On the contest 29 these were melted into resin I guess as it gives strength and durability and they were meant to last long. still how long is long? I suspect that they have never been changed since Mizar was built back in 1972, so that's 45 years today.
they do look pretty solid I could only change the valves...but I do think that once out at sea I would spend my sailing days asking to myself should I have changed them??
As usual I went on the internet and got some info about the material (bronze) the types of through hulls and so on...
Apparently when you see pink colour that's a sign of corrosion. and some of mizar's sea-cock did look pinkish in some parts.
So I have used a hammer and screw driver to take away the resin. not too difficult.
What was difficult was unscrewing the sea-cocks. I have tried with wd40 and banging here and there. but still not working ...although it made me think how strong these things are? do they really need replacement? (the answer later on will be yes).
So eventually I have decided to use the angle grinder and cut the seacocks paying attention not to cut the hull.
Out of 8 seacocks 6 where incredibly strong... but the last 2 (the 2 large drains from the cockpit) literally broke down in my hands. Now I am super glad that I went through all this work.
Later on I have decided to remove also the LOG thru-hull which being made of composite plastic usually are fine for many years to come but I did not like the sate of the sealant which was "jellish" and sticky... this turned out to be a challenging job as the sealant was preventing the plastic bolt from unscrewing and I was almost going to break it until I started warming it up with hot air and slowly taking the sealant apart with a small cutter... after 2 hours it finally unscrew without major damage.
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