What you don't say is how the boat will be treated once you start using it.
Will it be permanently in the water or on the dry during winter. Might
influence what you do.
I'd go with the idea of getting it back in the water and letting the wood
get back to some sort of "normal" moisture content, and then see how the
cracks look. I agree with James about putting it in the water with extra
bilge pumps, don't under estimate how much water it will make, and if at all
possible don't rely on just a couple of batteries. Be prepared to visit
several times per day for a couple of days until the planks take up. I'm
assuming the caulking has not fallen out ....

I'd also try to start the re-wetting process before you launch - common
practice where I am is to use a garden hose to put water into the boat,
ideally for a very dry old boat like yours one of those perforated hoses
which has lots of holes - run it around the hull above the water line and
keep on pouring the water in. Not sure if your shed owner will like this,
you may need to build a sheet plastic dam under the boat to catch the water
and pump the water back in ( second bilge pump will do fine for this if it
has enough head .. )

If you can't keep up with the leaks with the garden hose, you certainly
won't be able to keep it afloat with batteries and bilge pumps ... As the
planks expand and the caulking takes up, you should get a good idea of how
much water it will make once launched, and you may identify areas which need
to be re-caulked before you launch.

Good luck
David




"Matteo" wrote in message
m...
I have the opportunity to get hold of a 33 foot wooden sailboat -
basically for free (it comes from a divorce and the lady does not want
it anymore). It was a custom job and costed almost 150.000 US$ - the
rich guy tool.

The boat is 25 years old, is built of heavy mahagonay (carvel planked)
and was sitting the last 5 years *out* of the water, in a big shed.
Every winter the boat was sitting in the shed and was used only
sometime. Deck is perfect, no stains inside, no rot smell, no soft
spots.

The only problem: the boat has hairline (i guess up to 1/20 of inch
wide) cracks in some of the planks, both in the wet as in the
freeboard area.

So we had an expert had a look at it: he explained us that this is
normal - all wooden boat when taken out of the water will crack. Those
will close once the boat goes back to the water. I agree.

But then the owner of the yard where the boat is says that his applies
only for the wet area: the freeboard needs to be sealed again, and
this is their method:

cut a groove with a router over the hairline crack (let's say 1/10 of
a inch deep, 1/4 of a inch wide) and glue a mahagonay strip in the
groove. This in order to seal the boat - the thin strip has nothing to
do with structural problems or in order to stiffen the boat. This to
be repeated when new cracks appear.

Now i never heard of this method: my idea was to seal the cracks with
some caulking and repaint - if the plank then expand again they will
ev. squeeze some of the caulking out. Actually my original idea was to
do nothing at all, put the boat in the water and after some weeks
check where water is still coming in - then repair just those cracks
(judging from the water stains under the paint, this should affect
only two cracks quite high on the freeboard and close to the bow).

The method proposed by the yardowner looks overkill to me and i cannot
understand where the benefits are (the economic benefits for the
yardowner seem obvious, he would do the job). Beside this it will
alter the way the planks expand (the strip will act as a wedge) so it
will just cause cracks somewhere else.

So my question: is just applying some caulking good enough ? Or even
better the do-nothing and see what happens method even better ?

Remember i get the boat for (almost) free and I can do with less than
optimal results - no sense in throwing thousands at it.

Thanks
Matteo