Re: Bayliner Capi 1983 16' rebuild
In my '83 it appears they put the wood into the shell like stringers, transom wood, some of the seat structures, etc, and sprayed them in with a chopper gun. Some places have a lot like the edges of the transom board. The shell of the boat is high quality, the guts not put in very well. This one the passenger side rear seat has a vertical piece of ply that goes back to the transom about at the stringer, but it is a few inches away from the edge of the transom wood. The other side the stringer comes up next to it, there is space on top of the stringer enough to fit a battery, then it is boxed in under the rest of that rear seat with foam. The other seat is storage. Should note the splashwell does give it strength, and the three angles of the transom also makes it stronger. The side sections of the transom have no wood or not much I can see, and are heavy glass.
Mine is strong, it moves hardly any with me on the motor bouncing up and down. The only difference is I put mat over the inside, more than the chopper glass they had on it. There is no knee at all in the center. I can reach down to the plug, can reach back under the shelf for the gas tank. I drilled my plug out and wrapped fiberglass cloth around a tube of paper, soaked it and expanded the paper inside the hole. I had soaked the wood in hole with resin before this. That made a hard smooth surface inside. I put the bung on the outside with 3m5200 and really short screws into the glass only. I also filled the motor bolt holes with resin and glass fiber mix, had drilled them large and re-drilled them smaller to size of bolts. Also soaked the wood with resin inside before I filled them. I just put tape on outside and stuck the resin in with a q-tip from inside, some I poured it with a paper trough. I cut glass up to around inch long fibers or less and had some ground glass I mixed into it.
I forget what was in my boat, a traditional quality boat uses only marine ply that has more plies. However CDX (cheap) should have near the same strength anyway. CDX might have voids, but it is not much of an issue for a transom unless right where a bolt goes. I'd use marine ply in a performance boat but did not see the need with this boat. Marine ply is better for thinner ply in a stressed use its more durable. I don't think mine had marine ply in it, but it was hard to tell. Marine ply, CDX, treated...it will all rot with water in it. The key is to do it right and seal it well. When dry wood is some of the best core material to this day. Check out all those foam core boats that blew apart in those hurricanes.
