34' O'Day - leaking keel bolts?

[vze4sx46]

Doing spring prep on our 34' O'Day we found nothing in the bilge, it was dry. We had put at least a gallon or two of anitfreeze in there last fall and I don't think it just evaporated, so I think the keel bolts are leaking.
On the outside, we can see obvious drip lines at the crease (where hull meets keel) and I do remember seeing the drips and wondering where the wetness was coming from back in the fall.
In reading through the old posts, it says to open up the keel bolts, inspect them, dig out the old material and fill with 5200.

Any other recommendations?

 

[jibes138]

Keel Bolts

Have you ever torqued your keel bolts? After buying my 35 had the same issue and found the bolts were not fully torqued. You will need a deep socket, and extension bar and a torque wrench. These are large bolts and torque is well over 100 foot pounds so something with a 2 foot arm will make it easier. This should be done in the yard with the weight on the keel so the joint is in compression.
One school of thought is to drop the keel and rebed it and seal the bolts and torque them up, this allows you to check the condition of the bolts for stress corrosion. That is a big job and will require the travel lift to hold the boat up a few inches so you can scrape out the old bedding material and add new. Charlie Cobra had a great post on how to do this a few years ago, search for that it had all kinds of pictures. Very professional. From what I can tell O'Day use a very thick layer and made it almost like a gasket, uneveness in the surface of the keel and stub means you have differing amount of compression on the joint at spots where the gap is a little thicker.
If you want to delay dropping the keel I used a scraper and dug out all around the keel as much of the old compound as I could without lifting the hull, then I injected 3M 4000 into the joint and faired it all around. Once cured I torqued up the keel bolts. Stopped any leakage but I didn't see if the bolts were healthy.
What is bad is to have the bolts sitting in salt water that is stagnant and absent oxygen and with the bolts under high stress. Now holding up 4500 pounds distributed across 7 large bolts is not high stress. Stress would be the keel cantilevered out during heeling applying bending loads to the bolts or a hard ground stopping a 11000 pound boat instantly.
Hope my comments are helpful.

 

[vze4sx46]

Re: Keel Bolts

Thanks so much !

 

[sailorjoel96]

Doing spring prep on our 34' O'Day we found nothing in the bilge, it was dry. We had put at least a gallon or two of anitfreeze in there last fall and I don't think it just evaporated, so I think the keel bolts are leaking.
On the outside, we can see obvious drip lines at the crease (where hull meets keel) and I do remember seeing the drips and wondering where the wetness was coming from back in the fall.
In reading through the old posts, it says to open up the keel bolts, inspect them, dig out the old material and fill with 5200.

Any other recommendations?

When I pulled my O Day 35 last spring while scrubbing the bilge I noticed that the fender washers were moving. Not good! I put a socket on all of the bolts and must have put at least two to three full turns on the most forward bolt. The rest of them were loose as well. I will be doing a a quick haul in a couple of weeks and rest assured that I will be checking the keel bolts.
Strong winds and rough seas to all.

 

[jibes138]

Torque them on the hard

Best to torque them on the hard while the joint is in compression. Otherwise some of the torque is going to hold up the 4500 pounds of lead versus stretching the bolts to the correct tension. Given the number and size of the bolts this isn't that big a deal but to be a purist you should do this.

 

[damauney]

I separated my keel from keel stub about 6 years ago. I was seeing rust around one of the bolts. Found one thread was corroded away on one side from crevice corrosion. I was thankful that was all. In my case the damaging water came from the bilge. Bedded joint with 5200 and torqued it 160 ftlb. Rudy at D&R told me the torque for our boats. Encapsulated keel bolts in epoxy as suggested by Casey. Break off epoxy and retorque bolts each haulout. All is well now.

Goodwinds
DaveM

 

[jibes138]

Dave - great report, a few questions for you

Did you replace the corroded bolt or was it salvagable? Where did you do the work to separate the keel? Did you just break the joint to inspect and rebed or did you completely remove the keel from the boat?
CharlieCobra on this site had a great thread with photos showing a method of rebedding and how to seal the bolts I thought was great didn't involve epoxy but the bolts were bedded with 4200 or 5200 can't remember which. Sounds like your work was worth the effort for peace of mind. These boats are getting older now but show their age well. I'm thinking of doing the same routine as you did to mine so a good recommendation for a work site will be helpful/ Deacon's is great but I really need a DIY yard. Have been using Bock since moving to Beaufort.