Some thoughts from my keel repair adventures... What year is your M17? So we know if it's steel or lead ballast. Mine is 1974, so steel punchings ballast. I had no idea the fin keel connected to the main keel in that way. Never drilled into my fin keel, as my issue was water apparently getting into the main keel. So I drilled test holes there, and found some water had gotten in, and various repairs followed, not relevant here (yet). However if the aft fin part of the keel does connect to the main keel and is hollow, as you have found, then if you had water in there, it may well (most likely?) have come in through the main keel (meaning water got into your keel interior, probably filled any/all voids if it rose all the way up to the fin keel). As far as I know, there is complete separation of the keel interior from the interior of the hull. In other words the keel section is sealed off from the hull interior above the keel. There is certainly no opening between them in my M17. The 'mud' in your fin I have no explanation for - unless you have steel ballast and the 'mud' was actually rusted steel punchings (they are very tiny bits) and/or rust particulate. Some of what I found in fixing seepage into my keel could have been mistaken for 'mud' or something like that but was actually metal/rust grit of a 'muddy' color. One way to check for water in the lower keel - what I did - was to drill some test holes a few inches up from the bottom of the keel, along the outsides. I drilled upwards at an angle with a relatively small bit, 1/4" to start I think, or 5/16". You will drill through the keel wall and into the void where the ballast/resin is, and if you hit an area with loose ballast not fully resin-encapsulated, if there's water in there it will of course run out, along with some bits of ballast. It may be somewhat murky/muddy looking, in my case from grit/rust off the steel punchings, and also an oily scent, I assume from machining oil that was on the punchings when they were put in. No idea where your water might have come in, but I think the "weak points" (likely suspects) are the holes where the CB stop pin goes through (where mine was leaking AFAIK, apparently from some prior damage and poorly done repair work), the CB pivot bolt hole/tube, and possibly the joint between the keel bottom and the inner CB trunk sides. HTH... John S. On 06/18/2017 11:47 AM, Alan Oltman wrote:
Hello everyone. I recently bought an M17 and am in the process of repairing and repainting. I have come across something curious I need help with. There is a small fin keel that extends from the keel aft along the center line, to the transom. It is only 5 or 6 inches deep at this aftermost point. Mine looked a little beat up so I thought I’d have a closer look. I drilled a 1” hole in the side, near the transom, and to my surprise, the fin is hollow. Mine, however, contained mud and water. I vacuumed out as much as I could but need to know how mud could have gotten into this “keelette”. The hollow space goes all the way to the keel itself. I can’t see under the cabin sole to know whether the hollow space connects with the cabin. Can I flush it out with water (it was already wet so what the heck)? How can I keep this from happening once I repair this fin? Thanks in advance, AL in MPLS
-- John Schinnerer - M.A., Whole Systems Design -------------------------------------------- - Eco-Living - Whole Systems Design Services People - Place - Learning - Integration john@eco-living.net - 510.982.1334 http://eco-living.net http://sociocracyconsulting.com