There was only one way to discover the other leaks. I got into the garage. Keeping my head as low as possible, Jeannie closed that massive steel door on top of me. It became pitch black. Fortunately, I do not suffer from claustrophobia. For someone who does, it would have been a frightening experience. Jeannie then took a hose – connected to the tap on the pontoon since we had no water on Aleau – and began squirting water all around the garage roof. Eureka! I saw water leaking from the spud-pole hatch. Simon Piper had pointed this out to me earlier and I had applied massive amounts of mastic along every seam and around every bolt-hole. Not enough, apparently. In the photo below, some of the bolts have been removed as I fill the holes with even more mastic.
Using a flashlight, I searched every inch of the garage roof. And found a lot of water coming over the lip at the aft-end. When the boat was built, the lip was made too short. Whenever it rained, water would pass over the lip – and end up out of sight between the top of the water tank and the bottom of the wooden flooring. It would have required being in the garage when it was raining to discover this design flaw. The fix was simple – if it lasts. A length of tubing used to insulate hot-water pipes. Let’s hope it works.
