written by Thomas Maschkiwitz on September 29 of 2021 and read by 834
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The Soling and her rigging is a very solid thing but there is one area what needs to keep your eye on:
The deck area around the mast step is a sandwich plywood with gelcoat covered on top- and under deckside.
If the boatbuilder "forgot" to use marinesealant before mounting the mast step water will come through the holes for the bolts to the plywood and could destroy this over the years.
The result will be that earlier or later the mast step goes down because the plywood is rotten.
You can check the condition on your Soling very easy:
If you can remove the bolts which fix the mast step on deck easy everything should be ok but use some marinesealant (Sika or Tekal) before you mount the maststep again!!!
If you can turn the bolts only with a lot of power the plywood is wet and "grown" around the bolts winding.
The maststep must replaced with the hope that the wood can dry through the holes.
If this doesn´t work a professional, qualyfied boatbuilder is asked.
The plywood surface at the big hole, where the ropes go through the deck should also be protected, water repellent by using some wood protection like Intertox from International or similar.
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