We haul for paint in Tahiti, discover the usual small crack in the front of the keel, and come across some paddlers in distress.
Note- Before anyone starts twitching with comments about how our keel is going to fall off at any moment (with links to the threads about the release wax on the stub) we made sure we were good to go before leaving on this trip. In our opinion and experience a small crack on the leading edge of an externally mounted fin-keel on a boat that is sailed as often and as hard as ours is completely normal and not necessarily a sign of any problem. In fact, all the keelboats we've owned have had this. A fully loaded cruising boat sailed over 20,000 ocean miles in 2 years, much of it upwind, can easily develop small cosmetic stress cracks at the keel/hull margin.
We hope you enjoy the video!
https://youtu.be/ZGXQRuF35SI
Note- Before anyone starts twitching with comments about how our keel is going to fall off at any moment (with links to the threads about the release wax on the stub) we made sure we were good to go before leaving on this trip. In our opinion and experience a small crack on the leading edge of an externally mounted fin-keel on a boat that is sailed as often and as hard as ours is completely normal and not necessarily a sign of any problem. In fact, all the keelboats we've owned have had this. A fully loaded cruising boat sailed over 20,000 ocean miles in 2 years, much of it upwind, can easily develop small cosmetic stress cracks at the keel/hull margin.
We hope you enjoy the video!
https://youtu.be/ZGXQRuF35SI
