> During my maiden voyage of my Pygmy Arctic Tern kit, I had the misfortune
> of parking my new boat on top of a treestump that was only a few inches
> under the surface of the water. I ended up coming to a halt and had to
> wiggle myself off of it. The point of the stump that I dragged across left
> an interesting scar on the hull -- the weave of the cloth is visible in a
> zig-zagging line about 5-6mm wide. There is a slight indentation or groove
> in the surface, but it seems watertight yet. The cloth has not been
> damaged, but has just been made visible under this high pressure. I waited
> a month before varnishing, so the epoxy should have been plenty hard.

> Is this a common type of damage? Any suggestions on repair?

Yup, sounds like a pretty common type of damage. If it ain't broken don't fix it. If it isn't leaking or causing a structural problem, leave it alone. Let it be a battle scar -- a veritable testament to the strength of your construction -- for in this place YOUR boat met a stump, and got off with barely a scratch.

And if you get bored of telling that tale to anyone who should see the ding, then you can see of it can be disguised with another coat of varnish. Otherwise, sand it out and patch the area with some slightly oversized pieces of glass cloth and epoxy resin. After the first coat of resin lightly sand the edges of your patch to taper them out, or ``feather edge' them so they smoothly blend in with the hull. A few more coats of resin will kill the weave in the patch and with a light sanding and some varnish, you'll never see the repair.

I suggest you hold off on such minor repairs until the end of the season, though. This part of the boat may see many more dings and scratches by then, so you can take care of all of them at the same time. In fact, if you see areas where there are many such dings you may want to put an additional layer of cloth over those areas as a buffer against damage next year. If you can get away with a single 5 or 6 foot long strip, say 10 inches wide, of 4 or 6 ounce fabric along the dinged up areas you'll add greatly to your piece of mind, and add a minimal amount of weight. The additional weight would be about 3 ounces.

Hope this helps.

Paul G. Jacobson