Replacing the Beam Cleats and Sockets

The beam lashing cleats on the hulls showed a lot of rot and weakness around the edges. The cleats were made of plywood and the edges had not been sealed very well. In addition, the cleats for the front beam had not been bolted at all, but attached with screws. The buried screw heads had allowed moisture into the plywood. Also the cleats had not been epoxied to the hulls. I believe they were attached with 3M 5200. Going around the hulls I could pull some of the cleats off with just my hands!

I made new cleats out of ash and attached them according to the plans - 1/4” bolts and attached with epoxy.

Most of the beam sockets were also bad. They had broken around the “ears” and had some had rot from sunken screwheads. (I mean if you’re going to deeply countersink screws in softwood at least go back and fill with thickened epoxy!) I made the new sockets out of 2” white oak. A little overkill, but I had some sitting around.

Luckily! I only got around to gluing down the forebeam sockets before I decided to scrap the hulls. I will have to rebuild those four again but the rest of the sockets I can save for the new hulls.