I was on the boat last night finishing up cleaning of the v-birth when I noticed a problem with the bottom of the port bulkhead.

Yep, Delamination. Clearly there was prolonged water exposure on the port bulkhead which caused it to delaminate. That missing bit on the right side of the photo was done with my finger.

There are a few things to be thankful for despite having to replace the bulkhead. First off is that I haven’t stepped the mast yet so I don’t have to derig. The second is that the top is solid so the chain plate wouldn’t rip out suddenly. I’ve read horror stories about the chain plate ripping out of the bulkhead while under load. This still would have been bad but not as bad as it could be.

The bad news other than the obvious is that there Might be one place in town that sells marine plywood that I can use. I do know there are two stores that carry marine plywood. The first store has finished on one side marine lumber, A-B grading which would be fine if I was making replacement trim, but for the bulkhead A-B won’t work. The other store doesn’t say if their Marine plywood is A-A or A-B. If it carries only A-B grade then the next closest source of A-A marine plywood is a 2+ hour drive.