Reply To: Putting your floor together first

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#363
Eric
Participant

I believe you are not correct about rust and encapsulated stainless fasteners.  This is ,I admit a complicated and controversial subject. It has to do with activated or passivated stainless.  Rust by definition is oxidation and requires oxygen.  First I will say that I simply prefer working with stainless, but have buried sheetrock screws in centerboards that spent years at a time immersed in sea water then uncovered them years later while rebuilding the centerboards – and found zero corrosion.  Most sources discussing stainless corrosion refer to “crevice” corrosion (which is why exposed stainless gets polished) and corrosion that occurs in a half buried fastener right at the point of air/ epoxy interface.  This is the corrosion I worried about 25 years ago when ” potting in” stainless fastener u bolts using Gougeon Bros epoxy per their method. I just sold the boat 3 months ago and the u bolts have not as yet corroded despite a life around seawater (electrolyte promotes galvanic corrosion). The make a long story short I don’t worry about burying any metal in wood epoxy.  I do so because its a pain in the neck to fill the holes they leave. The buried fasteners do not contribute at all to the strength of a wood epoxy structure. I do use and remove sheetrock screws in cold molding.  As in the teardrop floor, they are merely for clamping.