On Sun, 02 Nov 2008 17:22:38 -0600, dEdEyE wrote:

Greetings, IÂ’m new here and would greatly appreciate some advise. I do
not know very much about boats or sailing but the only way I can afford
to get started, is to spend as little money and as much time as I can.
That being said, I have discovered an old fiberglass sailboat and
trailer in a scrapyard down the lane from me. Its about 22Â’ long and
what one notices immediately is that the keel is badly damaged. The
fiberglass has major cracks on both sides, indeed a section (5" x 7") of
bare metal is exposed, showing the hard foam cross section. Consider
also that there is a crack almost all the way around where it joins the
hull and the bottom of the keel is broken from resting on the trailer. I
have not been able to inspect the inside of the hull yet, but knowing
about the keel alone, is it even worth moving the boat down the road to
my house? I have more time than money, I just want to know if this is
worth the time.

Thanks for reading,

dEdEyE (Colin)

Leave it. If you take on a project such as this, before your done, you
will hope never to hear the sound of a single wave washing ashore.

You will never be happy with the results. It is cheaper to look for
something in the paper that is seaworthy but beyond someone else's current
budget. Especially now.

Take a sailing course at a local yacht club if you have never sailed
before shopping. Sailing is not a turn key style of boating. You may find
motoring more fun and less work.

Take along a person that sails to shop. Sails and tackle are expensive to
replace and inflation isn't helping the price of labour or materials.