Re: Hello, and "dreaded beam" question

Jason, there's little reason to Fear the Beam. I was a relative novice at refitting when we undertook the replacement project on Pentaquod (1969 Cal 29 #132 if my memory is correct). There are those here who have replaced it from the aft side; we replaced it from the forward side because we also replaced the forward bulkheads (dry rot from leaky chainplates) so we could remove the entire head pan in the process. But if you can mix a cup of epoxy and apply a layer or two of fiberglass cloth, there's not much reason why you can't replace the beam yourself. (We even did it with the mast still in place!) There are dimensioned drawings of the beam floating around that were made up by the late Roger Jones. We used them, but instead of welding the top plate on, we simply had it fabricated by bending it out of the same piece as the web. This lowered fab costs because only the bottom, curved plate had to be welded. One other piece of advice to keep costs down: don't have anything done by marine shops. Find an inland metal shop that does stainless fab work; if it's a big enough operation, you may be able to get all the metal from their scrap pile, which further lowers the cost. Then just get a cheap 4" grinder with a cut-off wheel from Harbor Freight, cut the floor along the raised part that goes over the beam (approach from front or back - your choice), take out the old beam and put in the new one, then epoxy the cut-out piece back in place. Depending on how picky you are about appearances, it's really not a difficult project. And you have a bunch of people here who have done it who you can lean on for support and lots of free advice! Alfred Poor 1973 Tartan 34C #288 "Jambalaya"

Thanks for the words of encouragement and advice Alfred! Did you put a temporary support strut in the cabin while you were working? --- In Ca… [at] yahoogroups.com, "Alfred Poor" <apoor@...> wrote: > > Jason, there's little reason to Fear the Beam. I was a relative novice at > refitting when we undertook the replacement project on Pentaquod (1969 Cal > 29 #132 if my memory is correct). There are those here who have replaced it > from the aft side; we replaced it from the forward side because we also > replaced the forward bulkheads (dry rot from leaky chainplates) so we could > remove the entire head pan in the process. > > > > But if you can mix a cup of epoxy and apply a layer or two of fiberglass > cloth, there's not much reason why you can't replace the beam yourself. (We > even did it with the mast still in place!) > > > > There are dimensioned drawings of the beam floating around that were made up > by the late Roger Jones. We used them, but instead of welding the top plate > on, we simply had it fabricated by bending it out of the same piece as the > web. This lowered fab costs because only the bottom, curved plate had to be > welded. > > > > One other piece of advice to keep costs down: don't have anything done by > marine shops. Find an inland metal shop that does stainless fab work; if > it's a big enough operation, you may be able to get all the metal from their > scrap pile, which further lowers the cost. > > > > Then just get a cheap 4" grinder with a cut-off wheel from Harbor Freight, > cut the floor along the raised part that goes over the beam (approach from > front or back - your choice), take out the old beam and put in the new one, > then epoxy the cut-out piece back in place. Depending on how picky you are > about appearances, it's really not a difficult project. > > > > And you have a bunch of people here who have done it who you can lean on for > support and lots of free advice! > > > > Alfred Poor > > 1973 Tartan 34C #288 "Jambalaya" >

Thanks for the words of encouragement and advice Alfred! Did you put a temporary support strut in the cabin while you were working? Yes, indeed. There were bottle jacks and four-by-fours involved. We also eased the shrouds a bit so that we could raise the cabin roof a little and make sure the pressure was off the beam. Alfred