From Joy to $#@%!!!!

[RECESS]

The Joy

Dropping the sails and getting ready for a deep water swim.

Jumping in off the side of the sailboat, somewhere in that splash is my 4 year old.

My friend's child and our family have a nice swim and continuous climbing on the boat and jumping off.

Spending the day with friends sailing on the boat.

The $#*&!!!!!!!!!

Later that evening after a yacht club party and everyone had gone home we were getting ready to take the boat back to my friend's dock. The winds had died down and I cranked up the engine. The engine lurched forward when shifting from neutral to forward and cracked the transom. Such is the life of a boat owner. We had an easy time getting her on the trailer and I called RUdy at D&R Marine walked me through how to redo the entire transom. I have already ordered the 1/2" marine plywood, $67 for a sheet...yikes. Also ordered the primer and paint to make the transom look like it never happened. At 6 foot tall, this is going to be an exercise in yoga to get the boat ready. I am rather strangely looking forward to doing this. All things considered it is not so bad but the repair cost will kill our Tampa sailing trip.

 

[Don S/V ILLusion]

Guess the good news is that anything above the waterline is preferable to the converse. It looks like the transom could do with some reinforcement anyway Dave so find a small person who likes to do glass work and watch somebody else crawl thru there.

 

[RichBone]

GOLLLLY!!
Was there any plywood backing inside the transom?
What outboard did you you have on it?

My 25 has some backing glassed in and the mount feels solid.

 

[RECESS]

I have a 9.9 four stroke, and there is backing. It was the engine lurching forward and some of the wood in the original build is now soft but not completely rotted. It was just enough to allow the give to crack the glass all the way through. Luckily I have been doing glass work for many years. Good thing I have an AC unit, it will allow me stay in the bilge and knock it out.

 

[Joe11688]

Dave!
What a bummer!!! That bracket that you have on there is the same identical bracket that is on my boat. I would have thought that the bracket would have let go before the transom with a four stroke on it. That's really amazing. Oh well, just take your time and do a good repair. The summer has just barely started and you'll be back out there again soon. Good luck!
Joe

 

[sailormanbigd]

Be Careful

Being wedged inside the cockpit hatch will be hot, stuffy, yes. But the proxcimity of your nose, mouth, eyes to the glass resin could be a killer. Wear a good canister mask and probably goggles and it would'nt hurt to have a fan to exhaust the fumes. Just my two cents.

 

[adirondackbob]

Yikes! As others have said, Dave, this is a doable repair. But wow!

I replaced the entire motor mount set-up on my Oday 23 at the end of last season in part because I feared something like this might happen. My set-up was identical to yours except that my motor is a 1983 Honda 7.5 (which weighs about 80 lbs.). I had the marina remove the old bracket and the fiberglass wedge to which it was bolted. They replaced the wedge with a steel bracket made of hefty angle iron, which they bolted to the transom (reinforcing it with half-inch starboard backing plates). They attached a new Garelick motor mount (http://www.garelick.com/product.php?pnumber=71091) to that bracket. It's a much better set-up than I had before, and I think it was worth the expense.

Good luck, Dave!

Bob

 

[Joe11688]

Dave,
It might be worth installing a large Beckson deck plate in the middle of your inside transom to get at the work area. That way, you may not need to crawl into that confined area with those toxic fumes. Your health needs to come first.
Joe

 

[RECESS]

I am going to have a lot of air circulating through the bilge, both AC and Fan. I also have a chemical fume rated respirator, plus many breaks.

 

[RichBone]

I was crawling about in my cockpit hold several weeks ago to repair the scupper drain and while checking around I saw this-

(Sorry that I couldn't get the images larger, though I tried. Need some help on that.)

I had a new motor mount on my list already but this looks like I might have problems with the backing plate also.
And the list just keeps growing. Rich

 

[emergpa1]

does anyone have a photo(s) of what they have done to reinforce their transom?

Keith
(currently a back-yard sailor)

 

[RECESS]

The AC was a good idea. We removed the motor mount bracket, wedge, and the rudder brackets.

 

[Shoaldrafter]

R bone and Keith:

First, on my 26 there is previuous owner reinforcement. Basicaly adding stainless steel backing plate instead of fender washers.

For the motor mount, when the boat was built 8-9 hp motors weighed in about 80 pounds. My older 8 two stoke weighs in about 65. First answer is locate an older used serviceable two stoke 8-9.9 motor. Less stress on transom, an old transom.

If you insist on using a new four stroke motor at 100 pounds pluss and the reported additional torque of four stroke motors then the whole transom should be reinforced and longitudinal stringers added connected to the hull to spread the stress loads.

I would remove old wood reinforcements shown in RBones' picture and smoothe inside of whole transome. Start with a layer of glass then add a layer of marine plywood (at least 1/2 inch), then another layer of glass.

The layers of glass should be wrapped around to the hull for several inches. And a couple of small stringers epoxied to the hull to extend strengthened area so as to spread stress over a greater area.

Then in areas of motor mount, gudgeons, swim ladder and back stay add aluminum or stainless steel backing plate over area of connections.

Why all this? Because boat's transom was not made to handle the stress of currently available motors and that underlying existing reinforcement may be weakend thru age or moisture intrusion.

The pictures shown in this tread are not significantly different from other pictures posted in the past or on other forums. I recall stories of motors winding up in the deep six.

I also use a security cable from motor to stern rail. I might add one time I was happy I used such as old fashion motor mount had wooden backing that cracked off. I still use that motor mount but now it has a 2" plastic backing with 1/2" stainless steel backing plate.

Ed K
26

 

[OdayDave]

Dave -

When I reinforced mine after changing the motor mount , I took an old school desk-top (with solid plywood and a formica top) that my father-in-law had laying around his shop and used that as a backing plate. I should probably glass it in at some point, but the main thing I wanted to do is to spread the load. The original backing plates were pretty small on the 222. Anyhow, after looking at your pictures, I'm glad I did. Good luck with the repair. I suspect that it won't be that difficult of a repair (in terms of time) even though it looks pretty nasty. But count your lucky stars. If that had been below the water line and/or in nasty weather, the boat could have sunk quickly. And it happened at the end of the day. Everyone appears to be having a good time on a beautiful day. I will say that that is one good looking O'Day 25 and it will be better than new and back on the water in no time.

Good luck,

Dave
O'Day 222