Intake screen in keel

[Dougv]

My 2006 Mainship 34 has a fiberglass shield in a section of the keel where the thru the hull fitting are located. I noticed when bottom painting the this shield has 3 screws on both sides for attachment. I found some of the screws were backing out and others would not tighten or loosen. It appears that this shield was removed at one point and bottom painted inside as well as the bottom of the boat where the seacock valves come through.

Has anybody removed this shield to clean and bottom paint the inside as well as the bottom of the boat. This boat is fairly new to me and I am not sure if yearly maintenance requires removal to clean up barnacle growth and recoat with bottom paint. Thanks for your input its been very helpful in understanding this boat.

See attached pic

 

[Comodave]

That is a new one for me. If you can disassemble it and clean it out and the bottom paint it I would. Barnacles will grow inside of it and eventually plug it up.

 

[BB-marine]

I have a 2002 34’ pilot twin engine that has a sea chest that you described. Mine does not have cut outs it has perko pick up screens one on each side. When I purchased the boat and did a refit to the boat. I removed the “ box” , there were 6 #10 oval head screws fastening the “box” to the hull. After removing the box I sanded to raw resin and applied three coats of interlux epoxy barrier coat then three coats of CSC interlux anti fouling. I painted the complete bottom of the boat at this time. Once the bottom was painted I reinstalled the box. That was 3 years ago and the interior of the box does not show any fouling. I did recoat the bottom this year to prepare the boat for our next trip to Florida.