something similiar in the bilges and over your repairs. Pure epoxy is not enough, you want to get this areas never to absorb moisture anymore. You are soaking the glass into to much resin, hardened epoxy is rather brittle...

[@Imightberiding]

I was going to leave a similar comment before I saw yours. I would be very concerned about the structural integrity of the bulkheads especially where they meet the bottom of the hull. Heaps of potential unseen damage there. It appears he is in favour of whittling away at one little piece at a time & performing patch repair jobs until discovering more damage. A thorough, complete inspection is long overdue. This boat has been severely abused, broken & then neglected. The seller was very dishonest (surprise) & I suspect the pre purchase inspection was cursory at best. If anything, the reduced cost at the time of sale (I think he mentioned what a great deal they got) should have been a red flag. It's unfortunate for this young couple but they do not appear to have a whole lot of experience. They will grow & learn. He seems determined if not a little misguided & lack of practical skills, knowledge & previous boat work/construction experience. Boats are a hobby & hobbies cost money. Unless it is your professional commercial business, rarely if ever do the words boat & make money or financial win make sense in the same sentence. the only time you might hear all those words together is from an extremely wealthy person while on their yacht. Even from a full time commercial perspective it is a risky, costly endeavour of never ending maintenance & repairs.

[@LearningtheLines]

Matthias, from what I can tell the bulkhead areas are fine. They're reinforced, and much stronger than the areas I'm repairing here which have no internal support structure. That being said, I will be looking for wet balsa from the outside, because if I need to repair those areas, a repair from the outside will be much less invasive. As far as the too much epoxy comment, That's why I used peel ply. The epoxy wets out the ply and excess sits on top, then gets removed when you peel the peel ply. Also, It's been proven that a too much resin in laminate doesn't cause loss of strength, only excess weight. That is something I'm doing my best to avoid, however.

[@matthiasvonmutius9264]

@@LearningtheLines Hi. I think what you showed at 1'26 and the broken tabbing is what let me wonder what is going on. just glassing over this delaminated tabbing is not gonna be good enough. Concerning excess resin: Yes peelply helps but my impression was that you have thickened the epoxy just a bit and not really made a stable putty with a consideable amount of fiber in it, it just seems to be a sauce/soft peanut butter instead of non running/ not saggy quality where your result is much less brittle. And excess resin in a laminate is a strength problem, the fibers are floating in a much bigger distance from your base material/ old laminate. Epoxy as a much lower resistence against pulling the the fibers used. To get a good and stable laminate the pros use vacuum, this gets a much better bonding and results in a much better resin-fibre ratio. Even pulling vacuum only with your shop-vac will help a lot...

[@prmc86]

If Jake Gyllenhaal was a news anchor and did DIY boat repairs on the side...

[@kencrouch668]

Was the boat sunk? You are just running into a lot of damage! Would you have bought this boat if you knew all of this? Second question - no offense but you fixed Freebie up- are you going to keep this boat for a while?

[@danmallery9142]

That thing looks like it fell off the hard. Do you know the background of what happened?

[@garretttheterrible4058]

Was thinking the same. The consistent fore-aft crack orientation looks like she came down hard on her keel.

[@RaiseHull]

You said that the damage in the front compartment was caused by outside damage letting water in, but you proceeded to repair from the inside without understanding or assessing the claimed outside damage.

[@jamesknape2883]

Keep track of weight of materials. These boats want to stay light. Adding 50 pounds is a big deal. Keep it light

[@richardchandonnait6697]

sand your edges down before you paint

[@Guvrunner]

I can't believe you guys bought that boat without a thorough inspection, that's not like you guys!!

[@roadboat9216]

You have to remember that they had to cut the board apart in order to thoroughly see the damage

[@timhardman4764]

@@roadboat9216 yes! - and, they bought the boat for 1/3 the going price for a similar example thus reducing their risk of a "bad" investment and knowing there could be hidden damage that the 2/3rd's price savings could absorb. The materials cost of fixing the previous unknown structural issues will be less than 10% of the cost of an inspection. And the labor for the repairs provides content for the KZbin channel. So far these, guys took a well calculated risk and seem to be firmly on the winning side....so far....only time will tell but it's looking good at this point.

[@normancook4620]

WHY WOULD YOU REPLACE WET BALLSA WITH BALSA AGAIN? I WOULD HAVE RECOMMEND A SYNTACTIC FOAN TO PREVENT A SECOND FAILURE WHICH YOU WILL EVENTUALLY SUFFER.

[@noellwilson1273]

I wonder about the balsa too. From everything I read, it’s there to increase the skin thickness for stiffness without extra weight. (And insulation) Rigid foams will do that with maybe less tendency to let water wick further and without the rot problems. Did you consider foam?

[@Tim8mit]

the past tense of grind is ground, not grinded

[@MrJhchrist]

grind, ground, have groumpt

[@patrickgilhooly8340]

Where is the layer of Kevlar ??? YOU will be sorry you didn’t put it in. How come you didn’t clean with Acetone be for you reglassed.

[@PaulHarold]

You look heavy on the liquid epoxy. Extra weight without extra strength. Need a fin roller and squeegee off the excess.

[@daveg4963]

🍋

[@troydavis7181]

Please, no more OK guys.

[@sirfrydryk360]

Wearing a WHITE button up?????Oooohh Kkkkk

[@patrickfitzoot]

This guy needs to at least look at Westsystem's protocols for proper fg repair. I am seeing so many things done wrong I can't even begin to enumerate them.

[@LearningtheLines]

That's about all I look at Patrick, please give me an example of what is wrong.

[@patrickfitzoot]

@@LearningtheLines I answered this but apparently the answer disappeared. Basically, FG repairs need to involve cutting out the damaged material, rounding the corners of the repair areas, beveling the edge (12:1 of hull) etc. Also if you had a structural failure you should probably reinforce the area, although care must be taken with reinforcement as some assemblies require a certain amount of flex, and stiffening them may make them more vulnerable to breaking.

[@robertbennett6697]

Take some of the money you claim to have saved and invest in a whole lot of bilge alarms and pumps.

[@clementforteau976]

You talk too much, just show what you do. We don’t need your rational for living

[@TOMVUTHEPIMP]

This boat is a wreck.

[@CheekyMonkey1776]

“Grinded away”..... ahhh the Dilemma of public schools. I hope this guy doesn’t teach grammar.

[@LearningtheLines]

It's a simple mistake, my guy. I know the proper past tense of grind is ground. I'll bet you were the bully back when you were in school!