[oldbluesplayer]

Nestor / Nick -

Nestor, Congrats on the sale !! I hope the right boat comes along for you - have to admit, either a 23 sceptre or 25 seafari would be real nice - as long as you got the rig to tow them - the sceptre probably isn't tooooo much worse than the seafari ?!?

Nick - did you ever look in the forward locker ? I remember that discussion we had last fall about door frames, I felt my boat was starting to loosen up, and discovered, in the forward well, were the cockpit liner was supposed to be tabbed to the hull, that the glass had -all- broken away on those tabs. Take a look at the inside of the end wall of the notch between the births - on mine, inside the forward well, you could see a plywood re-inforcement panel glassed to the end wall, and tabbed down to the hull, and to the sides of the forward ends of the stringer boxes. With that tabbing broken, the liner could no longer add structural stiffness to the hull, making it much more susceptible to twisting - which is a force mode probably amplified on yours, due to the hardtop - this twisting mode is whats causing you such grief with the cabin door opening/ frame.

Plus, I'm now worried about what effect it had, with the liner coming significantly loose from the hull up front, and at the back end of the liner, is where the two brass thru hull scuppers join between the liner and the hull - if you pry open at the front of the shoebox, the back end is now taking some stress as well.

I will be looking thoroughly at these points this spring, on mine, before geting wet.

Bill