Boat leans starboard at rest

[Crash]

I think there is water inside the bench seat on the port side, and wet flotation. I think it gets in through the screw holes where the bench is screwed down. Once I have made the bench attachments watertight again what is the best method to drain the water/dry it out? Inspection port(s) on the the side of the bench? Drill a couple of small holes then epoxy them closed once its drained?

View attachment 469595

Boat leans to starboard and port side settee space/floatation is wet?  That's even worse.  Looks like foam is totally encapsulated/glassed in.  I suspect you are correct in the assumption that water got in thru the screw holes for the wooden bench tops.  Unfortunately no real "quick and easy" way to just drain the water.  Best answer is to remove wooden bench seat boards, the cut through top skin of fiberglass bench seat, remove all wet foam.  replace with dry foam, reglass top back on, then re-attach wooden seat boards.  I'd make the top skin thick enough in the area of where the screws go that the screws never actually penetrate the fiberglass skin...

 

[Son of Hans]

It might be worth pointing out that a lot of small boats aren't actually stable at zero degrees of heel because of the weight of the mast.  They tend to flop one way or the other a couple of degrees to reach a stable position, and it wouldn't take much of weight bias in the boat itself to make it always go one way.

 

[European Bloke]

It might be worth pointing out that a lot of small boats aren't actually stable at zero degrees of heel because of the weight of the mast.  They tend to flop one way or the other a couple of degrees to reach a stable position, and it wouldn't take much of weight bias in the boat itself to make it always go one way.

That's very true 

I'd still want to get the wet foam out, it's not good for the other side of the wood that you don't see and don't look after. I had a similar issue in an old racing dinghy. It was a pig to get out and I wouldn't recommend the solution that only a 16 year old boy could come up with.

 

[Son of Hans]

Yeah, I certainly didn't mean to suggest that the fix was unnecessary!

 

[Grrr...]

When you fix it, don't glass the foam down to the bottom.  Leave a half inch of space down there, and drill a hole that leads into the boat.  Plug that with a removeable plug.  Make sure there are ways that water that intrudes can run down around the foam and into the bottom, where you can drain it in the future.

 

[Bull City]

I had an Alberg Typhoon many years ago (1800 lbs.; 900 ballast; 18 feet). It had a Johnson 6 HP 2-cycle on the stern bracket. The boat sat quite a bit down at the stern. The scum came to the top of the boot stripe, maybe a little higher. The motor probably weighed 55 lbs. I started storing it in the cabin, and that solved the problem.