Albin Vega 27 first time owner

[Šćiban]

Hi everyone. I just bought my Vega. Its been a long time coming.
I have never owned one before but i have always wanted one and now that i do i am gearing up to to a refit. My problem is i don't have any experience and i live in Serbia where all the materials are dificult to get and it takes a long time to get them and typically they are more expensive than in other places too (customs and so on).
I would like input from you guys that have experience and have this sort of thing before.

the boat is in a good shape. Its a 1977 and has been owned by the same guy since new. The biggest damage is seen in this picture. So my question would be how would you go about repairing this what would you use. there are some other scratches along a section of the starboard side but they are superficial and not a big deal at all. the only other place is a small crack on the transom.

Thank you all for your advice and help
Nenad Šćiban
Albin Vega 27 #3278

 

[jssailem]

I would suggest reviewing the video works of Andy at BoatworksToday.com
He is a talented individual with fiberglass and gelcoat repairs.

The dings on the bow are normal wear. Cosmetic repairs caused by:

• Coming in a little to fast to a Dock,
• pulling up an anchor that bangs against the bow.

The transom damage is a bit more questionable. Could be something struck the transom in the middle and the crack has elongated over time. Check the inside of the transom for any damage. I would want to open up the crack and check for separation, along the crack, of the outer layer of fiberglass from the inner core.

The surface type of damage you report is not unusual for a boat that is 48 years old.

You want to inspect the structural integrity of the boat if you plan to go sailing. The mast and boom. The stays and how they attach to the boat hull (chain plates) and the mast. The hull and sails as well the rudder and how it attaches to the boat. These are all key safety issues.

 

[PaulK]

The problems with the bow are small. Filling the divots with something like MarineTex (white) would probably do the trick. Be careful with other epoxygoop products because they might look good initially but then UV degradation sets in and they turn into brown blotches. We ended up having to repaint our entire deck because we filled some dings with the wrong stuff.

 

[Šćiban]

Thank you all for your reply. I really appreciate it.
The standing rigging has been replaced a few years ago and the boat passed all the cantonal checks (swiss) with no issues last year. The deck has no soft spots feels and sounds quite good (sound ) the plan is to do a complete refit. the boat has no systems onboard so i plan to do all that myself anyway. I have already made a plotter using a rpi and i have a inverter/charger (victron mjultiplus 12 / 1600 /70 -16) and a mppt (12v/24v 100v /50a) and a rpi cerbo gx that i built as well as a 8kwh (624ah tested measured value) lithium battery with a 200A bms. I have been planning this for a while now and getting components slowly over time. The crack on the transom i suspect is ( i hope) just a gelcoat crack. I emptied everything from the transom cockpit locker and climbed inside and could find nothing wrong or see any damage whatsoever. But than again it was just a quick check as i was cleaning. Also there is no osmosis damage i could detect anywhere. Didn't get a moister meter yet but no blisters or pits seen anywhere on the hull and tapping the whole hull for an entire day didn't raise any alarms. All in all i think i bought a sound boat. I also got 5 sails 3 of wich were not used. The one issue i have is that it has a boom furler for the mainsail and the issue is i am totally unfamiliar with it. I unpacked all the sails just to see if there are any issues and to clean them and they all look very good but 3 look and feel brad new. I have 5 winches of wich two are self tailing (lewmar 16 i think they are Hold Fast Self-Tailing Winches ). I am going away for about 6 months on a job so i wont be doing any work on the boat just yet but i am preparing slowly for when i come back from location. And i have no experience doing any kind of boat work so i am using this forum to brainstorm you guys who have experience in these kind of things. Once again thank you and if you have any suggestion on what i should look for and and what i should pay special attention to i would appreciate it immensely. Thank you!!!