The soon to be MY boat at the boatyard sitting hard on the ground while sporting holes in the soft squishy floor, a big stained rainwater puddle and leaves everywhere.
What a mess!

Here the spashwell has been cut out along with a little bit of the floor.
When I started to dig around at the top of the transom from the inside the original wood had the feel of cardboard but only half the strength, this dried out mush proceeded to get wetter and mushier the lower down the hull I worked, only the very highest-up outsides of the transom was dry with the wood in as new condition. This good wood proved a lot of work to chisel out, I preferred the mush!

Here is the start of the work toward raising the transom to make more room and to help keep the sea out a bit better than original.
Every single crack, hole and even a blister has been ground out. I even found the remains of mild steel screws in a few holes! The inside at this stage got 4 layers of triaxial alternated with 4 layers of chop strand mat. When this portion was completed the rear wall was almost double the original thickness. The result was an extremely solid rear wall with none of the floppy wobble of the original bare skin just a very solid structure ready to be built on.

The ply is fitted after near 50 hours work time, I used 2 layers of chop strand again for the second sandwich. The gap around the outside where the ply almost meets the hull and sides has been filled with resin, many thousand chop strand fibers and carbosil all mixed together into a slimy paste.

It is now all glassed up inside using a couple of layers of triax and chop with an additional three layers of triax filleted around the outside from the wood to the hull, every triax layer layer also had another layer of chop strand between.
This pic also shows a lip I put at the top to help when the rubber bump strip goes back on if I decide on one here, an attempt at thinking ahead I guess.

Had a change of location so working under a tarp here, certainly no substitute for a proper undercover workplace!
The caping is off in this pic and was getting a full rebuild (no pics sorry) I replaced any rotted wood, all the console wood was replaced and then I added a layer chop strand mat and a layer of triaxial to the underside of the capping. Apart from an unwanted small increase in weight the capping now is very much stronger than new.
In this pic the inner hull is being prepared for layup and the inclusion of two extra stringers either side to help with structure for the increased deck height I have planned. The stringers apart from some minor areas of softness where the factory stapled some deck parts into the stringer is in good condition The anchor well has also been removed from the bow ready for a new one.

I decided to add another 15mm layer to my new transom just for the hell of it, it is now near 50+ mm thick but I should now with bracing be able to cut a transom door in at a later date without pulling the floor to bits and other hassle's. I will see what happens.

Might have gone overboard on the glass a little bit. This is a pic showing the thickness of all the glass now in my finished transom. The wood in my transom from the factory stopped short of the bottom so I also followed that anti-rot feature.
This meant that every layer of glass added came together at the centre bottom where a bung hole would be in most boats, this is a piece from the drilling of that plug (bung) hole. I dont think my new transom will be falling apart any time soon!

The new anchor well (old one had delaminated from the side of the hull and was partly rotted also) is glued in readiness for laying up.

In this pic I have laid up around the anchor well with alternating layers of chop strand and triaxial mat, two of each. The inside where the anchor and rope will sit has been completely laid up with biaxial and chop strand.

Below the well the hull has been heavily reinforced with overlapping layers of triaxial mat and chop-strand, I learned the hard way here that despite my good intentions of doing it in multiple single pieces of glass, it was just too hard to get a quality result becuase of the hull deadrise so I ended up doing it in strips which was much easier to handle, the couple of inches of overlap each strip had with the next made for a very strong end result so I am happy it ended this way.

Here the reworked capping is back on, there was no way I could have made and fitted the new anchor well with the capping on anyway. Just visible is where the centre stringer has been laid up with triaxial mat and chop-strand, it was interesting to note how much stiffness just this bit of glass over the stringer made to the hull.

Now it's time to raise the stringers and add a couple, the hull and original stringers have been completely laid up with vinyl - ester as the resin and triaxial and chop-strand as the glass, for the second time, so 4 layers in total over the stringers so far.
The wood used to raise and make a stringer is 1st grade Hoop pine and 25mm thick, they were all glued down using Iso polyester resin, carbosil and many many thousands of small 4mm long glass fibers all mixed into a slimy paste.
The new wood was then planed and sanded to be level front to back and side to side but still low enough that the planned future glass over bare wood layup would bring them up to the correct height for the flooring.

Here the ply has been cut to size and a dry fitted, the stringers need to be laid up first.

Here the entire hull has been layed up again but this time with 450gram multixial may and 450grm chop strand as the separating layer.
The ply has now been glued in using the previous glue mix.
A PVC water channel has been glued in with 3m 4200 then a couple of layers of chop strand, the PVC was cut along the centre line length ways before fitting.

Just a pic of most of the glass cut ready to fillet the ply to the hull. the glass is multi axial with a bond layer of chop strand both 450gram/m2.

My most current pic where the fillets have been done as per the last description but as chop/multi/chop/multi so 4 layers in total. I now have a lot of sanding and grinding to prepare for the next steps.

I decided to attempt something a bit more fun than fibreglass so I bought some ply and spent the day cutting it to shape, it was great fun and in what seemed like light speed (compared to glass work)I had cut a complete deck! (almost).
There will be no crappy butt joints in this floor only quality scarfed joints.
The fuel tank holes and the in floor kill boxes have been roughly cut also the bilge hole.

Now I will go back and do some more preparation toward laying the floor proper, I need to fit some more water channel, tubes to route fuel line/s and breathers, line the kill boxes with foam and glass it in nice and pretty, fit a floor in the fuel tank holes, a bit more fiddly glass work then finally pouring the 2 pack foam and shaving flat ready for the floor after it has been prepped with resin and glass on the underside.

Here I have laid the water channel, not before what I call a barrier coat of V-ester resin over all glassed surfaces as an extra barrier.

Here the channel has been 3m 4200 glued in and 2 layers of 450gm chop strand has been laid over it.
I have also drilled weep holes in the channel each hole has been blanked off with a piece of masking tape to stop the foam filling through the holes. The masking tape over the weep holes will degrade and allow any water that would log the foam in a close system to weep away over time and under gravity.

Here is the first pour, I did 5 pours all up and used a 2 part polyurethane foam (35kg/m3).

The finished pour, within this cavity holds 2kg of part a and 2 kg of part b, I only just made it with the quantity I bought cost was $140 AUD.

The front deck piece underside here has been coated in V-ester and is waiting for this weekend and me to level the foam.
The dry Ply was placed in the sun to heat up then moved into the shade where the cool resin was poured on, this way the ply really sucks up a lot of resin and there should be no flaking like was the case with the floor I cut out.

Here the Foam has been shaved flat to just below the stringers and where the floor will touch the sides.

The floor has been glued in with v-ester, glass strands and carbosil.

The fuel tank box floors (underside)are being laid up with 2 layers of 450 chop. I cut the pieces wider than needed so that when I cut to size I will have full thickness glass right to the edge that will be enveloped by the glue but no before being sealed also, it will see a lot of water over the years. A person will never see this level of work on a bought boat.

Here is the bung clearance hole on one of the tank box floors.

The hole has been filled with V-ester.

Here is the above hole drilled to take the bung. The fuel tank floors have been fitted and the topside ply has had a heavy coat of resin to waterproof until the next weekend when I might lay it up proper.

long shot of the weekends flooring

While waiting for resin to set I decided to have a go at a very small portion of the gelcoat about a foot by a foot.

This is the result with about 20 minutes work which included wet and dry 240 and 800 grit then about 2min with the power buffer and fine 1000 grit paste.
It came up good enough to see a full reflection. Very happy about how well considering it probably had the worst case of oxidation I had ever known and has yet to be polished or even seen a good workout with the cutting compound.
Oxidation truly is only skin deep!

This pic shows inards where the water will drain from the front deck, this deck sits lower than the rear section so that someone as lanky as me can sit and drive without feeling like a sore thumb in the wind. I used 5200 to glue the fibreglass partition panels.

Wider shot showing the front floor towards the top of the pic then the step up to rear deck height, the partion/water gallery and the forward fueltank box floor.

Just finished working my way back with the foam, enough for this portion got done (+ I was out of foam!) to lay the first portion of the deck.

Here the fish boxs have been cut and pasted in, the foam is 22mm polyurethane panels.

In this pic the fish boxes have been laid up with 2 and in places 3 layers of 450g chop strand, also the bung/drain holes have been drilled, the water drains directly into the hull PVC water channels fitted earlir and then dumps into the bilge.

Well the floor is down and it is a big deal!!!

The floor is 17mm CD grade ply and glued down (zero screws will ever see this floor) all joins were scarfed together, the cutouts are rough undersize so that after I layup the surface and accurately cut each holes perimeter the fiberglass will be full thickness right to the edge.
The fuel tank holes will be cut close to the each stringer down each side and the top and bottom transverse bulkheads in each will be the other lines. The edge will then have a routed rebate approx 12 to 14mm deep carved into it (reason for 17mm ply) to possibly accept a fully glassed piece of 10mm 5ply that will comprise the hatch. The hatches will have no fittings and will be levered up with a purpose made tool for filling/inspection.
Anyway this photo is where I am at and a some of above is where I am going,
ATM I have a 2.9m by 1.9m bed of completely clear deck space from where the back of the drivers seat will be and at it's widest, it seems to me to be a large area for this size monohull and what I was aiming for but couldn't imagine until now, it's great!! Heaps of room for the important stuff-fishing!

I finished the floor laminating this arvo but didn't have enough resin to do the front floor finish coat, but luckily enough to finish the entire laminate.
I used chopstrand 1 layer each of 450g/m2 and 600g/m2 with the 600 on top and around 26L of resin.
I laid up both at once and used a and iso slow set resin as insurance, otherwise dont think I would have made 2 times 600/gm2 without a few panics.

The rear deck took 3 hours contuinual work and the front took an hour.

Here the holes have been cut out to their finished size and shape and routed to accept the covers. I also fixed a couple of bad areas in my front floor laminate where I must have sweated onto the glass while laying up, those spots were like sponge under my fingers so I ground them out and patched. I also mucked up with the Jigsaw sawing to the wrong mark on one of the fishbox holes (boy was the air blue for a minute after that!) . So I ground deep into the ply and patched that also, both now are as good as new or even stronger.

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15/8/05

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