Hull / tube leak

[Colin K]

Hello,
I bought a tired 3.1m Avon Rover a couple of months ago and with a bit of time,advise from here and encouragement from my brother who had also bought an old rib got it back to what looks a nice boat.
Brother launched before me and got on with his boat ok but noticed that he shipped a few gallons of water when it was left in the water for a few days !! I understand it all cleared when he got it moving and it drained as it should and so he is living with it.
Curious I wanted to test mine before launch but still in Coventry wondered how. When management decided that it was time for me to drain the kids paddling pool after Easter I thought what a great way to reuse the water and filled the Rib with it bucket by bucket !!
I filled it up to the underside of the valves not wanting to chance getting any water inside the tubes with the boat lifted a foot above the ground and waited. Well all was ok and then after 15 mins I noticed two leaks (drips) from the seams where the vertical tube tapes go into the tube/hull seam. Not massive leaks but leaks. Another was from a davit fixing which is a straight take the bolt out and reseal it job !!
I think I will simply mix some glue and force it into the tape joins which to the eye look pretty sound where they go through the material joining the hull/tubes !!
I think that the pressure that I have put it under by filling the boat is probably greater than that when floating and none of them face into the force of the water (if you understand my terminology ? )
Does anyone know if this is normal do you get a bit of leakage into the boat when floating from the hull/tube joint ??

All the best, Colin.

[jyasaki]

No, not normal, but also probably not all that uncommon (sealing a piece of fabric over a tape joint is tricky.) If there is a passage for water, water will get through (and sometimes a surprising amount over time.) One other ingress point that your "fill the boat" test won't reveal are leaky one-way valves in the drains. Even with the rubber stopper plugs, some amount of water will get through.

For the leaks you ID'd, rather than glue (in which the solvent is supposed to flash off leaving a very thin layer of adhesive, hopefully bonded to both sides), I'd use a marine caulk, which is designed to fill gaps and be waterproof. In the US, Lifecaulk is a popular brand. Don't know what you have over there (drawback to Lifecaulk is that it takes a while to fully cure, like several days.)

Luck;

jky

[Colin K]

Hello,
Thanks for that I have found a supplier of lifecaulk so will give it a try.
Cheers, Colin.