Front anchor broke loose

[Scarabski]

We had some big boat waves come by and pulled out my bow anchor! The boat broke loose and hit my buddy's pontoon boat twice. Took the gel coat off right down to the glass. I am looking for someone to do the repair, in the meantime do I need to seal this up ?

 

[GiddYupJoe]

This picture should go well with your morning coffee @Glassman !! Sorry about your luck on that one. Hopefully the repair doesn't hurt to bad.

 

[Glassman]

We had some big boat waves come by and pulled out my bow anchor! The boat broke loose and hit my buddy's pontoon boat twice. Took the gel coat off right down to the glass. I am looking for someone to do the repair, in the meantime do I need to seal this up ?View attachment 25096

Damage isn't too bad at all. That should disappear once repaired. Yes, if you can't repair that right away you do need to seal that up. Try not to get anything at all - no wax, no cleaners, etc. in there. At a minimum put a piece of clear packing tape over it if it's going to be around water, otherwise some Saran wrap or equivalent should work.

 

[sysinu]

I've never seen an anchor pop out of the water from set. How on earth does this happen? Was it just really shallow with a lot of tension on the line? Glad no one person (sad for the boat) got hurt in the process, though!

 

[rkluck]

That sucks. Glassman, I have to ask a stupid question. When the gel coat is gone like shown above isn't the fiberglass itself water proof? I can understand if the damage is down to the wood why this would have to be covered. I have seen fiberglass boats with no gel coat just the fiberglass. Maybe there is a coating on the fiberglass as well? I am just trying to understand why this isn't water proof anyway?

 

[farrelltravis]

I've never seen an anchor pop out of the water from set. How on earth does this happen? Was it just really shallow with a lot of tension on the line? Glad no one person (sad for the boat) got hurt in the process, though!

I thought the same thing. Then I re-read the post two times to realize that the damage pictured came from hitting the pontoon boat.

 

[Scarabski]

We were on the windward side of the island we hang out at, after 5 hours of wind driven waves, a big cruiser came by close to shore. All hell broke loose, my anchor wasn't the only one that let loose. Unfortunately, we had beached my buddy's pontoon boat right in back of mine. It was about 15 away when he got there.

 

[sysinu]

Ahhhhh okay, that makes total sense.

 

[Gym]

My guess is there wasn't enough scope out on the anchor line for the conditions created by the large boat. I would have had the same problem as I generally don't pay out the required scope unless I'm leaving sight of the boat or the conditions are rough. Fortunately the problem is on the white gel coat and not on the colored.

 

[Glassman]

That sucks. Glassman, I have to ask a stupid question. When the gel coat is gone like shown above isn't the fiberglass itself water proof? I can understand if the damage is down to the wood why this would have to be covered. I have seen fiberglass boats with no gel coat just the fiberglass. Maybe there is a coating on the fiberglass as well? I am just trying to understand why this isn't water proof anyway?

No stupid questions.....stupid answers maybe, but I'll try my best.

"Fiberglass" (for the purpose of this discussion) as we refer to it casually, is typically glass that has been formed into continuous fibers and either made into strands or woven into cloth. To make an object out of this material it needs to be combined with a special resin - typically vinyl ester resin in the case of boats. Polyester resins are also used to some degree in the marine industry. Commonly referred to as FRP or Fiber Reinforced Plastic. The glass is the reinforcing fiber, the resin - typically a thermoset, is the plastic.
The glass in and of itself is basically waterproof, but as I mentioned, it gets woven or chopped before being used. The glass fibers get wetted (Saturated) with resin in the molding process and sometimes little tiny air pockets form during this process no matter how well the wetted material is rolled out.

Since the gel coat is applied to the face of the mold first (after a release is applied) you see the gel coat as the outside of the boat - the fiberglass is behind it.

If you look closely at the photo you provided you can see that the glass you see is not solid. There is a bit of a cavity and if you allow water to enter that cavity it may soak into the material via capillary action. If you were to seal/repair that hole after water had entered, you would eventually see a blister form. Just think about how water reacts when hot and cold, Expands and contracts. That action will most likely cause delamination at some point if not taken care of.

So keep it dry and clean until repaired for the best results. If it should get wet, dry it well before repair.

 

[rkluck]

No stupid questions.....stupid answers maybe, but I'll try my best.

"Fiberglass" (for the purpose of this discussion) as we refer to it casually, is typically glass that has been formed into continuous fibers and either made into strands or woven into cloth. To make an object out of this material it needs to be combined with a special resin - typically vinyl ester resin in the case of boats. Polyester resins are also used to some degree in the marine industry. Commonly referred to as FRP or Fiber Reinforced Plastic. The glass is the reinforcing fiber, the resin - typically a thermoset, is the plastic.
The glass in and of itself is basically waterproof, but as I mentioned, it gets woven or chopped before being used. The glass fibers get wetted (Saturated) with resin in the molding process and sometimes little tiny air pockets form during this process no matter how well the wetted material is rolled out.

Since the gel coat is applied to the face of the mold first (after a release is applied) you see the gel coat as the outside of the boat - the fiberglass is behind it.

If you look closely at the photo you provided you can see that the glass you see is not solid. There is a bit of a cavity and if you allow water to enter that cavity it may soak into the material via capillary action. If you were to seal/repair that hole after water had entered, you would eventually see a blister form. Just think about how water reacts when hot and cold, Expands and contracts. That action will most likely cause delamination at some point if not taken care of.

So keep it dry and clean until repaired for the best results. If it should get wet, dry it well before repair.

That makes perfect sense and keeping this dry for the repair is what I had not even thought of! Thanks for your response!

 

[Gym]

Nice explaination @Glassman. I feel smarter already.