Repairing daggerboard

B

bhufham

Dr Bill
Help!
I hit a stump and snapped the end off my daggerboard. About 4" are gone, just exposing the tips of the steel rods. The board is still sailable but I want to repair it over the winter. Anyone had any success repairing the "new" board? What will adhere to it? I plan to insert a stainless steel rod or two into the bottom.
Thanks. Bill H.:mad:
 
Bill,

I made a repair like this about a year ago. Here's the drill:

Borrow another undamaged board and cover the bottom 6" or 8" of the tip of the board with plastic wrap. Then cover the plastic covered tip with unthickened expoxy resin and fiberglass cloth. When the resin cures, lift it off and you will have a female half-mold the shape of the tip.

Next leave the tip of the damaged board rough but drill a few holes in the damaged area lenghwise and epoxy in a few aluminum nails at odd angles - these will serve as reinforcing rods. Then paste wax one side of the damaged board (taking pains not to get the wax in the exposed "wound" of the damaged tip.) Give the inside of your mold a heavy coat of paste wax and clamp your mold onto the tip with several "C" clamps. Then overfill the mold with epoxy resin thickened with microfibers or microbaloons to stiff peanut butter consistency and let cure. When cured, lift off the mold (it should come free if you waxed the side and mold well.) The one side of the repair will be the right shape - the "overfill" side will be too big and rough. Sand the rough side with a power palm sander until it is the right shape. Then sand both sides with finer and finer grits of sandpaper (to, say 220 grit) and spray paint with white paint - Krylon white flat works fine - spray the entire board while you are at it and then wet sand the entire board down to say 320 grit.

I did this entire repair in about two hours not counting cure times. Worked fine. Good luck.

Alan Glos
Cazenovia, NY
 
AL:
Thanx for the tips. I used stainless steel rods instead of alum, inserting them into the board 1.5 inches into pre-drilled holes and set w/epoxy. My new board, built in UK (it has a label on it) is 44.5 inches from the button stop at the top of the board to the tip of the board. I noticed in the SF rules and regs (3.2.4) that the max length allowed is 40.25 inches from the bottom of the handle to the tip of the board. My boat was sailed in the Worlds in Charleston, so I know that all of the boats there had the same board. Is the new length 44.5 in? Anyone have an answer to this?
Bill H.
 
That's where I got the 40.25 inches from. I wonder how the British made board grew to 44.5 inches for the 2006 World Championship.
 
There is a fiberglass daggerboard up for sale right now on eBay for just $99.00 new. If the repairs don't work out or you want a spare for that next "stump" watch that auction.
 
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