Centerboard help for a 1969 MORGAN 30

[smoothsailing]

Hi all,

I recently purchased a 1969 Morgan 30.

The previous owner did not use the C-board and locked it in the up position with vice grips.

All is rusted, the wire is no good, and I am not sure if the C-board is now frozen in place

The boat is on the Hard with the keel blocked.

I would like to get it in working order for the 2012 season. I need to know how to replace the wire with new.

Any help (drawings and/or pics) would be greatly appreciated.

TIA

Bill
ESPA
1969 Morgan 30

 

[Merlin Clark]

Yea! A fellow Morganite!
You'll find some good info on these CBs at: http://members.cox.net/morgan24site/Morgancbpage.htm
and another excellant source of info: http://checa.us/sailorschoice.html
Also, there are a bunch of good and very knowledgable Morgan people at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/morganowners/.
I love my 24, it's a great sailing boat and did surprising well before I got my CB working and now it's even better. The 30 is another great boat!
Welcome aboard!

 

[smoothsailing]

merlinuxo

THANKS MUCH.

This is exactly what I was looking for.

Where can I purchase the parts?

 

[Rich Stidger]

Bill,

My last sailboat was 1968 Morgan 30. I have replaced the CB cable and hardware at least twice. The forward pulley should be a bronze unit, not steel. The cable is standard running rigging type cable. The stuffing tube is a piece of stainless that the cable passes through. Epoxy is forced into the tube to secure the cable. At the CB end of the cable is a stainless swaged fitting with a hole. This end is secured to the CB with a large stainless screw that passes through one side of the CB and threads into the opposite side. I think I remember that the pivot pin is held in with two bolted blocks on the bottom of the keel. Be sure to use a six-sided socket so that you don't round the bolts during removal.

You should be able to get the exact length of the cable and how much cable should be on each side of the stainless tube. The old cable can be removed and the epoxy cleaned out by heating the tube with a torch. After pulling out the cable, use a long threaded rod in an electric drill to clean out the inside of the tube for re-use.

Hopefully your boat was blocked at the front and back edge of the keel so that the CB slot is completely free. If the boat was blocked with some 12" timbers, the amount of digging will be minimal.

The CB weighs about 75 pounds. I was able to put it in by myself, but a second person would be helpful. I was also a lot younger at the time.

When you install the new cable, be sure to put a couple coats of tar pitch on the cable end that is in the water. That will greatly prolong the life of the cable. Properly installed with tar pitch, the cable should last 5-8 years.

Good luck.

 

[Merlin Clark]

I think I had a link for the bronze blocks on my old computer but it died. Anything you need should be available online.
If the PO used vice grips to hold the board up then the tube/shaft and stuffing box must still be there? Hope so, it'll make life much easier. You'll see in those other links that some owners made shafts out of old prop shafts and this makes changing the cables easier than the original SS pipe with the wire running through it.
You'll probably need to find a turning block for the front of the bilge right? Mine was steel and a rusted clump as Rich said pointed out about using bronze. I think there should also be a turning block below the cockpit to fairlead the wire to the winch from the bilge.
Do you have the winch?
The only things that were still on my 24 when I bought her was the glassed-in shaft tube in the bilge that the stuffing box would have been attached to and the rusted block in the fwd end of the bilge. The board was held up by a ss bolt through the trunk and the board.
I don't have an inboard (open area above the aft end of the trunk and behind the stairs) and don't need the original set up and so I ran a line directly from the lower part of the keel, up through a (trunk/bilge to cockpit floor) tube and use a cam cleat to hold the keel up.
My tube is a 1" Shields exhaust hose (wire type) with a thru hull in the top of the trunk and another on the stbd side of the cockpit sole. I don't think this is possible with an inboard.
I think the wire they use on CBs is 9/19 which is very flexible.
Below are some pics of a 24's equipment I got off the web some time back. Are these the same or close as a 30 Rich?

Pic 1= pivot pin and retaining blocks
Pic 2= top of board showing slot for wire
Pic 3= complete shaft/box assembly in bilge
Pic 4= complete shaft/box assembly out of boat
Pic 5= shows where pin retaining blocks go

 

[Rich Stidger]

merlinuxo-

Yup, looks like a dead-ringer for the M30. I forgot about the second turning block under the cockpit that leads the cable up to the cockpit winch, but that should be bronze as well.

Also on my M30 the cable attached to the CB in the second hole nearest the bottom tip of the CB and the swaged fitting passed under the machine screw in the upper hole on the left in your last picture above.

Seeing these pictures sure brings back memories.

 

[Morgan30]

Had mine fixed three/four times. Also, remember times when the cable let go and I had to walk a line from the bow to stern to try to raise it so I could dock.
I dove under and wedged it up with a wooden shim. Used a hammer under water.
Well, had her hauled, no center board. I guess it thought I did my time.
I sail without it and never looked back. It sails great.
This is the only poor design on the boat. Second is the so called gel coat that was used back then.
Maybe you will read this a few times and not go through it like I have. It is just a dagger board. No ballast. The boat still sails and responds like a one design.

 

[smoothsailing]

THANKS ALL FOR YOUR RESPONSES.

Bill