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Wing keel conversion

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alfreddiaz
1st Mate

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USA
30 Posts

Initially Posted - 08/21/2014 : 17:34:07

Not saying I am going to convert my Cat 25 tall rig swing keel, but I would like to start compiling info on the costs, financial and other. Even more, find who sells the kit and for how much. I am located in Pacific Northwest. So East Coast is out of the question.

Who out there owns a Cat 25 that they converted?

How much was it?

Where did you get it done?

Very important. What type of trailer conversions did you have to do to go from a swing keel to a wing keel?

Finally, how does it sail?

I have emailed Catalina Yachts and got nothing back. Catalina Direct no longer offers the kits.

Thanks.

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Stinkpotter
Master Marine Consultant

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Djibouti
9013 Posts

Response Posted - 08/21/2014 : 18:27:31

I think CD got the conversion keel castings from Catalina, and I recall hearing Catalina no longer has them. I believe the conversion casting was different from the 1989+ wing because it fit into the swing keel trunk. Try contacting Gary Douglas there--he has been responsive in the past. It was never cheap, and may no longer be economically sensible compared to switching boats.

Edited by - on

dasreboot
Admiral

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803 Posts

Response Posted - 08/22/2014 : 03:25:32

wing does not point quite as high as swing by a couple of degrees. You wont notice it. What you will notice is no thumping of the keel, no raising and lowering it, no maintenance, no worrying about the pin and cable, and much better sailing in shallow water (raised centreboard vs wing).

I did my conversion by selling the swing boat 4031 and getting a wing boat 5656.

wing keel trailer is just a little higher. If you have bunks, you could probably double up on bunk boards. my new trailer is easier to launch than the old one as the boat sits lower even though it is taller This is because the crossbeams are angled.

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Bill Holcomb
Admiral

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769 Posts

Response Posted - 08/22/2014 : 07:29:56

If you can get a copy of November 1994 Mainsheet magazine the following article also includes photos. Unfortunately, in those days we had to send the photos to the Mainsheet for publication.

Bill Holcomb wrote the following article on behalf of Mike Leyden and other skippers thinking about changing their swing keel to the new wing keel.

Mike Leyden's Wing Keel Installation by Bill Holcomb

During his fall haul-out, Mike Leyden didn't get his Catalina 25s keel fully retracted before the boat settled onto the trailer. The crunching sound that came from the keel trunk as the boat settled was alarming to say the least. Mike assessed the damage and found that the cable attachment fitting on the keel end of the cable had "flopped over" rather than finding its way into the cable hole. The resulting damage to the keel trunk was enough to convince Mike that he wanted to change to the wing keel by using the retro-fit option that is offered by Catalina.
Mike and I made plans to install the new wing keel "sometime" in the spring. And, on the weekend of March 26/27 we did just that. What follows are some thoughts that Mike and I have following the installation:
First of all, Mike had an almost perfect facility to do the work in. He works at a medium sized machine shop that has several overhead cranes. These cranes made moving keels and lifting the boat much easier than would have been otherwise possible. The cranes also made positioning the boat over the keel trunk (and the holes we'd drilled) very easy. The boat could be moved a little ahead, or to the right, or a little down at the bow, etc.
The arrangement that Mike devised was to use two overhead cranes, one to lift the forward part of the boat and the other to lift the aft half. He prepared a nine foot long "spreader" bar to keep the 4 inch nylon straps from exerting too much pressure against the sides of the boat, and also fashioned two connecting straps to keep the lifting straps from slipping toward either end of the boat.
Second, after you've received the keel, bolt hole template, resin, fiber-fil, etc.; think, think, think. What are the steps that you expect to go through, and in what order. Things like:
A - Bracing the old keel so that it won't "flop" over.
B - How will you lift the boat off of the old keel. You need to be able to lift the boat up about two and a half feet altogether.
C - Where will you put the old keel, and how will you get it there after it's been unbolted from the boat.
D - How will you get the new wing keel under the boat.
E - Do you have a long enough drill bit to drill the six 3/4 inch holes for the keel bolts. And, do you have a long 1/4 inch and 1/2 inch drill bit to drill a pilot hole and second hole before you drill the 3/4 inch final hole.
F - Do you have a method for "sanding" off all of the old bottom paint that has been painted on the bottom of the boat and in the keel trunk. This was the hardest single job in the whole process for us.
G - How will you make sure that the boat is lowered onto the keel bolts without a "near miss" and subsequent damage.
H - How will you stir the fiber-fil (the bedding compound that makes a water-tight seal between the keel and boat) and its hardener. The fiber-fil has the consistency of green tooth paste and needs to be thoroughly mixed with hardener to set up correctly.
I - What kind of hole in the cabin floor will you cut and how will you cut the holes so that you will be able to put the washers and nuts on the keel bolts. And, of course, how will you want to finish the hole in the cabin floor after the keel is bolted to the bottom.
J - How will you "fair" the junction between the flange on the wing keel and the bottom of the boat. What do you want this part of the boat to look like when you're through.
K - Will you need to drill new holes in the trailer bunks support pieces to accommodate the taller keel.
Well, you can see that the 5 "P's" (Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance) really come into play with this project.
For us, everything went pretty smoothly. With the two cranes ready, Mike unbolted the old keel hangers. The keel was resting on the trailer in its normal "travel" position. Mike had also made an extra brace to keep the keel from flopping, and had already removed the keel cable winch from inside the boat. We then lifted the boat straight up about a foot or so. Mike pulled the keel cable out of the hole and we used a forklift with a ball on one fork to move the trailer forward and out from under the boat. We now used a boom-crane to lift the old keel off of the trailer, and then positioned the trailer back under the boat.
One little surprise that we had when we lifted the boat off of the old keel was that we had not gotten the slings just right and the boat tilted a bit when lifted. When we lowered the boat back onto the bunks to sand the bottom, it was necessary to re-position the slings so that the boat would lift straight up and not tilt. This took a couple of tries lifting the boat off of the bunks to get the slings just right.
Now Mike loaded the old swing keel onto the forks of the fork lift and we took the keel out into the yard and deposited it on a couple of 6 X 6s. Mike says that if anyone wants the keel that you can have it for free if you pay the freight to haul it home to you. It's in very good condition.
Back inside, we lowered the boat and began the work of "sanding" the bottom paint from the keel trunk and from about six inches of the boats bottom around the keel trunk. As I said, this was the toughest single job. To sand the inside of the keel trunk Mike used a circular "Scotch-brite" type of pad that rotated on the end of a 1/4" die grinder. He wore out eight or nine of these. A circular sanding pad for a 4" sander with 6" discs (without a backing pad so the disc would flex) was used for the boats bottom. We had thought that 80 grit paper would be more than enough, but quickly found that the 10 or so layers of bottom paint were so tough that 24 grit was all that would really do the job. Boy were we a mess, especially Mike.
Throughout the sanding operation both of us wore respirators. The little white cloth masks would not have been enough with all of the fine dust that the bottom paint made.
When the sanding was done, we cleaned off the sanded areas with an air nozzle and then with acetone.
Now it was time to mark and then drill the bolt holes. We used the template that Catalina supplied. It is a fiberglass template that comes fitted to the new keel and has the bolt holes in just the right position. The template has a hump that fits into the keel cable hole. This anchors the template and makes marking and drilling the keel bolt holes an easy job if your drill bits are long enough. Mike ran the drill while I lined him up vertically from the side of the boat. The 1/4 inch drill bit was long enough to drill through both the top of the keel trunk and through the cabin floor. That way, we could see just where in the cabin the floor needed to be removed. Once the 1/4 inch pilot holes were in, we drilled the holes out to the recommended 3/4 inch size. This done, we both got inside the cabin and used a hole saw to cut holes in the floor over the bolt holes. Mike has a dinette model, so two of the holes were under the aft seat.
One surprise that we had at this point was that the fourth hole aft was too close to the forward side of the aft seat. This meant that we had to use a jig-saw to cut an opening for the hole-saw.
It was time now to get the wing keel on the trailer. But, before we did this, Mike welded a 6 inch piece of channel to the trailer as a pad for the keel to rest on. This piece extended over the three cross members on the trailer and, of course, was centered. A boom crane lifted the new keel into place on the trailer and we then lifted the boat high enough to "clear" the keel bolts, and positioned the trailer under the boat again. We used the two overhead cranes to move the boat into just the right position.
To make sure that we had the keel holes in the correct places, we now lowered the boat onto the keel. I got into the boat so that I could look down through the keel bolt holes and "line things up". This worked really well as Mike could use the cranes or simply push a little on the outside of the boat to get things just right.
We used the keel bolt furthest aft as the guide. Once this bolt was in its hole, the front of the boat was lowered a bit more and all of the holes had bolts in them. No clunking, cracking, or breaking. Everything was just perfect. Mike, using the cranes, now lifted the boat straight up off of the new keel.
The bedding compound that Catalina had sent was next. This was 3/4 gallon of a toothpaste like fiberglass and resin mixture that needed to have hardener mixed in. Mike had made a steel paddle that he could attach to a 1/2" impact wrench that made stirring the mixture possible. I'm not sure what you would do to stir by hand. The stuff is awfully thick, and you only have about a half an hour to mix and apply the mixture. We used plastic spatulas to spread the mixture on the upper surface of the flange on the keel and all over the part of the keel that would fit into the keel trunk.
I got back into the boat and again guided the lowering of the boat back onto the keel bolts. We again used the aft bolt as the primary guide. When the boat had been lowered down to the flange, I put the backing washers, lock washers, and nuts onto the keel bolts and tightened them down tight. The excess bedding compound "squooked" out at the flange to boat joint and we cleaned this excess up with the plastic spatulas.
All of this took about 5 1/2 hours of actual doing. We ate lunch and had a couple cups of coffee too, so spent about 7 hours getting this far, and we left the boat to let the bedding compound harden overnight.
The next morning, the bedding compound had hardened about 60 or 70% so we decided to leave things alone. But we did have a couple of jobs that could be done while we waited. The bunks and bow support on the trailer needed to be adjusted to fit the greater draft of the wing keel (the boat was still being supported by its slings and the overhead cranes). When the bunks and bow stand were adjusted, we lowered the slings enough to take them off and the boat sat perfectly on the trailer.
Due to the cool weather, the bedding compound had not hardened completely. We decided to allow it to finish hardening and made plans to fair the joint between the flange and the bottom of the boat on the next Saturday.
There were a couple jobs that needed attention that morning. We adjusted the bunks on the trailer to fit the taller configuration of the wing keel, as well as adjusting the launching guides at the back of the trailer. The bow winch stand also needed to be moved to fit. All of these jobs were completed in an hour or so. Mike took the boat home on the trailer.
The following Saturday morning I met Mike at his house and we decided to try fiberglassing the joint between the hull and the new keel. The lip was about 1/4 inch tall, so we cut some fiberglass into 1 inch wide strips and attached it with resin to make a fill. Next we used 4 inch wide fiberglass to bridge the area from the hull to the keel. Unfortunately, gravity began to come into play and the whole "mess" (and it turned into a real mess) began falling and pealing off the bottom. It was just impossible to get everything to stick, and we made the decision to clean up what was left and simply fair the flange itself by grinding. Mike did this during the next week and then epoxy sealed the whole hull to flange area.
Mike faired the flange to hull area by first grinding the flange down as close to the hull as he could. There was still a lip so epoxy putty was used to build up the hull and create a smooth radius transition all around the flange. A little light sanding made the flange to hull joint look just right. Mike sealed the area with epoxy paint and then finished the job by painting the new keel and bottom with new antifouling paint.
All in all, the job went pretty well. But having the right facility and planning the job out ahead of time probably meant the difference between our success and a real disaster of lost time and reworking mistakes.
The boat is in the water now and Mike reports that she feels much more stable....She "tracks" better and doesn't heel as quickly. And, Mike feels that she is now more particular as to the balance between mainsail and foresail.

(Mainsheet Vol 12, No 4. November 1994
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DavidBuoy
Admiral

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USA
707 Posts

Response Posted - 08/22/2014 : 07:50:22

Voila.

http://www.catalina-capri-25s.org/tech/tech25/wingcon1.asp

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Bill Holcomb
Admiral

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USA
769 Posts

Response Posted - 08/22/2014 : 07:54:52

Thanks David

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WesAllen
Navigator

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USA
222 Posts

Response Posted - 08/22/2014 : 17:15:04

Too bad they are no longer available. I think I would consider it.

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pastmember
Master Marine Consultant

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2402 Posts

Response Posted - 08/23/2014 : 10:25:27

I sold my '82 swinger and bought an '89 wing and was VERY happy I did.

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Stinkpotter
Master Marine Consultant

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Djibouti
9013 Posts

Response Posted - 08/23/2014 : 12:40:03

quote:
Originally posted by WesAllen

Too bad they are no longer available. I think I would consider it.

i think Frank's approach makes more sen$e. The market value of a converted '82 is likely to be about that of an '82 (not covering the conversion costs of material, transportation, and labor) while the '89+ is generally a nicer boat all around--including the greater headroom due to the lack of a keel trunk.

Edited by - on

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