Lead Keel Repairs

[karista]

I have not had much good luck re-fairing the lead keel where the covering had come off. I have tried sanding down to bare metal then applied Interlux Primocon Primer then followed with Interlux Watertite below water filler, then it was covered with 2 coats of Antifouling paint.
The boat was pulled yesterday and my keel fairing did not hold.
I have read on the board that the lead needs to be "etched" first, however no specific etching compound was named. I've contacted Interlux and they no longer are making etching material as theirs contained chromate, they simply recommended the same material/process that I had used, but did not work.
Anyone have experience with refinishing the lead keel and specificall what etching material (brand name) was used?

[Ken Heyman]

You may want to search our board on this subject. If I recall, Catalina's position on this is that it is not necessary to "re-epoxy"or recover the keel. I think Gerry Douglas is the source of this advice. You may want to call the factory. Bottom paint can be applied directly to the lead which you may want to rough up a bit.

good luck,

Ken

[Ken Heyman]

---here is what I was referring to:

Ken


http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,5795.0.html





Jim.
On the bottom of my keel, parts of the gelcoat has flaked off.  Apparently not a good grip on the lead.  Spoke face to face with Gerry Douglas at a recent boat show about it.  He said the beauty of lead is that exposure is not a problem.  He told me not to bother fairing it with epoxy, but just paint over it with bottom paint.  Been like that for a couple seasons and really no issues found.

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Roc - "Sea Life" 2000 MKII #1477


Roger Blake
Forum - Petty Officer 2nd Class


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Boat Name / Hull Number: Last Call/#1414
Model Year: 1998
Home Port: Chesapeake Bay (Herring Bay)
Posts: 110



     Re: Round holes on keel
« Reply #4 on: August 02, 2010, 04:32:04 PM » Quote 

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I had a similar issue in 2008...cracks throughout the cover over the lead. Talked to Frank Butler and Kent Nelson at Catalina Yachts about it. Got a similar response...no structural problem, lead is lead, just paint over it...which is what I've been doing with no other problems arising.
 

[Roger Blake]

I had a the same problem on my 1998 MKII. Talked with Frank Butler...who said, lead doesn't rust...just put bottom paint over it. I can report that I've had no issues with doing just that...2 years later and all is well.

[Ralph Masters]

Great information, thanks.  I'll print this and put it in my note book and when it's time to take care of that "Catalina Smile" as my surveyor called it I'll be one up.

Ralph
Ciao Bella

[karista]

I had a the same problem on my 1998 MKII. Talked with Frank Butler...who said, lead doesn't rust...just put bottom paint over it. I can report that I've had no issues with doing just that...2 years later and all is well.

Yes, I know Lead does not rust, however just painting over the exposed lead while still having part of the keel encapsulated is not something that I would want to do. The encapsulated material is about 3/16-1/4" thick so while they edges could be feathered in, it would look very suspect to any surveyor. I contacted one of the best known yards here and they did not agree (neither did Interlux support) with painting antifouling directly on to lead, while no fairing is needed if one does not object to having a 3/16=1/4 offset, then 2 coats of a binding primer must applied. I will try to find a chromate etching primer and then redo the entire keel and remove all the outside material. Nautical Coatings in Clearwater, Fl lists a 2 part Chromate Primer on their website, so that maybe the solution.

[Gary]

I understand your concerns about adhesion and also fairing the repair to the remaining fiberglass so that the repair becomes invisible. I did have a similar problem. It was a hand sized section, lower aft, starboard side of a fin keel. The fiberglass was not adhered to the keel and came away easily in my hand in a laminated layer. I used one small container of Marine-Tex to fill the void and faired it to the existing firm glass and lead surface, finishing with a block sander. No problems after 5 seasons and the repair is not visible under bottom paint.

Gary

[Stu Jackson]

Before and after pictures of our keel in December 2010.  Doesn't look like a whole lot of buildup of surface coating.  IIRC the yard used MarineTex or West epoxy to fix the trailing edge of the keel.

[Jack Hutteball]

Wow Stu, looks loke you were chased by a shark!:D

[pablosgirl]

Here are the before and after pictures of my removal of an ear to ear Catalina smile on our boat.  The the gel coat faring was cracked and de-laminating from the keel and the hull at the joint area.  The area affected was from the leading edge of the keel to about 4 feet aft of the leading edge on both sides.  To repair I ground out the old faring that was no longer sound and filled the keel-hull joint with west system epoxy thickened with filler.  I then sanded the filler flush and then applied 6oz 4" wide fiberglass cloth tape over the faring.  I then followed this with 6oz 6" wide fiberglass cloth tape to build up the keel-hull joint area to near the original thickness and to reinforce the fairing.  I then used west system epoxy thickened with a colloidal silica filler for the final fairing compound.  I then applied 4 coats of Interlux E2000 barrier coat over the hull and keel after sanding off all the old bottom paint.

[pablosgirl]

One more after the repair shot since I was over the 250Kb limit by 1KB on total pic size for a post.

Paul Shields
C34 #551 Pablo's Girl