Last season I noticed that the companionway hatch was becoming harder to open all the way. I assumed accumulation foreign debris and that a thorough spring cleaning would suffice. When a full force hose flush didn’t help much, I decided to remove the sea hood. To my surprise, upon lifting the sea hood my fingers sank quickly into spongy wood.
What I found was that Catalina uses a one inch wide piece of three quarters thick plywood encased in each side of the sea hood. They did a decent job of encasing it, but then drilled holes through it to attach the piece! Over time water found its way into the plywood, and the rest is history.
The story has a happy ending. Two days of chipping, chiseling, and grinding to remove the offending wood left a nice new
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Last night was the first night this year we slept on high priority. For the first time ever the bulge pump wet on while we were sleeping. I sponged all the water from the main bilge , no water migrating from the back or front appears to be slowly building around the bolts closest to the bulge pump. Never seemed to have this issue last year I searched some older threads on the web site and see some have had loose bolts in the past. Did you have success in retorqueing while in the water? Sounds as if torquing them on the hard while the weight is on the keel would be better?
Just splashed 2 weeks ago and really don’t want to haul out again if at all possible
Thanks Paul
Hull 170
Bronte
Paul;
Torque away!
Bring them all up to the recommended torque setting evenly and
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In the vberth.. The lower forward most compartment has standing water…. It seems that water seems through the forward wall which is fiberglass… Behind this wall is unreachable, as it is under the anchor locker. I can only assume that there is a crack in the anchor locker drain hose that ends up filling the space between the bow/hull and the forward wall.. It eventually seeps through… The white coating on the fiberglass has chipped off when I knocked it….Msgr
Has anyone had this issue? Again there is little to no access to around the anchor locker.. Not sure what to do with this one..
-ken c380 #176
Even after the leak is fixed, it is still a good idea to drill a drain hole that goes under the floor of the forward water tank so that any moisture that does accumulate in the very forward compartment will drain
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After the cleaning+ suggestions, here’s another technique you might try.
First, get a good reading on just what part of gasket/seal is leaking. I did this by looking at/thru closed hatch seal, using a mirror and good light conditions….I found light outside/dark inside [while looking from inside] best. In this way, I could see small gaps, maybe 4 -6″ long, where seal wasn’t sealing.
Fixed this by inserting a few short sections of once-folded aluminum foil under inner edge of gasket. Has been fine in the ensuing 5+ years.
About a year after purchasing our 380, we had “dribbles” from the V-berth hatch, when raining. I fooled around with this for multiple times, silicon greased the seal, no fix, etc. It ended up that the problem was at one of the two hinge mounts. There is one or two screws there that hold the top and bottom together, pinching the lens in between. I put some silicone sealant on the top side, and ran sealant into the screw holes. Problem fixed and has stayed fixed for the past 18 months. You might try to isolate your leak, if possible. Since ours was dripping at the hinge, that sort of got me pointed in the right direction.
Dr. Sam Balsley
Barca a Vela, C380, #322
Sausalito, CA
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