Hunter 30 stanchions

[Ron-Anne]

I visited our 1990 Hunter 30 last week and found one stachion bent over and broken just above the two braces, there are two bolts inboard of the toerail anchoring these braces and the nuts are hidden below deck, are these nuts captive or do I have to cut a hole from inside to get to them? Thanks for any help

 

[Steve Dion]

You may want to try backing out the screws. Chances are there is aluminum in the deck. You may have corrosion on the threads, so have patience.

 

[Nelsonhow]

On my 83 H30 you can reach the station nuts from inside the cabin . I need a deep dish socket with a small stubby ratchet handle and for some of of nuts a short extension with a flex joint. You need someone on deck with a screwdriver with a vice grip on the screwdriver shank.

 

[navigator97]

On my 1990 H-33.5 the stanchions have machine screw bolts with Philips Head and screw into a metal plate imbeded into the deck. If they are hard to unscrew, press down on a good sized Philips screwdriver and use a pliers (or the like) on the shaft of the screwdriver low down. It will take patience to get it to pop free, then you can just unscrew them. I had some of mine bend and one "tear" and I brought them to a metal shop that did stainless steel welding. They straightened the bent ones, and ground, welded, ground, and polished the one that tore. It is hard to see where they repaired it.

 

[Ray Bowles]

If you have screws holding the post then replace them with SS bolts of the same size and thread pitch and it will be much easier to install or remove in the future.
Ray