Osmotic Blister Repair

[juneausailin]

Greetings all, so I just purchased an E38, the hull is covered, literally, with osmotic blisters. In order to avoid repairing a dozen blisters every time I haul for the rest of my life I have decided to have the hull peeled and refinished. The boat yard is recomending using Vinyl Ester instead of gelcoat.. Any thoughts on Vinyl Ester for this purpose? Seems to be the standard for newer boats?

Thanks,
David

 

[Loren Beach]

Greetings all, so I just purchased an E38, the hull is covered, literally, with osmotic blisters. In order to avoid repairing a dozen blisters every time I haul for the rest of my life I have decided to have the hull peeled and refinished. The boat yard is recomending using Vinyl Ester instead of gelcoat.. Any thoughts on Vinyl Ester for this purpose? Seems to be the standard for newer boats?

Thanks,
David

David, what year is your hull? Our '88 had one area of blisters on one side of the bottom, about 2 X 4 feet, give or take, when we bought it in '94.
The yard opened 'em and sanded that area, and faired it with good quality filler.
they have not recurred in the years since.
Often, for shallow blisters in the gel coat, the fill-n-fair plan works well.
I had some large but shallow blisters in my prior '81 Niagara, and once filled they did not return.

So, do what seems best and most cost-effective, but try not to get talked into spending too much money...


LB

 

[juneausailin]

1984 e38

Hey Loren, yeah it's an 84 E38... there's literally thousands of blisters.. a handful are sandollar sized... I figure I will spend more time dealing with blisters than sailing it... yeah the quote is for 9k to do the job... I talked the seller down and then down again... ended up getting the boat for 12K believe it or not...

 

[rwthomas1]

I would insist on epoxy, IIRC it has the highest solids content, is stronger and more stable. Peel it, let it dry, barrier coat with West System or any other high quality epoxy, fill and fair with epoxy filler of the same brand and be done with it. RT

 

[u079721]

As regular readers here may recall, our 1989 E38-200 also developed thousands of blisters. So we had the hull peeled and treated with West epoxy. About 2/3 of the blisters came back. So we had it peeled and treated with West again. About 1/3 came back. So it was spot treated after that for a number of years each spring - but the blisters ALWAYS came back.

True it was fresh water, which makes these things worse, and maybe the West System was not to blame. But given our experience, I would for sure suggest something else - so why not vinyl ester resin? It couldn't possibly be any worse than our experience.

 

[juneausailin]

Blisters

Steve, I read your posts on your ordeal... sorry for your travails. The boat yard down here in S.D. swears Vinyl Ester is the way to go.. even offers a life time option of some sort... we'll see.... yeah, I know I'll be dealing with blisters from here on out if I don't do something drastic like peel the entire hull and start over....