I apologize for the tardy response. So here goes my Oday 23 is a 1973 model. It has an iron trunk with retractable fiber glass keel. Do you know if the fiberglass keel contains any lead or heavy metal within the fiberglass? I do have the dinette post and was able to find the crank. However I have bigger problems now the keel is stuck in the trunk. The boat has been sitting on land since 1996 so the iron trunk has rusted away causing a layer of friction between the keel and the iron case. Also the hinge that the keel swings on might also be frozen. I tried every thing from clearing the gap between trunk and fiberglass. Drilling holes into fiberglass and pulling keel down, banging down on keel from inside boat however it wouldn’t move an inch. Has anyone experienced a similar problem like this? I feel like the boat is worthless and won’t sail well without the keel down, this is the only problem with the boat everything else is mint. I also thought of fiber glassing an extension to the keel and making a new one that was fixed. Has anyone ever tried jerry rigging a new keel onto a stuck keel? Any help on this matter will be greatly appreciated. -Stephen Paul Westbury, NY 516-236-8026 spaulhk@gmail.com
Keel woes.
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B
Bob
stuck centerboard
Hi Stephen; Since nobody else has offered suggestions, I'll take a stab at it. I wonder if any part of the centerboard is sticking down below the boat. If so, what, if any clearance is there to the ground below? Is the boat on a trailer, or cradle? If there is some part of the cb to grab onto, I'm thinking you might be able to pull it free with a come along, or some other winch arrangement, perhaps by drilling through the cb and installing a shackle or other hardware as an attachment point. I have no idea what the load tolerance would be though; you might just rip the board apart. To do this, you would have to provide enough clearance to extend all the way. I once worked with a friend to jack up a powerboat that was resting on the ground. We gradually raised it up, by stacking blocks with cross planks. When we got the height we needed, we were able to drive a trailer under the boat. This can be very risky, and must be done with great care, and with proper tools and materials. And it will be trickier with a sailboat. You don't want the boat crashing to the ground, especially with a person in its path. If you could hire some sort of crane, that might be good. All in all, it's probably safer and no more expensive to haul the boat to a yard and have them fix it. I don't think an add on of any sort is feasible, short of getting professionals to make a proper permanent keel and install it. I imagine the cost for that would be prohibitive. The stock answer for your problem is to contact Rudy at D&R Marine for his advice. His web page is easily found in a search. If you don't already know, Rudy worked for ODay for years, and probably has more related knowledge and supplies for ODay owners than any other single source. Good luck with a very frustrating situation.
Hi Stephen; Since nobody else has offered suggestions, I'll take a stab at it. I wonder if any part of the centerboard is sticking down below the boat. If so, what, if any clearance is there to the ground below? Is the boat on a trailer, or cradle? If there is some part of the cb to grab onto, I'm thinking you might be able to pull it free with a come along, or some other winch arrangement, perhaps by drilling through the cb and installing a shackle or other hardware as an attachment point. I have no idea what the load tolerance would be though; you might just rip the board apart. To do this, you would have to provide enough clearance to extend all the way. I once worked with a friend to jack up a powerboat that was resting on the ground. We gradually raised it up, by stacking blocks with cross planks. When we got the height we needed, we were able to drive a trailer under the boat. This can be very risky, and must be done with great care, and with proper tools and materials. And it will be trickier with a sailboat. You don't want the boat crashing to the ground, especially with a person in its path. If you could hire some sort of crane, that might be good. All in all, it's probably safer and no more expensive to haul the boat to a yard and have them fix it. I don't think an add on of any sort is feasible, short of getting professionals to make a proper permanent keel and install it. I imagine the cost for that would be prohibitive. The stock answer for your problem is to contact Rudy at D&R Marine for his advice. His web page is easily found in a search. If you don't already know, Rudy worked for ODay for years, and probably has more related knowledge and supplies for ODay owners than any other single source. Good luck with a very frustrating situation.
M
Mike
A lot of company
You are not the only one with this problem. The Oday 23 swinging centerboard is a hot topic on this website. Check the archives for more than you will ever want to know. It sounds like you have tried just about everything non-destructive to free the board, and the remaining options are not attractive. However, let me offer the following info: you do not need the board to sail safely. The ballast of the 23 is encapsulated in the stub keel. The board is not a big weight and does not provide a great deal of the righting power of the boat. The board does make a difference in how well the boat sails; with the board down the boat will point higher and make less leeway. All good things, but not killers. It sounds like your board may have become waterlogged over the years and is now too big for the trunk. Your idea to glass in a new non-moving fin sounds novel: in reading all of the posts about frozen centerboards on this site over the years, I do not recall anyone else taking that on. The majority seem to find a way to unfreeze the board or simply do without. Good luck.
You are not the only one with this problem. The Oday 23 swinging centerboard is a hot topic on this website. Check the archives for more than you will ever want to know. It sounds like you have tried just about everything non-destructive to free the board, and the remaining options are not attractive. However, let me offer the following info: you do not need the board to sail safely. The ballast of the 23 is encapsulated in the stub keel. The board is not a big weight and does not provide a great deal of the righting power of the boat. The board does make a difference in how well the boat sails; with the board down the boat will point higher and make less leeway. All good things, but not killers. It sounds like your board may have become waterlogged over the years and is now too big for the trunk. Your idea to glass in a new non-moving fin sounds novel: in reading all of the posts about frozen centerboards on this site over the years, I do not recall anyone else taking that on. The majority seem to find a way to unfreeze the board or simply do without. Good luck.
Stuck Keel unstuck
So after trying everything possible I was able to get the keel free by straight brute force. For future reference I stuck an iron pole through the dinette table hole where the keel attaches to the retracting wire and banged down on the pole with a sledge hammer for about one hour. Note since you only have a small hole in which to insert the pole into the pole contact point will be a small surface area i.e. the size of a silver dollar. Banging on this will cause the blunt end of the pole to dig into the fiberglass however don’t be discouraged the pole will become lodged on so much until it will effectively start moving the keel downward. The keel now needs to be re-fiber glassed due to rotting but its better than sailing without a keel. P.S. Bob I tried your approach by drilling holes through the centerboard and attaching screws through the whole and pulling on those screws. However since the fiberglass centerboard had been rotting away for years the pressure on the screws would break through the fiberglass. Another approach could be attaching a clamp (vice) to the small naked portion of the centerboard and pulling the vice down. I haven’t tried this but that may be an alternative for someone else with the same problem. Special Thank to Mike and Bob for your advice
So after trying everything possible I was able to get the keel free by straight brute force. For future reference I stuck an iron pole through the dinette table hole where the keel attaches to the retracting wire and banged down on the pole with a sledge hammer for about one hour. Note since you only have a small hole in which to insert the pole into the pole contact point will be a small surface area i.e. the size of a silver dollar. Banging on this will cause the blunt end of the pole to dig into the fiberglass however don’t be discouraged the pole will become lodged on so much until it will effectively start moving the keel downward. The keel now needs to be re-fiber glassed due to rotting but its better than sailing without a keel. P.S. Bob I tried your approach by drilling holes through the centerboard and attaching screws through the whole and pulling on those screws. However since the fiberglass centerboard had been rotting away for years the pressure on the screws would break through the fiberglass. Another approach could be attaching a clamp (vice) to the small naked portion of the centerboard and pulling the vice down. I haven’t tried this but that may be an alternative for someone else with the same problem. Special Thank to Mike and Bob for your advice
freed centerboard
So after trying everything possible I was able to get the keel free by straight brute force. For future reference I stuck an iron pole through the dinette table hole where the keel attaches to the retracting wire and banged down on the pole with a sledge hammer for about one hour. Note since you only have a small hole in which to insert the pole into the pole contact point will be a small surface area i.e. the size of a silver dollar. Banging on this will cause the blunt end of the pole to dig into the fiberglass however don’t be discouraged the pole will become lodged on so much until it will effectively start moving the keel downward. The keel now needs to be re-fiber glassed due to rotting but its better than sailing without a keel. P.S. Bob I tried your approach by drilling holes through the centerboard and attaching screws through the whole and pulling on those screws. However since the fiberglass centerboard had been rotting away for years the pressure on the screws would break through the fiberglass. Another approach could be attaching a clamp (vice) to the small naked portion of the centerboard and pulling the vice down. I haven’t tried this but that may be an alternative for someone else with the same problem.
So after trying everything possible I was able to get the keel free by straight brute force. For future reference I stuck an iron pole through the dinette table hole where the keel attaches to the retracting wire and banged down on the pole with a sledge hammer for about one hour. Note since you only have a small hole in which to insert the pole into the pole contact point will be a small surface area i.e. the size of a silver dollar. Banging on this will cause the blunt end of the pole to dig into the fiberglass however don’t be discouraged the pole will become lodged on so much until it will effectively start moving the keel downward. The keel now needs to be re-fiber glassed due to rotting but its better than sailing without a keel. P.S. Bob I tried your approach by drilling holes through the centerboard and attaching screws through the whole and pulling on those screws. However since the fiberglass centerboard had been rotting away for years the pressure on the screws would break through the fiberglass. Another approach could be attaching a clamp (vice) to the small naked portion of the centerboard and pulling the vice down. I haven’t tried this but that may be an alternative for someone else with the same problem.
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