Hobie Forums
http://www.hobie.com/forums/

Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
http://www.hobie.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=47084		 Page 1 of 1
Author:  jmogyoro [ Wed Apr 03, 2013 11:01 pm ]
Post subject:  Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Hello, Hopefully I posted these photos correctly.

Does anyone know what the structure inside of the hull is that the nuts are mounted to? Is the top post (gudgeon) connected to the bottom one inside?

I am trying to understand how structurally sound this is, before I attempt a repair. It is not moving. It seems very solid, but looks awful.

I've seen other posts saying that plastic welding is the only way to go for the repairs. Are all Bravo's made with linear PE or just some years? I don't know why it failed here, so I am not sure if it will just fail again after welding. I was envisioning re-enforcing with fiberglass cloth and epoxy but have read that doesn't work.

If anyone has actually done a similar repair, I would like to hear about it and a photo would be even better.

Image

Image

thanks
Author:  Robcut1 [ Sat Apr 27, 2013 1:58 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
JB Water Weld needed and applied to area primed first with a little superglue.
Author:  mmiller [ Mon Apr 29, 2013 9:53 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Plastic weld.

Gudgeon insert is one piece. You can see it thru that hatch.

What the heck happened to this boat? Deep gouges? Repair prep?
Author:  jmogyoro [ Mon Apr 29, 2013 10:41 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Matt and Robcut1, thanks for the replies.

After I asked, I realized that I could look through the hatch and see the complete gudgeon insert. Thanks for pointing me to it.

So what happened? I don't really know. It was like that when I bought it but did not notice because I am/was dumb :) The previous owner had patched it with I-don't-know-what. He just kinda filled the cracks and made it look good. After I scraped away his work, they were revealed. Since I never had a bravo, I did not know that the mainsheet attached to that top gudgeon until the first time I rigged. That would seem to be an area that sees a very high stress.

I didn't get any replies for a couple weeks, so I went ahead and did a repair using G/Flex. I know that people say it is not supposed to work, but I already had it. The worst that could happen is that my cracks reappear and I start over. I uploaded some photos of what I did, below. I have not sailed(tested) it yet. I will report back the success or failure. Either way this could be useful to someone else.

I used West Systems G/Flex 655 thickened epoxy. I first opened up the cracks with a chisel and dremel to increase the bonding area. I followed the directions by cleaning with Alcohol and flame-treating the area (no photo of that).

Then I applied the epoxy and also fiberglass running over the cracks in a couple different directions. Here are the results of those steps:

Image

Image

After curing, I mixed up some more and added West Systems 407 fairing additive. I probably didn't really need to do this but I was trying to smooth out the imperfections and needed to thicken the 655 a bit to do that. Here's what that looked like:

Image

Let that cure and sand with 80 grit and then 150. Used a random orbit sander and some by hand :

Image

Masked and painted. Used Krylon Fusion for plastic. Will see if this holds up. This is all a big experiment! Screws are there to keep paint out of the nuts. I installed new screws later:

Image

Here is the end result:
Image

Image

Will update after sailing.

thanks
Author:  Murph_PEI [ Tue Apr 30, 2013 7:10 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Nice job!
Author:  KarlR [ Thu May 02, 2013 4:38 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Please post as you start to have experience with this on the water. In time I know my Bravo Hull is gonna need repairs and I have been hoping that Gflex would be up to the task.
Author:  jmogyoro [ Thu May 02, 2013 8:35 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Message received. I will update here, good or bad. If you search on gflex or g/flex you will see different experiences and several that say it does not work on PE and should plastic weld. I just didn't think I could figure out the welding technique, to do that. Epoxy is straight forward. I thought the area needed more reinforcing too.
Author:  sydsmith [ Mon May 27, 2013 7:44 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
Wow, you can work on my boat anytime !
Author:  jmogyoro [ Mon Sep 09, 2013 4:12 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Cracked hull on Hobie Bravo in Rudder Area
I've sailed my bravo (with the repair) 5 times or so over the summer. There is no sign of the crack returning. It is holding up well so far.
Page 1 of 1 All times are UTC - 8 hours [ DST ]
Powered by phpBB® Forum Software © phpBB Group
http://www.phpbb.com/