On my 1987 Hunter Legend 35 ....
I had noticed that over the past year or two, 5 of 6 of my Beckson opening ports were starting to leak brown stuff (water'ish) from behind the inside mounting flange. Clearly leaking around and not through.
I've pulled out two of the ports, and have found a small mess. I though I post here and solicit comments about how best to tackle this problem.
Current status: The plywood core from the cabin side is very wet in both the ports I have out, and is somewhat rotten in one of them.
My plan: My current thought, it to remove all 6 ports, and begin cleaning out rotten core material, and then let it dry, possibly over winter in order to maximize the amount of water I can get out.
Then, once dried out, and fully cleaned of rotten core, I'll fill the missing section of core with new wood, or just plain epoxy filler. I'd like to make a permanent bond between the inner and outer skin around the core, so no further water can make it to the core. The silocon use originally bonded well to the plastic of the port, but not as well to the edges of the opening in the hull (rough cut fiberglass, and the edge of the core plywood. I believe it will bond better to fairly smooth epoxy that I'll use to fill/replace the old core with.
At this point, I intend on re-using th old ports. They appear to be working well and replacing then with new ones would be quite expensive.
The Beckson website recommends trimming excess plastic that protrudes outside, beyond the exterior decorative flange. Hunter didn't do this, but I intend on doing this to help with the drainage of water that can sometimes collect there (even though these are the "rain drain" version of the ports).
Once the holes are prepared, and the ports fitted and trimmed on the outside to be flush, I'll remount them with black silicon (ports are black).
Is there anything else I should be doing to do this job right?
Thanks
Chris
I had noticed that over the past year or two, 5 of 6 of my Beckson opening ports were starting to leak brown stuff (water'ish) from behind the inside mounting flange. Clearly leaking around and not through.
I've pulled out two of the ports, and have found a small mess. I though I post here and solicit comments about how best to tackle this problem.
Current status: The plywood core from the cabin side is very wet in both the ports I have out, and is somewhat rotten in one of them.
My plan: My current thought, it to remove all 6 ports, and begin cleaning out rotten core material, and then let it dry, possibly over winter in order to maximize the amount of water I can get out.
Then, once dried out, and fully cleaned of rotten core, I'll fill the missing section of core with new wood, or just plain epoxy filler. I'd like to make a permanent bond between the inner and outer skin around the core, so no further water can make it to the core. The silocon use originally bonded well to the plastic of the port, but not as well to the edges of the opening in the hull (rough cut fiberglass, and the edge of the core plywood. I believe it will bond better to fairly smooth epoxy that I'll use to fill/replace the old core with.
At this point, I intend on re-using th old ports. They appear to be working well and replacing then with new ones would be quite expensive.
The Beckson website recommends trimming excess plastic that protrudes outside, beyond the exterior decorative flange. Hunter didn't do this, but I intend on doing this to help with the drainage of water that can sometimes collect there (even though these are the "rain drain" version of the ports).
Once the holes are prepared, and the ports fitted and trimmed on the outside to be flush, I'll remount them with black silicon (ports are black).
Is there anything else I should be doing to do this job right?
Thanks
Chris
