How to make emergency repairs to a holed yacht at sea

[ab1974 1]

Just a thought to start a new discussion and get some new ideas. When we eventually head off to the islands for our Pacific cruise (a while away and a larger yacht yet) I've always wondered what the most effective way to make an emergency repair to a hole in the yacht would be and what sort of materials should be carried. While prevention is better than cure - always good to have given this some thought before it happens (as Murphy will ensure it is more likely to happen if you are not prepared!)

 

Obviously there are the obligatory wooden bungs and pillows but what else?

 

I found this on another forum (written by Sea Maid) and have copied and pasted it here as I thought there were some good ideas.

 

"I teach marine fire fighting and how to stop vessels from sinking to Navy, Coast Guard, Washington State Ferries and the fishing fleet.

 

You can make these yourself to use aboard your vessel, to whatever size you want and have them ready for an emergency.

 

First is the folding plate patch. Take a piece of plywood or metal and cut a 3",4" or 12" circle, the size is up to you. Now drill a 1/4" or 1/2" hole in the center. Now cut the piece in half, now put the two pieces back together with piano hinge. You now have a circle that folds in half. Where you drilled the hole is where you place a piece of line to length of your choose, tie a knot and put it thru the hole. The folding plate patch is designed to fold up as you put it thru a hole, once thru it will open, you pull on the line to bring the patch up to the exterior or the hole. Most folding plate patches have sheet rubber glued to them to make a better seal. This may slow things down enough for your blige pump to keep up or slow it enough to make some sort or epoxie repair. You do not have to go over the side of your vessel to apply something like this. This will slow the water down considerably. You can ever put rags or small pieces of clothing around the edges to slow things down ever more.

 

Another way to stop a leak with out having to go over the side. Fist have something that will fit thru the hole and it must float. Attach a line to this floating item you are putting thru the hole from the inside of your vessel. Have someone outside reach over and grab the floating object or use boat hook. Pull the floating line up to the vessel. Now the things you can attatch to the line to pull back under the boat from the piece of line that is still inside your boat are endless. You can punch a hole thru a pillow with a knife, grap a cubbie hole lid, that may or may not have hole in the center all ready. Now put your line thru the pillow and then the wood lid, tie a big knot. Now some one inside pulls the line, which pulls the pillow with wood backing plate up to the hole in your vessel. Pull tight, use a tounniquet, what ever it takes to slow this water down.. Now someone should be doing whatever it takes to stop water from coming in while things are being put together. Use a wood plug, pillow, whatever it takes to slow it down.

 

Sometimes a wood plug will not work from the inside. Again float a line out the hole to topsides for some someone to grab. Have eyebolts in all your wood plugs. Attatch line to eyebolt and pull the plug up to the hole, or a bucket or can. Something to give you time to get off or allow you time to get rid of the water you have, with very little coming in now, you can re-group and figure out what to do. Of cours a Mayday should have went out a long time ago. If your repair will work you can call it off and just check in as needed.

 

Another option is a Box Patch or a Bucket with T,J,L and folding tee bolts. These are wood, steel, or welded sheet metal boxes made to the size you want and they do not have to all be square. We use mostly wood with 3" to 6" sides. So the box can be as deep or shallow as you want and as small or as big as you want. The T,J,L bolts are made from all thread. Thats a steel bar completely threaded. Cut off one or two foot lengths of all thread. On one of them heat it up and bend a J shape, you now have a piece of all thread that looks like the letter J. To make the T and L hooks just cut small pieces and weld them to the end of the all thread to make the letters T and L. Once you have made your hooks it is time to drill a hole in the center of the box patch, pass the all thread thru the hole in the box/bucket. Now put a piece of rubber over the all thread and a washer, now thread your wing nut one. Box patch is now complete. Now put the box patch with T,J,L bolt over the bole or crack in your hull. (Type of damage determines the type of bolt in the box patch) Put the T,J,or L bolt thru the hole, spin it around to it will lock onto the outside of the hole, Tighted down on the wing not to bring the box patch up tight to the hull. This will stop almost all the water, You can use an ax to make the box patch shaped like your hull or you can put wood wedges around the edges to stop more water. Rubber can be put on the box patch endges as you are makeing it. You can use them inside the vessel without ever having to go outside. If it will not work inside it make work outside for you. You will not spend a much time under water putting one of these on.

 

They truely do work and may give you the time you need to get back to shore or the time you need to get more off the vessel before having to leave it.

 

My wife and I live aboard our Ericson 39B here in Bremerton, WA. Any questions or if you want to visit my school. It looks like a ship inside our burn building and the engine room is what we flood out. E-mail me at mtinder@olympic.edu , have a great day. "

[Guest]

You can fother a hole with a sail (I just like the sound of the word really)

[ab1974 1]

But how practical is that?

[Guest]

Hardly at all. I also like the idea of positive buoyancy. All multihulls should have it, and I believe one of the European production builders have "unsinkable boats" (etap??)

 

Maybe instead of a liferaft a couple of hypalon bags under the decks?

[Guest]

A yacht involved in a port starboard startline collision in Welly stuffed a spinnaker in it's bag in the hole and got to a travel lift before it sank a couple of years ago.

[Fusion 0]

Hardly at all. I also like the idea of positive buoyancy. All multihulls should have it, and I believe one of the European production builders have "unsinkable boats" (etap??)

 

Maybe instead of a liferaft a couple of hypalon bags under the decks?

 

I seem to remember Andrew Fagin on Swerly World had inflatable bags at some stage.

 

How much internal buoyancy would you need for a 10 ton boat? Wheels? 10 cubic meters?

[wheels 543]

Yes 1 cubic metre is 1000Kg of water, or 1000Kg of bouyancy.

 

It is kind of like the jury Rig thread and Booboo coming to the party with a real life experience. Many of the scenarios of fixing leaks are all very well in being prepared. But in reality, it can be a very different story. It is unbelievable how much water comes in through even a small hole. Two things affect how much water flows in. Size of hole of course, but depth below water line. And with boats that have deep hulls, man can the water gush in when the hole is a long way down. But it actually looks worse than it is. So the number one thing to do in that case is DON'T PANIC! which is so damn easy to do. And the further from land you are, the greater that want of panic. A good friend of mine has a Tag line, there is no better Bilge pump than a scared Sailor with a Bucket

It is a great crew training exercise to pull a through hull transducer out and say, right we have a hole, what do we do? If you have never done it before yourself, it is well worth the experience and experiencing it on your own before you have crew watching can be a good idea too.

Something else I carry with me is that Epoxy putty stuff. Man it is great stuff and hardens underwater.

[rigger 47]

this one is not really useable on a small yacht but....

 

fixing a hole in a larger wooden hulled vessel.

a fastening failure causing a bad leak behind a frame

 

short term fix

step 1 - push oakum in between the frame and the hull planking,

step 2 - place boxing around the point of the leak - mix up some cement add a little caustic soda (not to much or the plastic bucket melts ) and pour the cement into the box

 

 

leak fixed for the short term

[wheels 543]

Ohh, something I don't know. What does the Caustic Soda do??

I do see one problem though, who carries Concrete and Caustic soda on a wooden boat

[Guest]

A sheet of 6mm ply, some grooved nails (galv will do) and some of that stick in the wet sillycone stuff. Can all be applied underwater and only gets stronger as the sillycone goes off. Used that quite a few times during salvages. One patch up I did like that lasted 5 weeks with the boat floating fine on a mooring while the assorted parties thrashed out who was paying for what. Was still sweet as the day they hauled it. Was about a 500mm x 800mm hole. That boat got 50mm too close to Nth Head.

 

Ply sized to suit and doesn't have to be 6mm or even ply really. All depends on the duration it needs to stand up for. On my 930 I'd use the washboards. Knot that large but as it's a small volume boat any decent hole would have us swimming long before we could do anything constructive if it was a decent sized cock-up.

 

Assuming you do get the hole patched the next worry would be the mess inside. The slightest hint of oil and everything is like an ice skating ring.

 

Yes 1 cubic metre is 1000Kg of water, or 1000Kg of bouyancy.

975kg if you are in 'average' sea water and to lift a 10,000 boat you'd knot need 9,750kg of extra buoyancy. 8450kg would lift a 10,000kg block of steel to being almost complete clear of the water. That's in theory as that calc doesn't take into account the steel getting instantly heavier once it breaks free of the water. To lift a boat to the surface takes bugger all usually. Bit hard to guess using a phantom boat at a phantom depth but stick a cubic meter or 2 of air to most average sized boats in the H Gulf and they would move upwards.

 

Take a boat that has water ballest like say a Class 950 (900lts all up) and assuming those tanks were empty at the time you punched a hole in it, I doubt she'd sink. Submerge for sure but sink, probably knot. NOTE: Don't try it, I maybe a little out with my numbers, it is Monday and I have a ballet team going hard out in my ear :)

[rigger 47]

Ohh, something I don't know. What does the Caustic Soda do??

I do see one problem though, who carries Concrete and Caustic soda on a wooden boat

 

the concrete was for a village on an island we were going to visit.

the caustic soda was in the engine room and was used for cleaning things.

 

The caustic soda acts as a catalyst to make the concrete set quickly, if you add to much it gets very hot, like ouch hot.

[Chewing Gum 17]

KM - where do you get that silicone? - Hardware shop ?

[Guest]

Most places have it these days. M10 I think we used to buy it at. Around $15 a tube as most seems to be.

 

We use some stuff called 'All clear' and it was clear and knot really a sillycone but very similar. They have a version that sticks to wet and goes off in the wet. Horrendously sticky and messy but then most sinking boats aren't that flash anyway.

 

There are more options of that sort of stuff that have come on the market recently.

 

Some of those 'construction adhesive sealers' would be worth a suss, some of those handle wet and even more sticky.

[Murky 1]

Knot to pick holes in a constructive discussion but I have always found those cartridges have a shelf life - around 12 months in my experience before they go into solid-lump mode - you'd want to pick up a couple of freshies just before you departed.

[Guest]

That "wetseal clear" sh*t is unbelievable sticky, mostly to everything other than what you are trying to get it on. Good for the roof when there is water pissing into the ceiling. Don't even have to go outside and get wet yourself.

[Chewing Gum 17]

I was wondering if a few plywood shapes cut in half as per previous post but using say bedroll foam glued on as the hinge and with a couple of strings to pull it tight could be the go ??

[Guest]

Knot to pick holes in a constructive discussion but I have always found those cartridges have a shelf life - around 12 months in my experience before they go into solid-lump mode - you'd want to pick up a couple of freshies just before you departed.

Good point, as much as it pains me to agree with a Young boat owner. Once you open one of the tubes it doesn't last long. Weeks rather than hours, days or months. Seems to last OK if you don't open it though.

 

Knot to silly an idea Chewing but I'm a tad surprised you know what size the hole you haven't got yet is. What ever you make won't fit, it's called Murphys Law

[Chewing Gum 17]

yeah youre right km - but could still be worth a shot

[Guest]

Something is always better than nothing.

 

Chatting with my canvas dude today and he said a lot of the foams that can be used on squabs are closed cell these days. If correct, he's a bit of a drinker, and the hole isn't massive glue on of those on or jamb it in the hole. Being closed cell it should hold the water out quite OK but being soft that's probably more a coastal type patch up rather than a longer ocean one. Just a thought that popped to mind during the chat/beer.

 

I did a quick calc today and if I inflated my kayak inside* it should keep a 930 on the surface, submerged but knot sinking. No I'm knot planning on a real life calculator check.

 

* It's a good sized one probably quite close in volume to a std 2mt Aquapro type ding. And I do usually have it inflated downstairs. Yes I know that is technically illegal but I'm safety 1st so get stuffed, besides I can deploy it in 15 seconds quite easily which is a LOT faster than most could their dings. But feel free to protest as I think it would be interesting to see the outcome and wouldn't mind if you do. Hard to get anyone to give a solid ruling on that. The word from someone who knows the safety regs very well that we all know and love, in that blokie have a beer way only, and I personally trust, said it should be OK but would need a protest to get a solid answer. Come on someone have a crack, I'll even pay the protest fee it there's one.

 

Hmmm..... I wonder if I can protest myself??