Dented hull from trailer/Paint Flaking? - O'Day 23

[Jclark29]

Hello Everyone,

I have a question about an O'Day 23, which I purchased late last season. I noticed a few months ago that the back side of the hull has been dented or flattened out due to where the boat sits on the rollers from the trailer. Is there any concern for this? Has anyone else noticed this before? Also as you can see from the the photos I have some "flaking" occuring. Can anyone tell me if this is bottom paint flaking or do I have an issue with the gel coat? Please see the photos below. Thanks for the help!

 

[Mich222]

I can address your dented hull question. When I purchased my 87 Oday 222, it had been on a bunk trailer for a few years. The bunk wood was rotting/ soft and the bunk post on the aft starboard side had caused a considerable dent in the hull- similar to what is shown in your picture. I lifted boat off the trailer and positioned on boat stands, replaced the rotted trailer bunks and left boat on boat stands for a couple of weeks. The dent disappeared. I checked several times during the process and after and saw no symptoms or troubles releated to the hull dent.

 

[HukilauMike]

I can't help you with the dents; I've never had that problem. The flaking looks like a bottom paint issue. The long-term solution is to strip the bottom of all paint, apply primer, and then fresh coats of bottom paint. If you really want to go whole hog, you can apply an epoxy barrier coat before (or instead of) the primer. Unless you are going to do the work yourself, this can get pretty expensive. You will however, get a really smooth bottom out of it.

However, if you are like me and would rather sail than sand and paint, you have some other options. When the bottom of my boat looks like that, I remove the paint in the flaking areas until I find well-adhered paint. I then lightly sand the "edges" of that area so that the well-adhered areas feather down to the bare hull. I then apply paint to the bare areas until it is built up to the same level as the surrounding, existing paint. This means usually two coats (I keep two coats of ablative bottom paint on my boat). I am guessing that if you need to put on more than three coats of paint on the bare area, this method might not work so well. I recognize that this is not a perfect solution. The flaking areas move or come back every year. However, it keeps the barnacles off the boat, and I am not going to spend several thousand dollars to have my Oday 23 sandblasted and painted.

 

[Indysailor]

My trailer doesn't have keel support yet. The previous owner had it that way for 15 years, and the bunks depress the hull a bit. To address this I support the keel with jack stands while it's on the trailer, but I'll soon be making a keel support so that it's always supported, rather than only when I park it (take out to yard is only about 750 yards).
Anyway, the hull must be pretty stout because it bounces right back. I think yours will be fine, but in the meantime you may want to address the issue of supporting the weight. The hull really shouldn't be taking the load like that.

 

[Joe11688]

The only thing I can think of for a reason for the flaking is that this hull may have never been bottom painted, but the PO may have applied some kind of a paint to the hull and neglected to remove the mold release wax from it prior to doing so.
It seems incredulous to think that a boat this old can still have mold release wax still on it from when it was molded at the factory, but it's true. An older boat's hull needs to be cleaned with Acetone before it is even roughed up for the primed coat. I would suggest doing whatever is necessary to remove the flaking and give the hull a few cleanings with Acetone. After that, you can use whatever you want on the bottom. Try using a strong power washer on the bottom. That would be a lot better than grinding off that flaking, I think.

I've been using an ablative bottom paint called Super Shipbottom for years now and I've had great results with it.
http://www.supershipbottom.com/PAINT SPECS.htm
This paint contains 62.5% copper. It has it's own primer built right into it and only requires one coat. It will go right over bare fiberglass and most bottom paints.
As for the dents, it's no biggie. I think they will disappear after a while. Perhaps there isn't enough weight on the keel and too much weight on the rollers. These boats have hard thick hulls and can sit with the boat's weight right on the keel with no problem. Some boats can't do this.