Lone Star keel...what series alloy?

In the middle of some major stringer upgrades on my Lone Star Cruiseliner.

When I bought the boat, there was a plate bolted and sealed onto a portion of the formed/riveted keel. Upon removing the floor, I found that the bolts were actually lags going into some kind of rigged up wooden keel support. After taking all of that junk off, I found that someone had hit a rock or something, which put a nice gash right down the center.

Anyway, I need to weld this up, but I'm not sure what alloy it is. I have read that Lonestar used 5052 in their hulls. I realize that extrusions would be a different alloy, but I'm pretty sure this is just a formed piece. I would assume it is also 5052, but wanted to see if any of you guys might know for sure.

Thanks,
Phillip

I'm unsure of the alloy, but 5052 sounds like a good guess.

Are you sure you want to weld this? If you're a good welder with aluminum experience, go for it... but welding aluminum is tricky and you can really muck it up if you don't know what you're doing.

I personally would patch it. Patches, dents, dings, scratches, and scars give aluminum boats character and are like scars on the human body... and everybody knows chicks really dig guys with scars and fish really dig aluminum boats with patches. :LOL2:

I'm not a welder, so I'm a patcher. Gimme a sheet of 6061, a bag of closed end blind rivets, and a tube of marine epoxy and even the nastiest gash will be watertight when I'm done.

[url=https://www.tinboats.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=352806#p352806 said:

jigngrub » 19 May 2014, 18:28[/url]"]

Are you sure you want to weld this? If you're a good welder with aluminum experience, go for it... but welding aluminum is tricky and you can really muck it up if you don't know what you're doing.

Click to expand...

Jigngrub,
Yes, I am a pretty decent welder. I run a fabrication shop, and I am plenty comfortable with stick, mig, and tig welding.

This particular repair I need to make would definitely get worse if it wasn't repaired properly (welded). The design of the this hull relies on the keel for a fair portion of it's structure. If I were to just patch it (which is what the previous owner did), it would continue to flex, crack, and leak. Patching, unless done on an individual non-structural section of the hull, is just a temporary repair...as in something you might use to get home where you can repair it correctly.

All that said, I'm not sure who the @$$hat was that originally convinced people that welding was too difficult to attempt, but I am here to tell you, it is NOT too difficult to learn. I started welding when I was 15yrs old after reading a book I found in the high school library. When I was 18, I went to work at the family company, and could already weld well enough that I got put out in the weld shop where we fabricated giant catch basins to hold fuel tanks on large construction sites/mining operations/etc. This was in the days before youtube, and I got it done.

Now that Youtube is available, you can learn to do almost anything, and you barely even have to be able to read. Don't be afraid of welding. Welding is actually similar to gluing, except, instead of moving puddles of glue around, you are moving puddles of liquid metal around where you want them, then letting them "dry".


Thanks,
Phillip

I've seen puddles of wild turkey crap that look better than my welding puddles :roll: :LOL2:

I've never cared for welding, don't like that hood over my face and don't like the smoke/fumes. I'll leave it to the pro's like you, if everyone could weld... you wouldn't have a job.

I'm a carpenter by trade and the only time we use fire on a job is to get rid of scrap wood. :twisted:

[url=https://www.tinboats.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=352866#p352866 said:

jigngrub » 20 May 2014, 08:36[/url]"]I've seen puddles of wild turkey crap that look better than my welding puddles :roll: :LOL2:

I've never cared for welding, don't like that hood over my face and don't like the smoke/fumes. I'll leave it to the pro's like you, if everyone could weld... you wouldn't have a job.

I'm a carpenter by trade and the only time we use fire on a job is to get rid of scrap wood. :twisted:

Click to expand...

Haha, well, welding is only part of the process used in manufacturing our products. By itself, it wouldn't keep the doors open. We deal with decoiling of steel, shearing, punching, stamping, plasma cutting, roll forming, etc, etc.

Most of my friends can and do weld. I help out the ones that can't. I can't tell you how many times a buddy started out with the puddles of wild turkey crap, but after some instruction, they were running decent beads.

All that said, if someone truly doesn't care to weld, there are a lot of small welding shops out there which are often struggling to find business. Usually they are more than happy to help a person out.

-Phillip