small crack from trap harness

Hello everyone,

It looks like I put a small circular crack in the deck of one of my hulls while getting back on the boat with my trap harness on. My question is whether or not I should just fill it it with a little epoxy or grind it out down to the foam, patch with shredded glass and epoxy and cover with gel. My biggest fear would be that this little spot leads to delam somewhere down the line. The hulls are from 86, but they are rock solid and I've been happy with them. I've dealt with delam in the past and would prefer not to have to in the future. Am I overthinking this and should just not worry about it or should I take the time to do a small bit of work for prevention. I don't want to do anything if it is unnecessary.

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James
86' Redline Hobie 16
Sail # 76909

It all depends on how severe the damage is. You need to repair the layers that were broken. Did you just crack the gelcoat? Did you crack the top layer of glass? Did you punch through the gelcoat and glass and into the foam?

My gut feeling is that most likely you cracked the gelcoat and fractured the glass. If that is the case, then you should grind out the gelcoat, grind out the damaged glass, and repair by applying a glass patch (I would use polyester resin, not epoxy), fair with Formula 27 filler, and then apply gelcoat. But, you really won't know how bad the damage is until you start grinding away the broken stuff.

Another thing you can do is to do a coin tap test around the damaged area. Strike the edge of a quarter on the deck all around the damaged area. You should hear a bright, crisp sound if the composite is undamaged. If the glass is cracked or delaminated, you will hear a dull sound when you tap near the damaged area.

sm