Ches, I had good luck buying a new centerboard from Bob Eeg with lead filling. Alternatively, you could fabricate a new one yourself in the same way. If yours is anything like mine was, there's little chance of recovering it. It's built with two relatively thin shells and tiny steel punchings sandwiched between, that will keep expanding wider and wider as it rusts. By the time it's swollen it already has major structural failure, and should be literally "bursting at the seams" with rusty chunks. If you can't get the centerboard out in the first place, you will find photos of me dealing with this issue posted a few months back. I think it's worth it to construct a puller from the bottom, rather than try to push the board through from the top. I initially tried hammering a rod down through the top and damaged the inside of the centerboard trunk, which was difficult to repair working inside such a narrow area. Captain Jim Sadler (a fellow list member) designed an excellent puller that only took a few hours to construct, and removed the centerboard safely and easily. Sincerely, Tyler 1981 M15 #157 "Defiant" ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chesley Sugg" <csugg@mindspring.com> To: "nebwest2@aol.com via montgomery_boats" <montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Friday, August 29, 2014 1:25:24 PM Subject: M_Boats: M-15 centerboard woes Hi all, I need a little advice. My 81 15 has developed a stuck centerboard. It appears that the centerboard truck walls have developed the dreaded bulge. My board sticks up and while I can drive it down, I don't want to do this on a ongoing basis. I think maybe a 1/8" clearance might let it work again. I don't see trying to correct the bulge in the walls. I see either making a new board or sanding about a 1/8 to 3/16 off the width of the existing board. Has anyone done this? Is there enough fiberglass in the construction of the board that would withstand taking this much off? Thanks for any help. Ches Sugg M-15 "Mouse" (#153)

If you want to restore the boat as original there's some good advice on here about fixing it. Before I got my Sage 17 I was on the lookout for a sweet deal on an M-17 with a bad keel, and I planned to hoist the boat up and cut the old keel off with a Sawzall. I planned to glass up the void in the bottom of the boat and install a new trunk up in the boat for a dagger keel with a lead bulb on the bottom. A major job but so is replacing the ballast the way Sean has done. I'm in the middle of making the tooling for a bulbed daggerboard for the upcoming Sage 15 that should work; it has more effective lateral area than the M-15 but less wetted area. In the Sage we plan to use about 200 lbs of lead in the bulb, but another 50 lbs or so could be added but filling the actual web of the board. In the Sage we plan to let the web fill with water to make it neutral but it will drain out when on the trailer. On paper, 200 lbs in the bulb will have as much righting moment as almost twice that in a shallow-draft fixed keel like the M-15. You could make the trunk out of plywood, heavily glassed inside and out, or you could get a glass trunk from Sage which would probably be better in the long term. My friend Stan, on this list as PaintBoy did essentially this with an old M-17 only he dug up a DB, maybe from WD Schock, for one of the Santanas, and it sailed like crazy. If you are interested in doing this you might talk to him. Also, look at the Sage site and it will show a sailplan of the upcoming Sage 15, or SageCat as we will probably call it, that shows the profile of the DB. It's raked aft to shed kelp, which I consider important for a cruiser. Whatever you do, have fun. Also, either way you do it, use epoxy resin rather than polyester; it sticks way better to cured glass. jerry ----- Original Message ----- From: "Chesley Sugg" <csugg@mindspring.com> To: "nebwest2@aol.com via montgomery_boats" <montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Friday, August 29, 2014 1:25 PM Subject: M_Boats: M-15 centerboard woes Hi all, I need a little advice. My 81 15 has developed a stuck centerboard. It appears that the centerboard truck walls have developed the dreaded bulge. My board sticks up and while I can drive it down, I don't want to do this on a ongoing basis. I think maybe a 1/8" clearance might let it work again. I don't see trying to correct the bulge in the walls. I see either making a new board or sanding about a 1/8 to 3/16 off the width of the existing board. Has anyone done this? Is there enough fiberglass in the construction of the board that would withstand taking this much off? Thanks for any help. Ches Sugg M-15 "Mouse" (#153) -- I am using the free version of SPAMfighter. SPAMfighter has removed 12283 of my spam emails to date. Get the free SPAMfighter here: http://www.spamfighter.com/len Do you have a slow PC? Try a Free scan http://www.spamfighter.com/SLOW-PCfighter?cid=sigen