"FOREVER"

There is nothing worse in a yacht than water leaking in through the deck, the deck fittings or worse again, through the hull. Thankfully, we have not yet identified any water leaking in through the hull, that area will be heavily scrutanised when "Forever" is re-immersed in the English Channel!

 

However, we have encountered many, many leaks through the deck, the portlights, the hatches and the innumerous cable glands that were fitted throughout her long career to date. We have assiduously found the source of each leak and tried to address the root cause.

 

However, to date, the most annoying leak was through the coachroof somewhere that caused water to pour into the starboard side of the saloon when it rained. Initially we thought we were dealing with water ingress through the old and perished dorade vent. On a wet day, the water literally flowed into the yacht. On closer inspection, there was staining on the saloon sole with the varnish lifting in places, which strongly indicated that the problem was old.

 

 

Off we went and did extensive Internet searches to find new dorade vents. After considerable amount of Googling we found a very interesting product from a company, Modus Maris, that was based in Malta. They produced an "Air Only Ventilator" - great idea of using light weight balls that float up and seals the air ingress vents when water rushed over the deck - see below. Their web site was quite impressive and the products were very well endorsed. We purchased three units and when they arrived we were impressed by their quality and the extensive installation guide. We installed them easily and thought they were cool!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, after fitting these vents with plenty of silicone sealant, the water poured in as usual with the next downpour. There were four possible sources of the leak -  

 

          1) the previous owners had drilled 8 holes in the deck (see picture above) to facilitate the passage of mast wires into the yacht and the glands were in varying states of disrepair and nearly all werte covered in black mastic - could they be possibly leaking and was the water coming in here and migrating between the teak deck and the GRP, and pouring downwards into the narrow gap between the deck holes and the insert for the dorade vents?

 

      2) another possible source was the mast base (see picture above) - a solid metal construct, attached to the deck with 4 large M10 bolts - one of these bolts was sheared and rotating freely, it and the others covered in varying amounts of mastic- could the water be entering this way?

 

     3)  the screws attaching the teak deck - were they assisting water passage through the teak?

 

      4) inadequate caulking - this was also possible as there were areas where the caulking was definately sub standard.