1965 Alcort Sunfish WAVE 09 Dec 20 Deck/Hull Seam Adhesive

09 Dec 20:

Sandbags off, deck shape looks great.

I should let Skipper order fabric, she knows what she is doing and I MIGHT have over-ordered. 5 square yards of 6 oz fiberglass cloth and about 12 square yards of woven roving. Might be able to build another boat.

Jamestown Distributors sends out these nice mixing cups, and we highlight the ratio we are using so we can find the right column easily while pouring. Today it was 5:1 Epoxy. Resin to Hardener. Ignore the last 1.

We used Great Stuff expanding foam to adhere the top front of the structural blocks to the underside of the deck. It will work fine as long as we don't let water fill the hull for extended periods, it is not closed cell and would eventually absorb water. We used it here because we didn't want to split any more seam than was already split, and the deck could only be raised so high.

Put down a bead of THIXO Wood thickened epoxy then laid a one inch wide strip of fiberglass cloth. The cloth helps distribute and hold the epoxy in the seam, a tip given to us by Howie, who repaired built Sunfish for 18 years at Alcort then AMF, and then did another 10 years of warranty repairs.

Skipper wet out the cloth with TotalBoat 5:1 High Performance Epoxy

We used a syringe to inject thickened epoxy into the deck/hull seam when the gap got small.

New adhesive to fasten Capn Jack's bow handle stainless repair plate to the deck, that was his fix to where a previous bow handle had torn off and left a hole in the bow. We added a strip of fiberglass cloth to act as a catch basin for a THIXO blob, that will fill and seal the hole. Just to confuse you I have the stainless plate turned around facing the wrong way.

Hmmmm, Float Test or fairing and sanding next? Maybe an air leak test...

Alan sent WAVE and PHOENIX some bow trim.

WAVE's peeking outside...

Log of WAVE.

Wilcox and Crittenden Co Inc Catalog 1954

02 Mar 19:

A few bits from the 1954 Wiclox and Crittenden Co. Inc catalog. They made the hardware for Alcort sailboats, the Sunfish and Sailfish. We have a lot of the hardware, one of our favorites is the bow handle for the wooden Alcorts. They run about 50 dollars today on the Old New Stock market.

We also like their boat hooks.

Now we know where to get our ice pick holders!

Wilcox and Crittenden Boat Hook, Chocks and Bow Handle

07 Feb 19

Rounded up some more Wilcox and Crittenden hardware for use on our boats. We will make another padook with the galvanized boat hook, it feels like the perfect weight. We love the crusty patina.

The tabbed bow handles fit on the wooden Alcort Standard Sailfish, Super Sailfish and Sunfish. We are losing track of how many boats we have, but I think this is a spare :)

I'm not sure what I was more excited about, the box or the chocks inside. The chocks will go on our little Sorg Runabout WILLOW.

Alcort Super Sailfish ZSA ZSA 29 Dec 18 Deck Fittings

29 Dec 18:

Trimmed the toe rail a bit to fit for the bow handle. The wooden Alcort bow handles have a tab that wraps the bow, and another strip attaches below and wraps the keel.

Keel strip wraps back about 16 inches.

Attached mast collar with #8 silicone bronze screws, drilled a pilot hole that matched the screw shank diameter and a countersink for the head of the screw. Attached the halyard cleat with the vintage Alcort bronze screws.

Drilled pilot holes and attached eyestraps with vintage Alcort bronze screws.

We like line bridles, the original boat would have had a 2 loop or 3 loop plastic coated wire bridle. 2 loop bridles are the standard today on new boats.

Attached the bow line and splashguard. Splashguard functions more as a handhold or foot rest.

Log of ZSA ZSA.

Sunfish Bits

14 Jun 18:

We picked up a few Sunfish bits, one bit was a vintage mainsheet with the bronze clip on the end. The line and the clip is really nice, but the lines measure around 22 feet, with 25 feet being an optimum length. For our low speed recreational sailing 22 feet is plenty.

The other bit was a bow handle designed for the wooden Alcort boats. The bow handle was made by Wilcox and Crittenden, Alcort's hometown hardware makers. The handle is chrome plated bronze and has the WC mark on the side. The tab on the front was for the wooden Sailfish and Sunfish, it covered the stem and another piece of aluminum quarter round flows down along the stem and keel for 18 inches.

1978 AMF Sunfish SUGAR 2 Intake Assessment

01 Jun 18:

Ready to do some work on SUGAR 2 but thought we'd check to see if she took on water at the car wash.



Grabbed a couple of carpenter trestles for SUGAR 2, she'll get worked on out at the Carriage House.

The halyard cleat backer block needs replacement, plus it is a good idea to have an inspection port to sponge out water, so we are adding a 6 inch port just ahead of the daggerboard trunk. The port cap makes a nice template to mark the hole size.

We use a jigsaw to cut the hole, and make a starter hole for the jigsaw blade with a 3/8th inch drill bit. If the gelcoat is nice, we tape over the deck with blue tape and draw the circle on the tape, to protect the gelcoat from vibration marks from shoe of the jigsaw. Another tip from one of the team was to tape the shoe.

A look inside at the guts.



The EPS foam structural and flotation blocks are in great condition as well as the expanding foam that holds them in place. There are some light spots on the mast step tube and daggerboard trunk that indicate chipped resin. The halyard cleat backer block is gone and someone siliconed in molly bolts :( But the halyard fairlead backer is still in good shape.

Wrong cleat and wrong fasteners, we cut off the cheapo molly bolts with a DeWALT multi oscillating tool. We will repair the huge holes left from the molly bolts.

SUGAR 2 hasn't even made it all the way off of the trailer and the inspection port hole is already cut and crummy cleat removed. We left her tilted so the little bit of water could drain out.

Interior is drying out, turned our attention to the bow handle. No molly bolts, yay!

We removed the weird handle and probed the holes to see if there was any remnants of the wooden backer block. What we did is poke inside the hole with an awl or paper clip to feel for solid wood. If there was still wood there, then we could have repaired the hole with thickened epoxy and a dowel or toothpicks, let it dry and redrill new holes. Or move the bow handle aft a 1/2 inch or so to drill into new wood. We also drilled a small hole and watched to see if wood shavings came out, no luck, that would have indicated that there was still a block there. S we'll split the bow to put in a new backer block.

Flipped the boat to sand off old fiberglass repairs. We used 40 grit on a DeWALT random orbital sander to take down the big blobs of resin and fiberglass and 120 grit pads to remove the old paint. Our thought was to paint the entire boat but we may be able to salvage the center section and just paint the bow and stern. Also removed the bailer and checked the cockpit/hull bailer seam for splits.

Skipper dug out the old sealant from the daggerboard trunk.

Good size hole to fill in the daggerboard trunk.

Log of SUGAR 2.