INVESTIGATOR 563

Concrete is often used in boats as it makes a good filler. It looks like you have some osmosis in the glass. Think about drilling some small holes in the bottom of the keel to drain out water that maybe trapped,

In the early days of the old msn forum I did a calc based on the relative weights of lead/ concrete to see what ballast would be in the 563. To achieve the stated ballast you need lead given the rough area if the keel. BUT, a local boat dealer once insisted the 563 was ballasted with concrete . I believe the boat had lead ingots , as evidenced by the steel lifting brackets and the area around the ingots was filled with concrete. Said dealer also reckoned that the concrete can degrade if affected by salt water. Not really sure how. But that's what he reckoned . My boat has been moored now for eight going on nine years and is ok as far as I'm aware.

If it s concrete you may need to remove the cracked bits and seal it with some relevant epoxy before re glassing. Lead will still be providing the bulk of your ballast. I'm just guessing here. Good Luck, hope it all pans out . They are good boats worth saving.

Just to be clear Ozzie, does your boat have concrete in the keel area?

If anybody thinks they can seal a leak by pouring concrete into a fibreglass hull, they are mistaken. Resin maybe, but it would have to be epoxy, and the surfaces well prepared first.

Mine has concrete in the keel area, not there to stop a leak, more likey there to fill around the ballist to stop water sumping down there.

edit by steve(more likey there to fill around the ballist "to support" it and stop water sumping down there.)

To be honest Ian I dont know as I've had no issues at all with the hull or even the keel bolt. The dealer who told me about the concrete said he had seen locally made Investigators poured with concrete. At one point they were made here by the same company I think that made Sonatas if I recall an old ad that appeared on the MSN forum. I personally would think they all had lead no matter what this bloke told me and perhaps some builders filled the void with concrete and others resin. I do not understand why water would effect the concrete anyway.

I hope I never find out what's inside mine

Good luck with the repair anyway Jalal

Interesting.
My guess is it was shaped lead ingots lowered into the keel with the steel ring inserts. The ones that rust and we cut off and glass over. Can't see the use for the rings if they just poured concrete in.
On the other hand from a cost aspect I can see why concrete would be used. Maybe they used both.
Anyhow I hope none of us find out.

The whole concept of the boat is based on using lead ballast. Its high density keeps the CG of the ballast low in the keel. It makes no sense to add concrete if you have the lead, in fact it is a negative, as it adds very little to the stabilty.

I cant see a problem with encasing lead with concrete, alot cheaper than using epoxy and easy to remove if needed. I dont think any of the 563's would only have concrete for ballast

Hi all, just been going back reading old posts and came across this one. All I can say is that concrete has lime in it. Think about a combination of polyester resin ( fibreglass) which always has a small percentage of unset resin in its make-up, ( it is the unset resin that causes osmosis) then add salt water and lime in the concrete and you then have a chemical disaster going on. I have been advised by a fibreglass expert that under no circumstances should concrete ever be added into an area of fibreglass such as a keel area as the result over time will be that it will destroy the fibreglass, creating a total disaster. If I had concrete in my keel, I would be digging it out.
With my Investigator, I removed the lead ingots each side of the centreboard. The way I did that was to put a long 16 x 16 RHS on to an old 2 inch chisel and cut out the very thin (1 layer) of fibreglass that was laid over top of the lead ingots in the keel each side of the centreboard. These lead ingots are around 3 inch by about 2 inches and sit in there loosely and packed in there with scraps of foam which was sodden wet. Then I drilled into the lead and screwed in a 100 mm bugle screw which enabled me to attach a small chain and then used a lever to remove the lead on each side. It was not that hard to remove. This allowed repairs to be completed on the fibreglass inside of the bottom of my keel. This was done with epoxy resin and double diagonal woven glass rovings after months of drying out.
After this, I re fibreglassed over the outside of the keel. The point I am trying to make is that from the advice that I have been given, I would strongly discourage anyone to use concrete in their keel and my advice would be to remove it if there has been any added previously. Mind you, owners must decide themselves the best action to take for them