first of all: Sorry for not starting with a proper introduction of me and the boat but at the moment I'm living 400km away from my boat and have to get stuff done while I'm on site. I'll do a proper intro later. For now, my Name is Andi and I'm from Germany, currently at the Pinnau, a tributary to the Elbe (known for the Port of Hamburg) . The Boat was advertised to me as a pre 1986 Super Seal 26, haven't found a hull number yet. It was formerly registered under the name "Exe".

I started looking into the keel because it has a tendency to stick in the downwards position. So the first question would be: "Is there something missing here?". While rummaging through this forum I found references to a sort of roller block which is absent and the asymmetric shape of the hole sort of implies something might have broken off?

Here is some pictures of the problem (and the boat)

https://photos.app.goo.gl/W5oxxNSxJmgoJ9tY7 

And I would be interested in how to clearance the mechanism, everything looks a bit worn but this is difficult to remedy without knowing some measurements to shoot for.

Should I dissemble the rear guide / is it a common thing that it rots out/gets lost as well?

Thanks, Andi

And I had a close look and am quite bummed. It looks like there was a mishap down the line which resulted in some carnage and maybe even a questionable fix.

I added some more photos and would love some suggestions on what to do now. I'm sort of at a loss :-(

The front of the keel dug deep into the keelbox.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/W5oxxNSxJmgoJ9tY7 

I have a Super Seal 26. From comparing a photo of my keel with yours, the guides on the keel look exactly the same so that part is normal.

The aperture in the bottom of the hull of my boat is a smooth elliptical shape. There are no rollers but at each end (fore and aft) is a plastic piece (I cant remember the proper term for the material) which wears away gradually. I think the guides on keel itself (which are the same material) rest on this narrow gap in the hull. It looks to me as if your keel has been dropped and has broken through. The keel weighs approximately 80 kg.

I think I have some photos of the aperture in the hull but cannot check until next Thursday as I am away from home.

Hilary

SS26 No 33 LESA

I can start to answer some of your questions as we own Super Seal Mk 2 #131 1987 which shares some of the construction..Your photos are a great help.

The keel has suffered from a serious lack of maintenance over the years -perhaps the boat was not lifted out at regular intervals because of its location.,so mounting problems were not addressed.

1 The acetal slides on the keel appear to be out of parallel - one side appears to have become loose on its bolts at some point ,even if they are tight now. I had the same issue and it must be a common problem.The acetal strips will tend to slide on the grp surface and get displaced .The fixing holes can then become oversize and the fit sloppy.I went so far as to add thinner FG strips inside the slides so that they could not move inwards.The slides themselves need to be proud .

2 The assymetry of the opening seems very unusual because the 'widenings/cavities' have been cut back to the cast iron ballast plate .It is possible that pockets were attempted here in order to fit an ad hoc non-standard roller - I cannot see any other explanation. This could have been done after the original nylon blocks became overworn.I believe that rollers are only standard on a Parker 275 which has a substantially heavy keel of different design.The grp hull originally overhangs the cast iron to give the precise opening.

3 The keel is originally provided with the nylon (later acetal) blocks shaped to the leading and trailing edge to give fine control fore and aft as the keel is lowered through the hull aperture.These must be sacrificial to some extent as they keep the keel away from the cast iron and the grp.They are fixed with large machine screws into the cast iron,which has recessed pockets to take them.

When I find it I can send you a photo of the trailing edge block which I have replaced from our hull-because it's groove had very nearly worn back sufficiently to allow contact of the keel with the cast iron.

4 It seems that the trailing edge block on your hull became so worn that the keel was allowed to wear heavily into the box itself ,and the obvious wear there surely took many years to form.Surely the trailng edge must also have suffered .

These things together would certainly have made it sometimes impossible to shift the keel.Hard to see if the final hull slot is itself assymetric ,as well as the rough side cavities and whether the actual box is dangerously compromised and needs repair .

The fore and aft blocks are easy enough to form cut from acetal and to replace provided that the threads in the cast iron are still usable .

But to reform the final opening my initial thought would be of a thick surface plate that gives wide spread beyond the hole for strength ,possibly in fibreglass and bonded to the hull.Not the most desirable but easier than trying to structurally extend the existing fibreglass 'lips' which actually take the side thrust of the keel.

Best wishes ,Peter

I can see from the later photos and also from Manual item 89/3 that the blocks/supports on a 26 were fixed differently from the later arrangement on a 27 .And that item conveniently refers specifically to hull #33 'Con Brio' now called 'Lesa' and owned by Hilary ,so plainly that will be the best example of the original plus the mods made.I do wonder also whether the pronounced and regular groove in the back of the box is really scored by the uncontrolled movement of the keel or whether that inner face of the box is original and is the slider mentioned in the article. On the 27 the box has plain square ends to the slot and the blocks are about 90 x 90 max and 20mm thick and fixed into horizontal pockets in the cast iron.

I also agree with Hilary's suggestion that the keel may have been dropped within the box from a height causing the side recesses in the grp-very probable .I don't know the safety strop arrangement on a 26 or whether you have one fitted.This was devised by Parker so is shown in the later manuals.

If you do need to pack out the side sliders on the keel you can do this with what some call 'fender washers ' which are larger than penny washers at 38/40 mm diameter and give a slightly more stable bearing.

Peter

I also think Hillary is to the point, the keel was probably dropped, cracked off the guides on the keel and impacted the aperture / smacked of the front guide on the keel box. There is no device for limiting it's travel . There is a separation line between the back plate and the hull. Also there seems to be separation going on between the keel box and hull (3rd to last picture) which concerns me deeply. I would love to see some pictures of a working assembly. I also read up on 89/3, it's a pity digital photography wasn't thing back then, a couple of pics with a measurement tape held in front of the object would help a great deal. I found one unrelated picture which seems to show my missing part, the sort of horseshoe

shaped one on the right.

Does anybody know how the keel box, hull and aperture is constructed and which parts are structural? I'm sort of hoping a dropped keel is something which is so likely to happen that its engineered in a way that does not turn the boat into a write-off?

The more I look at it the more I'm afraid somebody dropped the keel, slathered the carnage in a generous helping of thickened epoxy and called it good (as in good for sale).

Today is community service day at my sailing club so I probably won't get anything else done. But I'll remove the back plate shortly and post more pictures. I really hope this turns out ok, I just ordered rigging for around a grand yesterday...

Thanks again for the answers!

There are actually quite a few differences between the 26 series built by Baker and the MK 2 /27 built by Parker and this seems another.

The photos from Hilary will be key as they should provide exactly what you want.

Peter

today I did some investigative surgery, see new pictures in the gallery. So yeah, definitely a botched repair, no two ways around it. The wooden panels on the inside were removed and quite smartly put back on one site in with a fake mast strut to take up the space of the cut. On the other side and in the forward bunk somebody did an atrocious fairing job and some interesting lamination. Also (nut non related) there's a filled up hole in the panel between the head and the forward bunk. On the outside, note the poor craftmanship on everything, neither the stainless plate is symmetrical nor the cutout for the keel. None of the bolts were tight (a repeating pattern on this boat), they were literally just put in there and slathered with thickened epoxy. One washer didn't even make it on a bolt, it just fell out of the epoxy mess while I hit it with a hammer.

On the upside, the keel box seems fine. Sounds solid all around, no discoloration. I found two soft spots/trapped air in the upper layers, at least one of which probably from factory. Both are of the "it's trick to glass around corners" kind.

My main concern is a separation line between the hull and the keel box? (I'm not sure which parts are involved but there is a gap and it looks quite clean, so maybe it's supposed to be there? The perspective is the camera stuck into the aperture of the keel box and looking to port.

(edit: direct link does not seem to work, I commented on the pic in the gallery below)

So yeah, I guess I will start a new thread shortly "Dropped Keel, how to repair (bought a boat with massive hidden damage)". Or something around those lines. The task of "Let's clearance my keel to it doesn't stick" sort of got out of hand :-(

The gallery:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/W5oxxNSxJmgoJ9tY7