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Old 07-02-2017, 11:02 AM   #11
Art
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City: SF Bay Area
Vessel Model: Tollycraft 34' Tri Cabin
Join Date: Feb 2011
Posts: 12,569
Mid 1900's.... during late 50's, all through the 60's and into early 70's... I worked on our family's wood boats as well as working at "boat yards" on a lot of wood boats; many different makes, models and different wood construction types.

So... I have a question for you: Did she float before hauling with little to no leaking into bilge from the water it was floating in. If so... she will swell-up and float again.

As has been mentioned here you will probably need to keep her in slings for a while and you may need an extra pump as her seams tighten-up. Hand soap forced into seams mentioned before is also good; it melts into water soon after launch. A trick we sometimes used on really wide open seams was roofing tar pushed into seams that had opened quite wide. Tar would squeeze out during swelling and create a "long" lump along the seam. So, don't put too much in... the seam just needs a little on the exterior opening to slow the seep till planks swell.

Basically, as long as the boat floated before with no big leaks... I'd launch her as is and be sure to have agreement that it can stay in slings for long enough to get it so that water ingress could easily be handled by the boat's bilge pumps. I would also make sure I had an out source sump pump and electricity to run it on hand until the boat swells to point of little to no hull-water ingress.

We used to take boats out of slings soon as her bilge bumps could handle the flow. In other words... once the pumps could empty the bilge and be turned off until ample water again came in to restart pumps. Auto float switches can take care of pump needs.

Happy "Boat-Float" Daze! - Art
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