Boat repair

Welcome to basic shell repair 101. Throughout the season I've been taking stock of what I've got, what I need, what needs to be fixed and what is ok. The boat that I use is a Vespoli shell that saw it's hey day back in the early 1990s. It's still a very good boat - stiff and fast when crewed correctly - but she is in desperate need of basic repairs that have been allowed to slide.

The first project of the year was cleaning up the oars that we use. That was a rather straightforward project that I don't feel the need to put into picture format. This project on the other hand, replacing the track supports, was a three day project.

And so it begins...

These are the tracks from inside our racing shell. There are two per seat and the seats have wheels that fit into channels on the top. They are supported and angled in the boat by wooden supports - now plastic. As you can see here, the wood that has been holding our tracks up has been well used and is in desperate need of replacement. The wood was so soft that you could squeeze it forcing water out of it's depths like a sponge.


The first thing I did was remove the old rotting wood. It was a lot of "fun" pulling off this reeking, spongy, molding, rotting wood and the garage area smelled fantastic. I was lucky and managed to remove a whole one to use as a template to back up my measurements but the rest came off in pieces.


Next up comes the new wood. For the price of a couple rounds at the local watering hole I got a 1x10 piece of pine from Home Depot, measured out 20 replacement tracks - we need 16 but extras are always handy - and got to cutting. Unfortunately the table saw I was going to use picked this exact moment to die. After fiddling with it for a while the decision was made that the saw needed to be replaced anyhow and this was as good a time to do it.


Life is so much easier when you have the tools you need rather than trying to piece meal it together. Having cut the wood to length, I drilled two small holes for the bolts that hold the track to the wood to the boat and then several 3/8 inch holes that would be the guide for the router. Despite having an amazing drill press I had no intention of drilling 20 holes per board to help with drainage.


So instead I went with slots. I drilled two 3/8 holes then used the router to clear material between them. Note that each bolt hole has an inch of play on either side. Despite measuring the distance between bolts on the boat several times I decided that 2 inches of play would make life a lot better in case I missed rather than having to scrape 16 supports and start over.

At this point the tracks are almost done. To get the angle that I needed I used the old track as a guide. I was going to use the router to get the angle but when that proved more difficult than convenient I decided to go back to the table saw. While the cut is less clean it was far more accurate than it would have been on the router, it was quicker - at this point speed was becoming a priority - and because the variations would be small and that this repair is only temporary till we get the real replacement tracks, the table saw was fine for the job.


The final step was the soak the wood for about a minute or so in water seal and then let them air dry for 48 hours.

16 tracks in two days of work. The cost? Not even a 1/4 the cost of the plastic ones on the Vespoli website. And while it did take a little longer than expected, I didn't have to pay for rush delivery. I put them into the boat yesterday and we tested them and they work great.