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Interior Repairs

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Like I said, I felt completely overwhelmed by all that needs to be done. After ripping out the insides of the boat I found a lot of fiberglass damage to the ribs and stringers. One thing I discovered is that Columbia 23 factory construction was, well, not very good. The ribs and stringers are foam covered with a very thin layer of chapped strand fiberglass mat and gelcoat. Water had soaked the foam causing the fiberglass to delaminate. This looked like a good starting point. The jobs were small in size and if I screwed up, well, they'd be covered up.
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First Steps

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Upon inspection of the I felt completely overwhelmed by what needed to be done and where to start first. The interior was completely ruined by years of water damage and exposure to the elements. Top sides there is a lot of gelcoat and fiberglass damage. The cockpit floor is mushy. The mast step is depressed and the fiberglass is delaminating. The windows leak. The fore hatch leaks. All thru deck fittings leak. The electrical system is completely shot. On the bottom, the hull has suffered severe osmosis, there are some blisters in the fiberglass and a lot of dried moss and gunk. So, First: gut the interior of the boat and start cleaning things up.
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New Old Boat

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Gayle Force is a 1973 Columbia 23T. She is a shoal draft trailerable sailboat that belong to my late aunt and uncle and is named after my Aunt Gayle. The boat had been sitting neglected for a number of years in the trailer yard at Windycrest sailing club. My cousin Dan offered her to me for free if I would fix her up. This blog is my attempt to document the work of restoring and refitting the boat to get her back into sailing condition. I have very little experience at doing this sort of work and is a learning experience. My buddy Matt and I picked her up on August 26, 2018 after removing around 150 gallons of water and muck from the cabin and bilge with a shop vac. Over the course of the past couple of months the saturated hull has continued to fill the bilge and another 25-30 gallons of water has been pumped out.
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