Another lesson learned: When rudders kick up you might loose steering

Ouch!
What location was this?

Wow, crappy experience but:
1. At least you made it without sinking
2. The gouges look nasty but are likely a relatively simple fix with a fibreglass kit. Good access and no corners.

Still it is a PITA to spend that much time (and/or money) fixing it!

Wow.

Ya can buff that out in about 5 minutes.....Just had to say that,,,,, sorry. Where do ya sail outta of?? so much for island hopping. It looks like ya got a bunch of work to do.
Now ya can take that fiberglass class like the rest of us.
Good luck and I hope it works out ok for ya.... Keep us informed !!!!!!!

I'm in Subic bay, Philippines.

Suppose the hull fills completely, am I assuming correctly that there is no way to hold the cat? I guess it will tip over. Anyone here who had that experience?

Thanks for the heads-up.

Dan

if 1 hull fills completely then it will sink and stop at the mast for awhile before that too fills and sinks

then the whole lot will hang underwater with just the 1 good hull floating at an angle

i'd say that would pretty much be the end of the boat and you too if the water was cold and it was dusk

even if someone was there to tow you it would have to be towed upside down and very carefully or the stays would break etc.

the once you got it to a beach, what then?

50?people or a truck going to drag it through the surf up the beach without ripping the beams from the beam seats?

even if the beach has been smooth white sand you could have easily ripped the bottom out at speed on a rock just below the surface. you wouldn't even see a swell around a rock deep enough to rip a daggerboard through the hull if you were going fast enough

think you were very lucky and guess you won't be speeding into unknown, deserted, poisonous snake jungle surrounded beaches in the future

i know i'll certainly keep your story in mind;o)

thanks for sharing

edited by: erice, Oct 19, 2009 - 08:51 AM

glad you survived.. that is crazy.

i had an experience this reminded me of (but not as bad).

on my h16 about 12 years ago i was sailing in the Tampa bay. we were in the middle of Tampa bay and i found a small little white sand island... as i did my Hobie beaching (didn't know how to back up a cat in those days)... i found out it wasn't sand.. it was all shell... to say it was a loud landing is an understatment...

I didn't realize i had put a hole in my hull... and by the time i got back to the park (picnic park) my hull was under water... had i needed to sail further,... i would have been in real trouble.

The girl was no more than 100lbs and it took about 3 hours to get the boat drained and on the trailer

CatDan, you live in a part of the world most of us dream of and through you most of us will live adventure we can only imagine. Keep us posted as to the repairs and also to any/all new adventures in the near future. Keep on sailing dude and may the wind always fill your sails.

R

I gotta get a reverse thingy like Andrew... Where did ya get it ? at the 'online marine store'???? 😆

your cat didn't come with reverse? did you look in the glove box ?

"CatDan, you live in a part of the world most of us dream of and through you most of us will live adventure we can only imagine."

That's funny, I was going to say something to the effect - I wish I had volcanic rock island to crash on. When I crash its just good old granite... or ice in the next 3 weeks. 🙂

catdan wrote: I may post pics of the repair process in the tech section later.

Dan

Thanks for sharing your story and pics. Please do document the repair and post pics and details.

I know it's depressing to see your boat with that damage, just keep repeating... "it's only fiberglass"

do the wild thing? did you tell her that the boat might sink and you both could possibly die so this is our last chance before the sharks eat us? who held the "tiller"? so many questions. i like your style!

I know that my old 5.8 has Styrofoam blocks in the hulls to keep the boat from completely sinking. The newer 5.8 has plastic air bags in the hulls. There are photos in the technical section of this forum that show the Styrofoam in Hobie 14s & 16s.
You probably could not sail very well with one hull full of water. You might be able to keep the boat upright, which would help with rescue. Hope I never have to find out. Next time I sail in fresh water, I"ll pull a plug at the ramp and see how low it sinks.

In side a Hobie 16

edited by: skarr1, Oct 19, 2009 - 07:27 PM

I see from the previous posts several cat models have flotation built into the hulls. Has anyone ever considered adding flotation to a boat without any built in. This summer my P-18 suffered a significant hull failure which left about 75% of the hull filled. In order to prevent this level of submergence I am considering adding several partially inflated rubber balls (think $5 Wal-mart 2' dia. balls). I wouldn't inflate these enough to put any pressure on the hulls just enough to hold them ball in place.

I've heard of people putting spray foam in thier hulls. Although I would be seriously scared to try it.

Even better than your idea is getting some supplemental floatation bags that are used in rotomolded kayaks. These are really important for kayaks with open hull areas. Here's an example I googled up (never seen the site before):
http://www.westerncanoekayak.com/product_spec.php?item_description_id=5490

They are approximately the right shape, tough and are inflated with a built in tube you blow into so you are unlikely to be able to overinflate them enough to hurt the boat.

Could you use empty 2 liter or 20oz plastic bottles?

I guess that would work if you can fit them through the ports. They would sure be annoying banging around in the hulls though!

[quote= did you look in the glove box ?

glove box ???? under the seat??

just keep repeating... "it's only fiberglass"

On the bottom yes, but upon closer inspection, it's a foam sandwich in this section of the hull.

There seems to be two fiberglass layers with a 1/4" foam layer in between.

Does anyone have more info about this?

In order to prevent this level of submergence I am considering adding several partially inflated rubber balls (think $5 Wal-mart 2' dia. balls). I wouldn't inflate these enough to put any pressure on the hulls just enough to hold them ball in place.

Inserting 2 or 3 of those rubber balls is a great idea.

Thanks,
Dan

do the wild thing? did you tell her that the boat might sink and you both could possibly die so this is our last chance before the sharks eat us? who held the "tiller"? so many questions. i like your style!

Maybe I have dramatized a tiny bit 😉

But yes, we were both aware of the possibility of sinking, but the worst case scenario would have been loosing the boat. We had life vests, are good swimmers, it's in the middle of the bay and there are no dangerous currents, the water is 80 degrees, so dying is highly unlikely. It's way more dangerous to walk along or crossing a busy highway...

Dan

she doesn't have to know that but that's another subject, youtube has a video for west systems foam sandwich hull repair that is easy to follow and thorough. they also have a video for fairing techniques(like bondo on cars for a slick looking repair). finally, they have videos on gel coat repairs. there is a wealth of stuff related to this on the ole youtube, its helped me much with the ole "blue ribbon"(my '78 16' prindle). i hope you have access to some good products over there in paradise, that might be the hard part. good luck player! bill.

check out this amazing piece of foam in my mystere (actually in a friends)... this is incase you happen to have a pet flea or pet rock with you that needs saving.

as per adding flotation:

spray foam is actually pretty heavy and not the best choice (or it would already be used). it is used sometimes as a way to re-enforce the hulls... but not a great choice.. it also can get water logged and add a lot of weight.

inflatable balls are silly (i am trying to be more PC here...) ... as they will all float away as soon as you get a hole.... big enough for them to escape. they could work in situations (like small holes) but they are worthless in more serious failures, and isn't that what you need?

inflatable bladders would also need securing (or will float away) and at $30 (Canadian) each... you would be spending 100's on them to have any effect.

the best choice? The same foam that is in Hobie's. I dont know much about it.. or where to get it.. but it doesn't seem to get water logged, it seems like big enough in size to have a chance of staying in the hull if ripped open.

I would contact Jeremy at SurfCityRacing (jeremy@surfcitycatamarans.com) for more info and or to order some. He is very experienced in Hobie repairs

Andrew,
I may be missing something here. If you get a rip in your hull big enough for a beach ball to float out of it... well you have some serious problems.

I guess the fact that Dan has a huge hole in his hull would be a good opportunity to insert some foam batts easily but I was thinking more for people like myself who only have 2 ports to get stuff into (and out of) the hulls with. Those inflatable bladders are great for this purpose! A little pricey yes, but they add a LOT of floatation and conform the shape of the space they are placed in.

My wife has a 16 foot kayak with no supplementary floatation except air bladders and no bulkheads (i.e. you tip, you sink without supplemental floatation). She hasn't sank it yet.

D.

i apologize, i misread the post.. i thought it was 2" balls, not 2' balls... all i could picture is 100's of balls spilling out of the hull

I am sure the bladders work well (especially for a plastic molded kayak that has air inside it),... but you have 300 -400lbs of glass/aluminum here. how many would you need?

if your not worried about catastrophic failure, why not use a few dozen water noodles?

edited by: andrewscott, Oct 20, 2009 - 11:04 AM

Hee hee, 1000 ping pong balls in each hull. That's why I like metric. 🙂

You would probably only need 2 bladders in each hull, maybe 3. It basically will act as an inner skin for the hull so will provide about as much bouyancy as the equivalent amount of hull space. So if you can fill the hull up by 1/3 you will probably have about as much bouyancy as the foam batts, maybe slightly less.

Noodles would work too! But I'm not sure about thier lifespan.

andrewscott wrote: i apologize, i misread the post.. i thought it was 2" balls, not 2' balls... all i could picture is 100's of balls spilling out of the hull

Stop that. That is silly. Not to mention the amount of weight something like say 1000 tennis balls would add to the total boat weight.

andrewscott wrote: I am sure the bladders work well (especially for a plastic molded kayak that has air inside it),... but you have 300 -400lbs of glass/aluminum here. how many would you need?

Some rough numbers
2 FOOT diameter ball constrained by the hull shape probably has about 50% of its standard volumetric capacity. Resulting in about 2.1 cubic feet of volume per "Ball"
Lets assume that 75% of the total weight of the boat is trying to submerge the "Bad" hull. In my case the total boat weight is around 350 lbs ( http://www.ussailing.org/portsmouth/mhweights01.asp) Therefore we need approximately 265 pounds of flotation.

each cubic foot of water displaced provides 62.4 pounds of buoyancy therefor in order to prevent capsize and approximately 4.25 cubic feet of flotation would be required.

This translates into just over 2 balls per side to keep the boat afloat.

andrewscott wrote: if your not worried about catastrophic failure, why not use a few dozen water noodles?

Not a bad idea either. They do however have a tenancy to soak up water so they might become saturated over time with any water in the hulls. They also may shift around quite a bit causing noise.

Factory Nacra flotation inside a 5.8