Thansk for the responses! If the hull is wet via a meter reading of 70- 80 or if it is soaking wet wouldn't that be a very good reason not to buy the boat? How hard is that moisture to repair?
I read an article about moisture in the hull. What I got from it was that the manufacturer used cheap materials which are porous in the 1st place. Then during layup allowed the previous layer to cure to long or allowed it to gather dust before laying the next layer. This would cause a failure of the layers to cehmically bond resulting in a permanent problem that can't effectively be repaired permanently. A sign of this wold be a small puncture that causes a long moist area. This would lead me to think that a J boat is a great boat to sail, but a pain to own. (
PS I want a J so bad I can taste it and I loose sleep at night dreaming about sailing it.)

Quote
Originally posted by Jason King:
I would guess that percentage saturation refers to the relative weight of the saturated wood. Balsa can hold several times its own weight in water.

A cored boat can maintain its structural strength even with wet core. However, once a core is wet, it will eventually rot. Once that process starts, the skins will delaminate and, ultimately, there will be a void between the two skins when the wood fibers break down. It's at that point that it becomes a significant structural issue.

Here's a photo of me squeezing rotten, saturated balsa core from a Pearson Triton - note the water that's squeezing out. In this case, the saturated deck section failed and, when someone jumped from the dock to the boat, it caused a six inch crack in the deck.

[Linked Image from triton218.com]