What to do about holes...

[rlhigginsjr]

My brand new 1973 Typhoon has two nicely drilled holes, a 3/4" one courtesy of the PO who decided it was the easiest way to drain the bilge when on the hard, and a 2" hole left when I removed the loose plastic thru-hull (another 3-hours of my life gone) formerly used as the original toilet discharge. The discharge valve is inoperable and stuck in a slightly open position, so the assembly had to go. I studied the books and watched YouTube videos on how to repair holes in fiberglass hulls, and am ready to start grinding and splashing around in epoxy and matting. However, a friend of mine with many years' experience in and around boats suggests I add 2 new thru-hulls, cap them off, and maybe use them in the future for something instead of mucking around with fiberglass repair. It sounds reasonable, but I tend to believe that a useless hole below the waterline is a failure mode that can be eliminated by a properly applied fiberglass repair. On the other hand, I decided to leave the seawater inlet thru-hull to the head installed since it has obviously been watertight for a number of decades, and the isolation valve works fine.

I am new to the art of managing holes in boats, so I am looking for confirmation or comments. It's still too cold and wet here in Maine to be working with epoxy, but I'm itching to start fiberglassing when the weather permits.

[Terry]

Here's a pictorial of filling a hole that may be of interest: http://home.comcast.net/~ringj/hole.htm

Hope you get what you need done, and it works out for you.

Regards, Terry

[Steve Laume]

I would go ahead and fill any holes you do not intend to use. Having capped off through hull fittings is just a lazy way out. Plus it will cost you more and they will be in the way. If you ever want a seawater intake (for what?) it would be very easy to drill a new hole for it, where you want it, when you feel you need it. Doing them all at once will not take much longer than just doing a couple of them as you will already have all the supplies and equipment there.

This is not a difficult job and your boat will have a nice smooth bottom with nothing to worry about in the future.

One comment on the Terry's blog would be to use a flexable spline instead of a straight edge to get the shape right. You can flex the spline in both directions to make sure the patch is fair, Steve.

[Maine_Buzzard]

Is the 3/4" hole close to the bottom of the bilge? A threaded drain plug would be welcome on a seasonal boat...

[John Stone]

I agree with Steve . . . fill the holes. Here is how I patched the many holes in my boat's hull. West Systems also has some excellent info on filling holes. I used their material as the guide. There is a link to their guide embedded in the link below.
http://www.farreachvoyages.com/project ... rline.html

This is not a complicated project, but it does require you to get some bone up on working with biaxial cloth and epoxy. You'll need a right angle 4 1/2" grinder with a sanding flap or some other kind of powerful RO sander that can cut through fiberglass to bevel the edge of the hole. Once you complete the job, and do it right, you will be surprised how much easier it will be to tackle other projects. And get ready to spend a lot more than 3 hours of your life when you own an old fiberglass boat. It might feel like it is sucking the life out of you in the beginning but you'll get use to it!

[rlhigginsjr]

Thanks for the advice. I have prepped the bottom for painting, ground out 12:1 bevels on the two holes, and purchased the West Systems stuff to patch the holes. I watched so many tutorials on fiberglass that I feel confident that patching them is the best thing. Keeping water out of the people tank is job #1.