Last couple of trips to the workshop have gone well! I got myself a new grinder and some flap disks and removed one of the old “factory-fitted” strengthening braces around the starboard keel area.

After watching some videos of Ben Sutcliffe and his famous hammer I thought I’d have a go too. At the start when I noticed the cracks after Rosie had been lifted out they looked only minor to me.

All around where the “rib” is bonded to the hull should be the same sound (there will be a dead sound on the keel stub face because there is Sikaflex the other side). You can hear in the video at around 14 seconds that the sound changes to a much lower tone. Which is the sound of the fiberglass there acting like a drum rather than a solid. You can hear the same sort of sound at about 35 seconds where I tap a non-structural area that I know is thin and has a gap underneath.

I went home, got myself a bigger grinder and some 60 grit flap disks and returned a week later.

Half way through using the small grinder I’d got rid of the easy bits, At this stage I’d only removed the thin areas that were probably only added to divide the two compartments from the bilges and under-sink area (this is the battery storage area)

The rib here is already quite wobbly and I was able to peel it away with surprising ease as you will see from the next photo!

You can see the area here where it simply peeled away!

I have some structural foam that others had recommended for this job so set about cutting some to size.

This stuff isn’t really very strong at all, it is supposed to support making a structure out of fibreglass or other material. So you need to treat it like a former and laminate it. I used two layers either side (but forgot to take photos!)

Roll on to this half-term week and I have the worst of the epoxy done and the rib fitted snugly and forgot to take pictures of it again. But I did manage to tackle the stuck Blakes valves and take some photos of those. You might want to check-out Ben’s video on these.

Bit of a clean up with some valve paste and put back together.

It’s a great relief to get this far and on to the home stretch, next up are a general clean-up of the cockpit (lots of brown stains from the engine removal) and cabin and then antifoul and maybe polishing the hull (it’s not too bad)