removing delaminated Plywood

[levinth]

One quick question...very basic...
My boat has teak plywood on the cabin interior walls around the portholes and around cabin access..about 7 - 10 pieces all together..none terribly tall..but a couple are quite long and go around 1 or 2 portholes...
After 40 years it is all delaminating...
It is glued to the fiberglass apparently (according to Denise P)
How do I get this stuff off without wrecking the portholes & everything else
:-)
I couldn't find a posting discussing this...only seemed to discuss what to do after it was removed
The portholes are framed with solid teak pieces which seem fine, just in need of TLC but there are no visible screws holding them in place...so I suspect more glue...and I would like to be able to keep these if possible
thanks
new to this game

[Hirilondë]

It is hard to tell from your picture, but it appears you will have to remove the interior dead light trim at the least before removing the plywood. How this effects the glazing of the dead light itself is unclear. I would need to see an exterior photo and possibly a better or at least brighter interior one. The major cause of this ply delaminating is leaky dead lights. Have they been repaired? The plywood may not be glued to the inside of the cabin at all, but merely held in by the dead light trim and other trims, but again, I can't see enough to tell, and seeing may not tell. It may very well be that removing the ply will create a mess of everything adjacent to it. Most interiors were not designed to be easily taken apart. I always like projects like yours as a professional, they seem to grow as the tear out is done. As a fellow forum mate says "its all connected". I hate to be a pessimist, but you may have a very extensive project ahead of you and the extent won't be known till you start tearing out.

[levinth]

I'll go out tomorrow and stare at this with a lot more light. See if I can get a better picture, but what I can post is limitted to 1K X 1K pixel count so that may be moot. I have no doubt that I am in for a long haul
thanks
d

[Oscar]

Definitely need to get the light out and either reinstalled with proper gooping, or replaced with something better. Re-doing the wood without fixing the leak.....

[falcon]

I had the same problem with my 1967 cheoy lee frisco flyer. The teak is a veneer bonded to plywood which in turn is bonded to the underlying fiberglass. Mine was dammaged beyond repair from leaking ports. I removed the trim and then the plywood pannelling using a scaper. I then sanded the fiberglass and coated it with West Systems epoxy. I made up new pannels with thin marine plywood surfaced with teak venner. I sealed the plyood edges and back with West Systems.I bonded the teak veneer to the plywood by coating both surfaces with tight bond II waterproof wood glue, letting it dry, and then re-actiating the glue with heat using an iron. This worked well. I finished the pannels with several coats of epifanis varnish. The pannels were then reattached to the cabin sides with the teak trim. I also had to remove the openning ports. Hope this helps.

Pete

[levinth]

Thanks!!
that was exactly the question..
one follow up...how did you lift the trim without trashing it? I don't see any screws??
d

[falcon]

Although I did have to re-manufacture a few, but with care I was able to remove them. I removed the bungs by first removing the varnish with a cabinate scraper then piercing the center of the bung with the point of a sharp awl to reveal the bronze machine screws. Once all the fasteners are removed a thin paint scraper can be carefully pushed under the trim pieces to separate them from the black mastic underneith. You will probably damage some of the bung holes, but this can be remidied by boreing larger holes and re-bunging with larger bungs. The fasteners are soft and easy to break but I have found that "un-screw-ums" take the stubs right out with minimal dammage.This isnt as hard as it may sound but it does take time. The desighn is realy a rather poor one and would require the addition of substancial shutters for off shore use. I could try and send pictures if that would help.

Pete

Pete

[levinth]

Pete
Looking at this again carefully...the exterior frames to the ports have screws (under plugs)...that appear to screw into the interior frames. Is that how they are held on? You have to remove both the inside and outside trim in order to remove the glass and then the interior delaminated wood?
d

[falcon]

No, I removed only the inside port trim pieces, although they are attached the same way that the outside trim is, i.e. bunged screws into the underlaying fiberglass. If you find that there is not enough teak remaining on the trim pieces to re-bung, you could consider glueing in a "false bung" and attach the trim with surface fasteners. I have used bronze round-headed screws and finishwashers and I think it lresulted in a solid attachment and it looks fine.

Pete

[levinth]

I'll start this in a few weeks after the hoses and valves..get her in the water and the mast up..then the hatches..then I'll find out what is going on with this mess
:-)
thanks to all
d

[keelbolts]

An old trick for removing bungs is to screw a wood screw into the center of the bung. The screw hits the head of the embedded screw & rotates in place, either lifting the bung out or splitting it out. Though I've been a bad boy and glued in my bungs on more than one occasion, they were traditionally held in with old varnish or, occasionally, shellac.

Falcon, how thick was your plywood? I assume you ran the iron over the face of the plywood. Did it hold as soon as it cooled or did it require clamping. I think I have some vague memory of seeing this done, but I'd have to say that, really, I'm not familiar with this technique. Tell me more. I might like to put some wood in my Westerly eventually.

There's an Offshore 27 that has lived beside Favona for many years. Nice boat. Worth the effort. There's a blog somewhere on the web that chronicles the restoration and use of an Offshore 27/Newell Cadet. I don't know if it came without the wood or he took it off, but she seemed to get by without it. I've slapped on enough gallons of varnish that, if I'm going plastic, I want as little wood as possible.

[falcon]

Jeff,

I used 5 mm marine plywood as a base onto which I glued teak veneer. The technique of bonding the veneer by reactivating dry wood glue was suggested to me by another Cheoy Lee owner who was also a cabinet maker. Accurately positioning the veneer was much easier than it would have been with contact cement and it seemed to bond well. Once the glue had dried, I simply ran an iron directly over the face of the teak veneer. I then laid on several coats of epifanis varnish.

Pete