J/30 Class Association Forums J/30 Forum The Boat, Sails and Equipment Icebox Rebuild

Hey all!

I'll be embarking on a rebuild of Ananda's icebox. Here's the plan:

• Cut the top out around the icebox opening, freeing the existing liner and granting access to the insulation that's there.
• Clear out all the old insulation and replace with Cryogel Z insulation (R=10/inch). Likely 3 inches of new insulation to approach R=30 for the install.
• Cut and plug the bilge drain hose - new drain hose will empty into a bucket only.
• Fabricate a new liner out of fiberglass and install in place inside the new insulation. Apply insulation to the top of the liner.
• Glass the liner to the old top, forming a new holder for a door. The exact door system has yet to be determined.

What do you guys think?

with all your other upgrades, would you consider installing cooling coils and a 12v compressor? While you have it torn apart would be the best time to do that.

I've got an Isotherm holding plate system that will be installed into the box, with a 12V compressor.

I've been considering installing 12v coils. Been looking at a few upgrade kits online. I'll be interested in what people have done and what they are planning as well.

I began this project last weekend!

I prepped the patient by removing the small stop at the end of the chart table track. This allowed me to slide the chart table aft, exposing the full top of the icebox.

My surgical tool of choice was a reciprocating saw. I made the initial incision at the inboard aft end of the icebox opening, penetrating to within 1 inch of the icebox edge. The second incision ran at a 45 degree angle inboard to meet at the corner, carving off a V shaped chunk of the top of the box.

And here's where things get interesting - my initial assumptions about the construction were all wrong. I'd assumed the interior sides of the icebox wrapped around the edges of the opening and became the top. Turns out this isn't the case.

The top of the icebox is surprisingly thick, and there's no foam insulation there as I'd expected. Instead, it's made of 3 alternating layers of balsa and fiberglass. Only underneath that does the inner liner fold around over foam walls.

So I had to stop work, as my plan to extract the icebox wasn't going to work this way. I'll probably need a shorter blade for the saw, and maybe even a small jigsaw bit to do cuts around the inside of the liner.

Sorry I don't have any pictures, I was a bit preoccupied with the cutting but I'll post some as soon as I take them.

This is fun!

Greetings all!

An update on my icebox project, which stalled for a while as I was too busy sailing.

I made some more significant cuts this weekend, and am well on my way to understanding fully how the icebox is built (and thus how to remove it).

A picture is worth a thousand words, though, so if you ever wanted to know how your icebox was constructed, here's one in mid-dissection:



The right side of the picture is inboard, the left side is aft. As you can tell, the top of the box where the lid sits is insanely strong - 3 layers of balsa core sandwiched with glass. The inside of the box on the aft side is glass only, but inboard there is a layer of balsa core between the box and the insulating foam, which seems like a strange place for it to be.

My plan is to continue demolition and thoroughly remove the inner shell and all the old foam insulation. The interior will be lined with a layer of balsa and glass for reinforcement, then 2 or 3 inches (haven't decided) of Vacuum Insulated Panels (VIPs), with an R-value of 30+/inch. A final layer of glass will form the interior of the box.

For the lid, I am still planning how exactly but the gist is that I will form a lip around the top of the box using thick FRP. This will then be glassed flush with the top of the box. My goal is for it to be just as sturdy as the old top, if not more. VIPs will line the bottom, providing the insulation. Hopefully I can find a new hatch with an equivalent R value to install.

Maybe make it so you slide the chart table aft open the ice box?

A few years ago I completed a less ambitious project on Radiant's icebox. I cut away a portion of the counter top aft of the lid and installed a piano hinge so the lid could be hinged open.
The drain was clogged, so I went in from the locker forward of the icebox and cut out the old drain fitting at the bottom of the icebox and epoxied in a new one. The hose from that travelled through the bilge to a Y-valve under the sink which allowed me to use the foot pump in the sink for either fresh water from the tank or to drain the icebox. It really works well.

Was it absolutely necessary to remove the old drain once you had access?

My cooler drain line now ends at the inboard side of the cooler after being nicely cut up removing the sole. I have been inclined to leave that stub and just let it drain into the bilge over the epoxy that I have glassed in. I like your solution with the Y-valve, but I don't want to make or expand my projects right now. So unless it was really easy I would postpone this fix for another day. But it would be much easier to do this fix now while everything is exposed.

Fortunately it is not that hard to keep beer cold in the Great Northwest, so getting really aggressive with cooler fixes is one of the advantages of our climate. Now if you want to talk about rust and corrosion and moss, that is a whole other thing.

Wow, I can't believe I started cutting up my icebox 6 months ago, and have been planning this project for longer. I really need to make more progress on things!

That said, the icebox project advanced quite a bit this weekend. All cutting is done. The interior liner is completely gone, and the hatch has been removed and discarded. Check it out:

Looking outboard:



Looking inboard:



And from the top:



Next steps: extract all the old foam insulation and clean out the box interior. Once that's done, I will measure thoroughly and build a computer model of the box, to figure out what assortment of VIPs I need to order.

As for the top, I plan on carving out the middle layer of balsa enough to insert boards (or FRP maybe) into the groove and make the foundation upon which I will rest a new "top" for the box. Underneath this will be 2" of insulation, of course.