The Trouble with Junior - Part 2

|Peter Johnson
The trouble with Junior, Part 2

Part 2 of 5 in the The Restoration of Junior series.  Start at part 1 →

Junior's biggest job: the old screws

Junior is a 1954-designed Yachting Monthly Junior by Kenneth Gibbs.

In our last update we'd stitched the boat together with nylon nails to prevent any loss of shape.

The hull is built from Gaboon ply on frames — a strong and simple method of construction. The panels are glued and screwed to the frames with copper and brass fixings (screws and nails), and these are now corroding, causing rot and soft patches in the wood around every fixing.

One of the jobs that takes a long time is removing all of these old brass screws. 99% of them have rotted and gone pink, with no strength left at all — even trying to remove them causes the heads to come straight off.

Removal is a tedious procedure: cutting each screw out, re-drilling the hole, then re-fixing with a hardwood dowel and a liberal use of MAS FLAG epoxy with medium hardener and Workshop Mix (our own blend of fibres for thickening and gluing).

Removing old brass screws from Junior's hull during restoration

Rotten screw

New screws ready for refitting during Junior's restoration

The cutting out is done with a mitre cutter and drill; the root of the screw then comes out with anything you can get a grip on.

Close-up of a corroded screw removed from Junior's hull

I've used long-nose pliers, but I find sharp wire nippers get a better grip.

Screw holes in Junior's timber ready for filling

The horrible beastie removed.
Peter Johnson

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Peter Johnson

Pete Johnson is the owner of Epoxy Ltd, trading since the late 1990s and supplying MAS epoxy and boatbuilding materials to professional and DIY builders alike, all under the philosophy of "Simple Perfection". When he's not helping customers, he's usually elbow-deep in one of his own projects, from building the 38ft schooner Iracunda from scratch to restoring boats like Junior, a 1950s Yachting Monthly dinghy rescued from the scrap heap. He writes the workshop blog to share the practical, often hard-won lessons learned building and repairing boats with epoxy.