Launching the boat

The big day has come and we spashed the boat. It’s in the water for two days now, so far so good, no leaks! We still need to do some internal plumbing to change some of the old hoses and get the right size hose clamps, but the boat is dry, hurray!

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Scanmar bilge and swinging keel

The Scanmars, at least the SC33 and SC35 that I'm aware of, are infamous of developing a swinging/pendulum keel due to the lack of structural members in the bilge that could prevent the hull from flexing sideways at the hull to keel joint. Here is an article (in Swedish) that mentions this problem (svajköl) and here is another one from a surveyor who claims it's a weakness in the construction. The "stringers" on these boats are only floor beams, that are not going down deep enough to the bilge to act as a structural element. If the boat had harder groundings the attachments of the floor beams could delaminate from the hull, making the hull-keel joint even weaker and the swinging keel symptom worse. When we were on a boat hunt we've checked out almost all the SC33 on the market at the time and paid attention to how their bilges looked like (and in the end bought a SC35 without reinforcements 😄). As the bilge on the SC33 and SC35 looks very similar, I thoug

New bowsprit installed

Last weekend we finally installed our new bowsprit. It's the MultiMarine / Ocean Comfort model with an anchor roller, made from 32mm AISI316 stainless steel and teak and measures 115x52cm. The reason we choose this particular type is that we wanted a bowsprit to be able to carry our new Delta anchor (after we finish the anchor windlass installation) and provide an attachment for the tack of a gennaker a bit further ahead of the bow. Some added benefits are that it's possible to add a ladder to it to help with onboarding from rocky shores and sit out there and enjoy the ride when the weather is nice. The other alternative on the market would have been a similar model from Båtsystem, which is a bit more sturdy but costs more than double. The installation wasn't particularly tricky, although there we absolutely no instructions in the box and unfortunately the kit was lacking some nuts and backing plates so we had to run to a hardware store to get them. We used cargo belts fro

Bilge reinforcement - Part 2

Read Part 1 After careful surface preparation the bilge reinforcement project continued with laying the new laminate. I consulted with West System on what fabric to use and they suggested biaxial cloth without chopped strand matting. The biaxial cloth is very strong and CSM would just add weight. We bought 600g biaxial cloth with 45/45 degree strands from Composite24 and West System 105 epoxy with 206 fast hardener at a local marine store. Cutting fabric The work was done in sections, we started with the bilge bottom while the keel nuts and washers were removed. It got 4 layers that come up 10cm at the bilge sides. This area gets most of the load and we wanted to reinforce it by connecting the fabric on the bottom to the fabric layed on the sides. 4 layers on the bottom In theory these types of reinforcements are suggested to be done either with the keel dropped or while the keel is hanging so it's not compressing the joint while the boat is standing on th

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