Feb 14, 2022 · Invariably, rust eventually appears on the cast iron keel of a sailboat. How do you get rid of it and how do you protect yourself against it? A few tips for renovating your keel.

Jan 30, 2011 · The best way to treat an iron keel that’s rusting is to sandblast the whole thing and apply a complete, new, epoxy-based coating system. But that’s not always feasible or desirable. Because of the mess involved, many boat yards do not allow sandblasting.

Mar 11, 2012 · I have a 34 Hunter with steel keel that is rusting. I would like to 1) remove the rust and 2) refinish the surface and fair the keel. Has anyone done this and how would one proceed to accomplish this? I believe that one should be able to epoxy the keel prior to applying bottom paint to keep the rust from re-appearing. Thanks in advance for the ...

Aug 12, 2010 · These keel bolts are very bad and the boat is in danger of capsizing when the keel falls off. There are several ways of repairing the keel bolts. The first is to take the keel of and melt out the old keel bolt and weld the lead around a new keel bolts.

The bolts on my 1980s vintage beneteau first 305 that go into the steel fin keel are rusty and chipping off when I poke them with a screwdriver. I am in a part of the world where I will need to direct people to do it for me or do it myself. How do I go about fixing this issue?

Feb 3, 2012 · It originally had a plastic like coating around the cast iron keel and small cracks in the plastic allowed water to seep in causing the cast iron to rust, which showed up as rusty blooms on the outside of the plastic coating.

Dec 22, 2014 · I recently had a Legend 40 surveyed and all went pretty well except for these two rusty cracks in the hull/keel joint. One wraps around the trailing edge of the keel about a foot on either side, the other is on the port side a 1-2 feet behind the leading edge of the keel.

Oct 1, 2020 · The rust on the keel is, as others say, superficial and non consequential - clean out, fill and restore the surface. Much attention is paid to smoothing the keel (and underwater hull) to a polished finish but casual thought would show that this delivers nothing tangible in speed - other than perhaps if competing for the Americas Cup.

Mar 29, 2020 · Dealing with rust will require grinding the rust off, priming with a metal primer and then several coats of epoxy barrier coat and then bottom paint. Depending on how extensive the rust is it can be done as a spot repair or take the whole keel to bare metal.

Oct 24, 2021 · The keel attached directly to the flat bottom of the hull. As a result, absolutely any flexing of the joint would crack the joint slightly and allow the iron to rust at the joint. I tried everything, but was avoiding the one thing that ultimately worked.