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I've done the Mainesail polish/wax treatment twice on my prior C250, and just a week ago on my C34mkII. It gets easier each time.

He does give some options on which materials to use, so I'll briefly describe what I use.

I really like using the Presta Ultra Cutting Cream for the polish. It starts as a course grit, but breaks down into a fine polish as you work it in with an electric buffer with wool pad. This gets you a nice shine in one step. The 32 oz bottle is costly at $30, but lasts a long time. I've done my C250 (twice) and 34mkII once, and still have a little left over. I also have the Collinite Liquid FG Cleaner that I use for hand-polishing intricate areas, but for a large smooth surface I prefer the Presta with electric buffer.

Make frequent use of a spray bottle with water to extend the open time of the Presta and provide cooling. If it dries out, you may damage the fiberglass due to excessive abrasion and/or overheating.

For the wax I have used Collinite 850 Fleet Wax. If you have done your polishing correctly, it should be wipe on/wipe off without any electric buffing required. If it's hard to get off, you're waiting too long, doing it in sunlight, and/or did not do a good enough job polishing. This year I used up the 850 and needed more on short notice (not enough time to order online or drive all the way to West Marine), and the guy at the nearby auto refinish store told me their 476s is the same stuff, just packaged and marketed for the automotive market. So I bought some and it seems to be the same as 850. Collinite's application tables suggest that it's the same stuff as well (same balance of properties). So if you want to support your local business, I'd suggest considering the 476s if your Presta dealer also carries Collinite. One advantage of buying locally is the ability to return unused material, which came in handy when I didn't end up needing that new bottle of Presta.

For my bootstrip restoration I have always started with a wet sand on the blue gelcoat bootstripe, followed by the Presta and wax. Don't overdo the sanding. You will see some light blue residue during the wet sanding. If your bootstripe is painted, all bets are off and you should be very careful. If the paint is Awlgrip or other 2-part urethane, I would only follow manufacturer's instructions for polishing.

I've used Poliglow on other boats, and have very mixed feelings about it. I'd always recommend the Mainesail procedure, and only resort to Poliglow if you find it impossible to get a truly glossy, non-porous finish by that method, or the hull form of the boat is too irregular to use a mechanical polisher. The former was the case with our Phantom sailing dinghy, and the latter was the case with our Trophy fishing boat. Polyglow worked well for those cases, but the Mainsail procedure gets superior results that last longer.

No worries. I realize that it's always a work in progress.

I did not make this up.

I went to the section that seemed to make sense: Diesel Engine - Mechanical

http://c34.org/wikiwp/?rdp_we_resource=http%3A%2F%2Fc34.org%2Fwiki%2Findex.php%3Ftitle%3DDiesel_Engine#Mechanical

Scroll to the text that says "Transmissions:Hurth Transmission Cable Adjustment PDF file" to confirm that it is a dead link.

The service bulletin covering adjusting the travel is on the tech wiki.

It seems that there is a placeholder for it in the Wiki, but the actual link to the PDF is missing. (I can't find the message right now, but I remember us discussing this before and realizing Westerbeke had reorganized their website, breaking many of the Wiki's links):

https://www.westerbeke.com/service%20bulletin/sb_136.pdf

This 1984 service bulletin is unremarkable for owners of later engines, because our manuals were updated to incorporate its recommendations. However, the pictures can be useful for visualizing the required throw distance of the shift lever. (Picture worth a thousand words.)

As for the issue of the pedestal's shift lever not being able to throw the transmission's shift lever far enough to be in spec, please see my attached picture to see how I fixed the problem by adjusting the mounting plate. The two holes with worn paint around them are the ones that were originally used to mount this plate to the transmission. You can see by the red circles that I enlarged an adjacent hole, and drilled a new hole, which enabled mounting the plate 1/2" further aft, causing the shift cable to throw the shift lever symmetrically forward and reverse (with some minor adjustment on the normal linkage screws), and in agreement with Westerbeke's recommendation.

After drilling the holes where the red circles are, I polished the rust off of the mounting plate and painted it up nicely, but failed to get a picture of it. Next time I am down at the boat I'll get a picture of the modified plate as mounted on the transmission.

A little Google searching shows that this issue (insufficient throw into forward gear) is fairly common for the Hurth/Westerbeke installations on multiple boats, having been reported here and on Sailnet and CruisersForum, and elsewhere. So this modification does have potential to help a lot of people. But it all has to start with a measurement of the actual throw distance of the shift lever on the transmission. If the throw does not go far enough into forward gear (per Westerbeke's spec), my modification could help.

I too have problems shifting into forward gear. When coming off the mooring, it takes four attempts before I'm successful, that is I push into forward gear, wait a bit, then a little accelerator, but nothing then back to neutral and try again.

I've had my boat (C34 Mark II #1801) about eighteen months. When I bought it, the Edson shift lever was hitting against the pedestal guard tube. Last September I replaced the original two lever system with an Edson single lever side mounted engine control.Now the lever doesn't hit anything.

My mechanic says he's adjusted the cable as much as possible and that now the gearbox needs to be pulled out and overhauled, in particular the shift selector.The only thing that makes me question this advice is that once I've been motoring for a while, say fifteen minutes, and I take it out of gear, it will go into gear on the first attempt every time. This may be a co-incidence or it may be related to the gearbox warming up. I would have thought that if the problem was cable adjustment, the problem would remain regardless of how long the engine had been running. The engine (M-35B) only has about 260 hours on it, so the gearbox should not be too worn.

Does anyone have any suggestions on solving this problem?

Thanks

I'm sorry to hear that you may have wasted your money on a shift arm that didn't fix the problem.

I think your mechanic may be lacking a little creativity in saying that he's adjusted the cable as much as possible. He (or you) can drill another hole or two in the mounting plate and get a whole lot more adjustment latitude. That resolved the issue for me. See my replies #22 and 27 for information on this.

But before you do that, you need to refer to your engine manual for the specs on how far the shift lever (on the transmission itself) should be moving. There should be a couple of specs listed, depending on which hole your cable is connecting to. (I suggest the inner hole, as that gives the longest travel of the lever.) Actuate the shift lever at the transmission with the shift cable attached, since that will let you know if your cockpit lever is limiting the motion. The travel should be the same forward and aft, and greater than the mfr spec in each direction. If not, then you you need to get it right, possibly by repositioning the mounting plate as I described in reply #22 and 27.

I would not consider a rebuild unless you confirm that the shift lever complies with mfg specs, because if you rebuild and the problem goes away, it may come back later due to wear/damage from the shift lever not moving far enough.

My own transmission was rebuilt by the prior owner, and I wonder if the shift lever being out of spec is what required the rebuild in the first place.

Just a quick update. As a test I re-masked around the hatch, taking care that everything was sealed very well, and it was bone dry through several heavy rain storms. So I spent the last couple days picking the old caulk out from around the LP tank pan (using utility knives, putty knives, multi-tool scraper, various solvents -- whatever worked). Today I filled up the void with a nice large bead of 3M 4000UV. It will be several days before our next rain event, but since the masking tape worked and the pan itself looks to be water tight, I expect that this leak is history. I'll try to get pics someday. It the leak isn't fixed, I'll be back for advice on what to try next.

Unfortunately, I live in a place with seasons  , so with the winter cover in place I was limited to putting masking tape around the hatch. It rained yesterday, and there was still water that leaked in. So either the masking tape failed to make a good seal, or the leak is coming from somewhere else. I'll try again in the spring.

What kind of caulk did you use?

Thanks for posting this. I tried your weatherstripping fix, and it didn't stop the problem. My caulking is clearly deteriorated, and is a likely source of the problem.

How did you re-caulk? Did you remove the whole liner and re-bed it? (Might be difficult if there are propane vent hoses attached.) Or did you just pick out as much old caulk as you could and shoot some new stuff in from above?

That whole are is a little tough to get to right now under my boat cover, but this will go to the top of my list for as soon as my boat is uncovered.

I fully agree, and share your concern about people being fooled and/or forced to buy a cocktail of 6 medicines when 5 of them are unnecessary for a given need. The reason that people are being "forced" is because manufacturers are discontinuing their one- or two-medication products in their race to have more comprehensive label claim on multi-symptom concoctions. For instance, "Sudafed" has become a brand instead of a trade name for a decongestant. "Sudafed Plus" (which was renamed as "Sudafed Cold & Allergy") was a useful pairing of ingredients because the undesirable side effects canceled each other out, so that was good. Unfortunately you can't even find it anymore, as it's been displaced by multi symptom cocktails that cause some to overdose when people unknowingly double up by taking it in combination with things like Advil.

Off my soapbox now.

Back to the original topic, my specific curiosity was over the implication that WD40 is as bad as silicone. That's a strong condemnation, and I'd like to know what, specifically, makes it deserve that.

Your criticism is more mild and more reasonable. I'd like to compile a list of single-ingredient recommendations for rust removal, penetrating anti-seize, crevice lubrication, etc. Is there a thread that covers these things all in one place?

Back to WD40, I have found it to be a really good plasticizer. I have a really nice inkjet printer that happens to be 20 years old. Only problem is that every few years it stops feeding paper because the rubber rollers dried out and won't grab the paper. Some WD40, applied to the rollers every couple years, has kept it running great. Like Stu, I've found that this makes it really good for restoring the sealing effectiveness of rubberized gaskets on ports, hatches, etc.

No need to paint it, Bill. Paint traps heat, right?   But throw away the WD40.  I think of it as silicone (only place to use it is on the Beckson ports).  Get Boeshield T9 for that use, and PB Blaster to remove stubborn nuts & bolts.

Just to keep this fact-based, what offending ingredient does WD-40 contain, and what are its objectionable effects?

...Unfortunately the world of laptops is not so sane. Different laptop brands and models specify different voltage levels and need more than 2 amps to charge quickly. Unless a particular laptop offers a 12 volt charger as an accessory, it means that you have to provide its proprietary charger with120 volts AC via an inverter if you are the boat or in the car...

I'd encourage anyone to shop around for a pure DC charger that runs off of 12v instead of an inverter. Step-up chargers that provide 19-20vDC are easy to find with plugs to fit virtually any laptop. I have a Targus one with about 8 different tips for Dell, Lenovo, Asus, etc; a genuine HP/Compaq one that also works for an old MSI netbook, one from PWR that's designed to work with a newer Asus (with a smaller tip), and another one from PWR that works with an Acer tablet/laptop hybrid. The generic ones can be found on Amazon usually for under $15. So far, every one that I have has outlasted the laptop they were bought for.

It's worth the effort to have the more efficient charging of pure DC. I hate inverters with the passion of someone who has had one catch fire. My new boat came with a really nice pure sine wave inverter that someday I'll use to for the microwave while at anchor, but meanwhile it's much better to invest in 12v appliances on the boat and avoid inverter wherever possible. So much runs off of 12v these days anyway.

To return to my question, is there any perceived benefit to drying the area around the bolts and under the washers, then applying some bedding (perhaps MainSail's butyl) to keep water and chloride ions out of the crevices? It might also provide enough lubrication to avoid scraping away the passivation layer. Both, taken together, might inhibit crevice corrosion.  Any reason why this would be a bad idea?

FWIW, my SuperLube is a totally different product, their "Synthetic Grease" meant for lubricating. It also has PTFE. I bought it to lubricate the steering chain on my C250, and then inherited a second tube that the PO of my current boat left behind.

To add to the knowledge base here, I exchanged a private message today with Drew Fry, who did the 2010 corrosion testing for Practical Sailor:

Hi Drew,

I need to replace my float switch. It's going to require splicing with a heat-sealed butt connector in the bilge, and I want to make sure I minimize any possible corrosion. I've ordered some NO-OX-ID for general use around the boat, and am also considering some lower viscosity penetrating spray for other hard-to-reach places (unrelated to the splices).

I know that you were heavily involved in the Practical Sailor testing of anti-corrosives in 2010, so would value your recommendations, In particular, I am curious about why the TC-11 that was so highly rated in 2007 was not included in your testing in 2010. Has there been a formulation change or something else affecting efficacy or availability?

What products do you currently use for various anti-corrosion needs?

Thanks,

Rick Sonntag
Swarthmore, PA
s/v "Breakin' Away" in Rock Hall MD
---End Quote---
No particular reason, TC-11 simply was not included. I have no reason to think it isn't very good. As for spray, I've been using Corrosion Block. They also make a grease which is pretty good, though not as good as...

Green Grease. Actually, there is a new set of grease tests coming out soon in PS, and Green Grease (omni lubes--they have it at Advanced Autoparts) seems even better, although No-Ox-Id is still very good. Thee will also be an article coming out showing that conductive greases that contain metals actually increase corrosion, compared with plain grease. Dissimilar metals, it seems, never help.

So long as you use a properly adjusted ratchet crimper (test pulling the wire out, hard--something should break) grease is not needed.

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I did not realize that Catalina finished the bilge with gelcoat. I thought it was just paint over top the fiberglass layup. I also did not realize that they would do this after the washers and nuts were tightened onto the keel bolts. I sort of thought that they would finish all fiberglass work in the keel sump first, then bolt on the keel.

I don't really see any signs of gelcoat on top of my washers.

The washer for my front-most keel bolt has some brown rust on it, but the washer can't be removed because of interference from the drain scupper that sticks out over it. I tried some CLR on it, but the best I could do was to go in with a toilet brush, and the CLR did not take much off. I can barely squeeze my hand down there (but getting it out is real rough on my skin), so I might be able to get some sandpaper on it. I could also lift the washer up partway to dry underneath it and possibly apply some bedding compound.

So to return to my question, is there any perceived benefit to drying the area around the bolts and under the washers, then applying some bedding (perhaps MainSail's butyl) to keep water out of the crevices? Any reason why this would be a bad idea?

OK, I now have three new nuts, as well as lock washers and flat washers. Although the front-most nut is clearly the worst, there are a couple of others that are starting to show erosion in spots, and the lock washers underneath also look bad. So I'll use all three.

My question is on what else to do. Is there any reason to try to make things water-tight, perhaps with butyl tape bedding? My bilge is 100% dry on the hard, and mostly dry afloat, except for the occasional air conditioner drainage in the front compartment, and packing gland water in the aft compartment. Is there some benefit to preventing water from getting into the crevices between bolts, nuts, and washers? Currently there appears to be no bedding present.

By the way, I'm curious why the front-most nut corroded worse than the others. It is exposed to ion-free condensate water, and I wonder if the limited solubility of metal ions caused a gradual erosion in the nut and washers. It's ironic that deionized water could be more corrosive than water with a small amount of ions, but I have stainless steel cooling baths in my lab with manufacturers' warnings not to fill them up with deionized water for this very reason.