When it rains, it pours

 

Tahiti Rain

The sun and heat in Mexico must have done some damage to some of the caulking, that is supposed to seal between parts on the outside of the boat. While in MX, we did work on re-sealing hatch lenses, several times. On the passage from MX to French Polynesia we took quite a bit of water over the bow, plus we had 3 days of solid hard rain crossing the ITCZ. 

On that passage we found water coming in in the v-berth, around the mast, and above the galley. Our boat has (somewhat) removable headliners, but that is not something one wants to do on a passage. So we mopped up incoming water, plus we had some extra plastic wrapped around where the mast comes thru the deck.

Since arrival in FP, we are trying to identify the source of those leaks one by one. Sounds easy? Not so! Water travels on top of the headliner to some distant corner and flows down there.

Leak 1 was easy to find, the boot around the mast was punctured, probably while manhandling the whisker pole into storage position while the boat was rocking and rolling.

Leak 2 was close by but hidden: Forward of the mast is a 1/2" stainless rod that is supposed to hold down the deck when removing the mast. Unfortunately there was no access to the underside of the deck to see what is going on, the manufacturer had just drilled a 1/2" hole thru deck and ceiling (headliner) and pushed the rod thru that. Any water traveling down from above deck was caught by the head-liner and ended up to port or starboard at the next bulkhead.

 

 

Fwd hatch removed

 

 

Leak 3, the big forward hatch leaked between aluminum frame and fiberglass. That can be caused by just an aging sealant, and was fixed easily, with money and time. The price for marine sealant / adhesive is more than double to what we are used to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Galley, missing the headliner

Leak 4 sucked the most. Water came dripping down at the galley, which is under the center cockpit. It seemed to be on the forward end of the cockpit, we suspected the 'waterproof speakers', which we had to swap out for the same reason in Colombia. No, speakers weren't the problem. Then there is a cockpit-seat-drain-pipe, and we tried to flush a lot of water thru there: No, it is not that drain-pipe. In the end we had to remove the head-liner. Most of the headliners in this boat are easy to remove, except a few, where the screws holding the trim were bunged. Removing the bungs without damaging the trim takes time, but we got to the source of the leak: 

 The engine control panel, 7 feet further aft, had a leak, and the water traveled on top of the head-liner all those 7 feet forward and dripped down there. The head-liner is made from 1/4 inch non-marine plywood, plus foam, plus a nicely structured textile surface. While the underside looked OK, the plywood was coming apart in sheets. After looking at what is available locally, we decided to rebuild. After splitting and drying the plywood pieces, we epoxied the layers back together. The part that was damaged worst will have an access plate bolted into, plus a backing piece of plywood. This inspection plate will allow for an easier check for leaks, and to change the bulbs in the instruments of the engine control panel.

 There may be a few more, smaller mysterious leaks. It does rain a lot here, in a gap between mountains, and that will help to find those too.