Ericson 25 Rudder Renovation

[onymous]

I'm a new member and this is my first post. I was very relieved to find this forum.

I'm in the process of restoring an Ericson 25 centerboard model. (rotten bulkheads, soft deck). I know very little about fiberglass but I'm enjoying learning about it.

The rudder had multiple layers of bottom paint on it and was very rough and pockmarked. Using the moisture meter on it yielded false readings because of the bottom paint's metal content (as I recently learned). So I started scraping and sanding. This uncovered many blister-like pockets -- they are all dry and are filled with bottom paint as shown in the pictures. The gelcoat is very powdery and unavoidably comes off when sanding the bottom paint, causing the fiberglass roving to show through.

The moisture meter now gives acceptable readings (mostly between 10 and 12). So, apparently, the rudder isn't wet -- to my relief.

But I thought I had better stop and ask for some advice on whether I've gone too far in exposing the roving, but mostly to ask how I should go about painting and bottom-painting the rudder (and what products to use). Up to the time I found this forum, I was going to apply a barrier-coat, but I'm now going to avoid doing that.

Lastly, I intend enlarging the crack around the gudgeon and filling it with thickened epoxy.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

[georgefmys]

Glad your rudder is dry. Don't think you are looking at woven roving,though. My guess is major work has been done in the past because what's visible looks more like repair material than original construction. More pics might help-but from here doesn't look like much structural glass left [you didn't remove it!] If that's right, you can remove all coatings and fillers and wrap that thing good-then fair with epoxy. Bottom paint? that's the easy part!