When we cut the fiberglass off the roof of the coach house near the companionway, the core was in much worse shape than I originally anticipated. I was hoping to do a quick epoxy flood job, but the damage appeared to be too extensive to do that. I then cut the skin with the goal of removing the damaged core and installing new core and epoxying the cut panels back down, grinding the edges and reglassing the gap between the existing roof and the repaired portion.
But what I saw made me want to check more of the roof. I noticed a soft spot on the ceiling from down below in the galley. It was right over a leaking port, so I assumed that was the issue, moisture had softened that section directly above the other part of the coach house well we were repairing.
On the Port side of the boat across from where the inspection was done near the companionway on the Starboard side, I cut two more panels. These were just above that soft spot I noticed from below in the galley. Upon inspection, I found more rot. Pretty bad rot in this case.
What is interesting is the way the core can be destroyed in one area and just 1 foot next to it, robust as it was initially 40 years ago in a lumber yard.
As you can see in this photo the core is soft, and I can push my fingers right through it down into the galley. The white beam you see just below the core above where my hand is in the photo is the horizontal beams that run from one side of the coach house to the other and holds up the ceiling of the boat. You can see however that as we move to the (right) center of the ship, the core starts to get more solid which led me to believe that this was moisture related. Why you may ask, The roof slopes downward on the outer edges so the thought was that any water intrusion was settling in those lower areas.
Upon closer inspection, however, I am starting to think this is termite damage. The consistency of some of the core reminds me of multiple layers of something like tissue paper. I am now wondering if that tissue paper like substance is the glue that was between the layers of plywood. Maybe termites ate the wood leaving the layers of adhesive just to be stacked on top of each other like tissue paper.
Additionally, there appears to be what I think a termite trail may look like. I saw no evidence of actual termites (dead bodies or mud trails), but I did see these little areas near where I am pointing that look like a place where termites may have been tunneling from one area to another.
What it does mean is that we need a better plan. This is more extensive than just patching a couple of 1 square foot areas. This needs to be evaluated. I got so dejected by my findings on this day that I stopped the work on the core and started thinking that we may need to rip off the entire coach house roof. This soft plywood seemed to go under the mizzen step, and that was not something I was willing to leave like that.
If you are interested in the tools we use most often for this kind of work, we have them listed here
It was time to consult with Michael again at the yard. Mayer Yacht services have not led us astray yet, so I suspect they won’t start now. I set up a meeting with Michael to go down below and talk through my repair options.