Boater, "May Day, May Day, MAY DAY!!!!!"
Coast Guard, "Vessel hailing May Day, what is the nature of your emergency?"
Boater, "My boat's broke!!!"
Not to make fun of another's misfortune, but now I know how he feels - my boat's broke!
A couple months ago, we discovered that Joli's forward-most keel bolt was leaking. The top of the nut and bolt sticks up through the stringer inside a recess in the stringer. We had noticed water in that recessed pocket and thought it was from rain coming in through the leaking hatch above it. After further inspection, we determined that the bolt was leaking. After consulting with Karl at Sassy Marina, we decided to haul the boat early and get the keel removed to assess the situation. After three days hanging in the slings on the keel stand, the guys at Sassy finally got the keel separated. It was really stuck on there, but not sealed, allowing the one bolt and maybe others to leak. We will probably be able to let everything dry out over the winter, clean up the bolts and reattach the keel using 5200 sealant. It shall never come off again!!! So, my boat's not actually broke, just undergoing maintenance that is not that unusual for a 45 year old boat.
The notch in the lead that you can see above is where the nut was removed from the bottom side of the keel bolt that was leaking. The bolt has also been removed.
If you look closely, you can see the bolts coming up through the lead keel. There are 11 keel bolts along the center line and 2 smaller ones on either side up forward where the lead mushrooms out on the bottom of the boat.
