C&C 27 Association Forum

Some time back, I had a conversation with one of the early members of the C&C design team about his own boat. He had by chance met one of the foremen who built Corvettes at Morch Marine in the early days of C&C and this fellow told him that, basically, the builders were winging it through those years. No one had built fibreglass boats before, so they were learning on the job. Fibreglass appeared to be waterproof, plywood is strong, so plywood encapsulated in glass should be a perfect combination of strength and cost (remembering that one of the goals of glass boatbuilding is to lower cost).

We know better now - the glass encapsulation that keeps the water away from stringers also holds in any water that manages to find its way past the glass (not to mention hiding the subsequent rot), whereas if it were just wood, the water would dry, no problem. But it often took ten years or more for some of these issues to start showing up - I well remember being told that examination of collision-damaged boats showed that water in balsa laminate would not migrate beyond the point of penetration, so early cases were treated as isolated incidents - and people confidently kept building boats the same way.

Another issue is that contemporary manufacturing accounting practices virtually mandated some choices that we find bizarre - but that's too complicated a subject to go into here.

The long and the short of it is that, as the preceding message has it, a surveyor is essential.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

> most have not had anything other than a few intrusions at handrail mounts and other screw holes

Do I read this correctly as defining this as a minor problem? Intrusions at handrail mounts appear to be the worst problem, perhaps because the coachroof flexes there, perhaps because the water can weep down from there and perhaps because it's such a bother to fix that people put it off.

Look at the Critical Path story in Black Arts and see how much of the damage is adjacent to or below the handrails. There's a boat from my club at Wigger's yard this winter having extensive repairs around the handrails and there was a 30 there three years ago, same problem. As I've mentioned before, when I was looking for a boat, I was aboard a very nice-looking one whose decks below the windows were so delaminated that the stanchions swung inboard to meet you as you walked that part of the deck.

I had my handrails off the year I bought the boat because they leaked. Regrettably, I didn't epoxy the holes then, but if I see so much as a drop out of them, knowing what I do now, they're coming off and getting the full treatment.

Incidentally, I mention above that I pulled my deck organizers this fall. I wasn't looking forward to this because when you back-fill a hole that runs right through the deck, the epoxy always loosens the tape that I've used in the past to block the lower hole, so the epoxy runs through.

This time, I tried two materials to block the lower hole. One was blue insulating foam (Styrofoam SM, carved into a tapered-plug shape), the other was a foam material called "gimp" (I think), a round, spongey foam material that is sold as a backing material to force into large cracks before you put latex caulk in the crack.

Both worked reasonably well, allowing none of the epoxy to escape. The gimp was easier to work with. As with the work done on deck tracks (Black Arts), I used an epoxy syringe and tape around the upper hole to minimize mess and simplify clean-up.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

There was a fellow on this forum who lost his boat to Katrina. He might still have the p-bracket. Search for "Katrina". 

Alternatively, take the pieces to a moulding shop and see if they can cast a new one (or even repair the one you have).

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

Mike, I think if you examine the boat with the in-line shrouds and babystay, you'll find that these are an owner modification. The 27 next to me has this setup and although it's been neatly done, it's clearly post-factory. It's also a modification that's not allowed by our Association rules, but since the change doesn't appear to confer a benefit, no one much objects.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

A liner will trap air to some extent, minimizing the temperature differential that causes condensation. The C&C liner does provide some rigidity, particularly in the V-berth, but that's not a major function as it is in some (70's Ericcsons and contemporary French boats use structural liners). Most of the strength comes from the major components themselves (balsa core helps make the deck more rigid without weight).

The downside of a liner is that it can provide a spot for mould to grow. Keep your boat well ventilated.

Perhaps someone could provide you a precise laminate schedule from his South Shore build report, but I know that C&C hulls were gelcoat, a thin layer of chopper-gun to prevent print-through, then hand-laid glass, mostly roving for strength). It's grossly over-built by contemporary standards.

Don't listen to people who want you to beef up your boat - yacht club bars are full of Nervous Nellies who want to convert their boats into cast-iron boilers. Look at the picture of Lark in 27 Tales - slammed down on a rock ledge and what do you get? A bent rudder stock and scuffed gelcoat. Try that with a Beneteau or Hunter and you'd be picking the boat out of your clothing. Remember:
- "All amateurs overbuild," - George Cassian, aerospace engineer and the materials-and-structure "C" of "C&C",
- The sailors who died in the infamous '79 Fastnet were those who abandoned their yachts. I think I'm correct in saying that all the abandoned yachts were recovered afloat, and these were lighter boats than a 27. The yacht that was abandoned in A Perfect Storm was found on a New Jersey beach, essentially undamaged, and returned to her owner. Lesson: fibreglass boats are incredibly tough, so much so that it might make sense to forbid boats to carry life-rafts in races like the Fastnet so people don't panic and bail out. Yachts' major weak point is through-hulls and hoses, an issue any intelligent sailor can manage.

Their other major weak point is sailors - unless you have the supreme bad fortune to run into the sort of century storm that turns up in Heavy-Weather Sailing or have someone run over you, all the literature of sailing disasters points to bad decision-making - but isn't that the prime ingredient in every human disaster?

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

Before you let a doctor chop your head off to cure your dandruff, it's a good idea to get a second opinion. And before embarking on a wholesale stripping and re-epoxying of the bottom, it might be a good idea to speak to the tech specialists at Interlux.

You might have an age-related breakdown – though there are enough epoxy cold-moulded boats from 20 years ago still sailing to make me question this diagnosis – but I'll wager that your problem is just something to do with the wet carpet (as in, the hull not having been sufficiently dry in the way of the carpet when the Interprotect was put on). If I were you, I'd sand just the pad areas to bare gelcoat right now, leave them to dry over the off-season, then re-coat the pad areas before launch. If the problem recurs, you know you've got a real problem. But if it doesn't – and I'll bet it won't – you'll have saved a fair bit of time and trouble.

Tangaroa in NZ? Merry Xmas to you too.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

Can't offer photos, but my Mk IV's boom (which also had no proper outhaul) has a vertical channel that seemed purpose-made for an outhaul sheave. I was able to find an alloy sheave with oilite bearing of about 1/4" wide, 1" to 1 1/4" diameter that slid in there nicely.

Once I removed the casting from the boom, I was able to drill an appropriate sized hole for the retaining pin. A length of wire (probably 3/32" or thereabouts) has a shackle swaged on one end, a Harken block on the other. A line (3/8"?) that is dead-ended at the gooseneck end runs aft to the block, then forward to an exit block mounted on the underside of the boom at the gooseneck. From there the line goes aft to a cam cleat. The block in the boom is also attached to a length of shock cord, to provide a positive releasing force.

Line sizes aren't really important as the loads aren't high. The wire was sized for the sheave and the rope was sized to be easy on the hand.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

One of the neatest solutions to the cabin sole issue that I've seen was on a Mk II with the bare gelcoated sole with a non-skid pattern. The owners, however, had a nice little oriental runner that they laid down in port. The best of both worlds.

The current standard "teak-&-holly" sole is something of a travesty, being pretty but a skating rink when wet or mucky. (I know whereof I speak - I was in major pain for about a week after an overnight race, during which I slipped on the varnished cabin sole of a 34 owing to the presence of a slurry of water and crushed potato chips.) Originally, real teak-&-holly was made with the harder holly standing 1/16" proud of the surface and only the teak varnished, making an attractive but effective non-skid.

I thought of this when doing my sole, which had been destroyed by the previous owner - gouged then sanded through in a number of places. I contemplated not replacing it after I took it up, mostly for the sake of the non-skid qualities, but I figured that it would be as much work to deal with all the screw holes as to replace it, plus I'd have to find a runner, and I hate shopping for carpet.

I also don't like the way that water pools between the wood and the fibreglass - all you need is about half a cup and it's squelch, squelch, squelch until the stuff evaporates.

The solution I adopted when replacing my sole was to stop the wood at the "door" to the galley. The rectangle represented by the galley is now floored with Dri-deck or whatever it's called - the ribbed material that's normally sold to floor your cockpit. (I also made holes under the companion steps to drain water away to the bilge). Fortuitously, this material is the same thickness as the "teak-&-holly" ply. Stopping the wood at this point also allowed me to replace the sole without having to remove the teak trim on the settees.

What we now have is a not unreasonable compromise. The galley is totally non-skid, so you can stand there with some security. The settee area is a potential skating rink, but we seldom walk around there when sailing (and when someone is on the way to the head, they can hang on). And of course, there's no squelching.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

I had to replace the wood floor on Towser. I sealed both sides with penetrating epoxy (vile stuff). Once the floor was down, I finished the upper side with a Minwax floor urethane. The urethane is harder than the epoxy and provides UV protection.

Be careful sanding – the teak-and-holly veneer is paper-thin.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV

There is now a brief section in Black Arts giving dimensions of a cradle.

David Weatherston
Towser, Toronto
C&C 27 Mk IV