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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Mold for patching the hole Mold for patching the hole Time to patch that hole, finally. Between time demands and budget, I finally was able to order the fiberglass and resin and tools. I decided the first step is to make a mold for shaping the new fiberglass. The problem I have is that the...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Measuring for Stringers Measuring for Stringers I printed out a previous picture, and recorded the measurements directly on it. A set of measurements along each inner and outer stringer lines. The measurements let me make a scale drawing of the shapes of the stringer forms. Then I took...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Measuring for Stringers Measuring for Stringers Thought I should back up just a little, and show how I measured for the stringers. I couldn't use my old stringer cores as patterns, 'cuz they literally were mush. There was no way they could come out in measurable pieces. When I cut out the old...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Weight and Cost -- YES! Foam-core stringers are MUCH lighter than wood! Weight and Cost -- YES! Foam-core stringers are MUCH lighter than wood! Well, I've crunched the numbers. All the "experts" on the Internet say something like "carefully remove the old stringers for use as a pattern."...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Gluing in the New Transom Wood Gluing in the New Transom Wood I set the wood in place in the shell, and drew it up tight with six stainless steel screws, through the six counter-sunk holes that I drilled earlier. The piece of black tape is over a hole that did not get filled completely. I...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Gluing in the New Transom Wood Gluing in the New Transom Wood I read on an epoxy and fiberglass supplier's web site that it took basically a 1:1 mix of resin to Cab-O-Sil to make a peanut butter consistency. Well it took a lot more than a 1:1 mix to get the expoxy mixture this thick. It was...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Gluing in the New Transom Wood Gluing in the New Transom Wood I struggled with the question of how I was going to clamp the wood in place in the transom while the epoxy hardened. I've seen lots of different ways guys have clamped the transom. Big wood clamps. Home-made wood clamps. Steel...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Sanding Epoxy Transom - Sanding Epoxy Today I had a few minutes free before having to do some mowing, so I decided to sand the epoxy. I had read that epoxy was hard to sand, but I think that was probably talking about sanding by hand. The epoxy must be sanded so the epoxy adhesive...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Sealing the Wood Transom - Sealing the Wood One batch of epoxy (3 squirts resin, 1 squirt catalyst) was exactly what was needed to saturate one side. Two-day process to do both sides. The guide I read said to mix equal parts Carb-o-Sil and resin. That turned out not to be thick...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Sealing the Wood Transom - Sealing the Wood I bought my epoxy supplies from US Composites on-line. Great quality and great prices. Exceptional service. Left to right: Cab-o-Sil thickener; epoxy hardening catalyst; epoxy resin; measuring pumps. The epoxy is to be mixed 3 parts...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - First Drilling of Holes Transom - First Drilling of Holes With the wood clamped in position in the transom shell, mark the required holes. The best tool I could come up with to drill the holes. My grandfather's brace and bit set, which is older than me. Quality tools are truly...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Fitting the Wood Transom - Fitting the Wood I used a sabre saw to cut the bottom edge. It was set at a 12-degree angle to match the transom's vertical angle. After final cut on the ends, fitting the ends to the sidewall bevels. Just a little fine trimming was needed at this point...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Fitting the Wood Transom - Fitting the Wood Measuring the angle of the transom to the sides of the set-back. End of transom board, cut to fit the set-back angle. First length cut. 1/2" longer than transom shell. Ends notched to match approximately the bevels in the side walls...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Hull Sanding Transom - Hull Sanding Sanded the last wood layer off the outer transom shell, and finished the outside edges. Safety, safety, safety! See that little red spot beneath my fingernail? That's what I got from a 7-inch sanding disc spinning at 19,000 rpm, when it...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Transom - Hull Sanding Transom - Hull Sanding Had to take some time off to deal with the generalities of life, budget, and time. Finally got a chance to move forward some more on the transom. I was about to generate a LOT of wood and resin dust, so I set up my highly specialized dust control...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Re: 1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS Here's the "worst" edge after working the PL into the gaps as best I could. I applied a C-clamp and squeezed the boards together. Look closely and you can see that some adhesive has squeezed out, indicating that I have...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Re: 1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS Sorry for taking so long to post again. Got sick for a week. Then I slipped on some rocks while fishing for smallmouth along Iowa's Middle Raccoon River. Slammed my shin down hard on a big rock. Yeah, it left a mark. Then...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Re: 1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS Clamping the Plywood What you use to clamp the plywood isn't so important, as long as the plywood is flat and the clamping pressure is fairly even. As you'll see, I invested in a highly expensive clamping system, to ensure...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Re: 1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS Spreading the adhesive The biggest mistake most people make with construction adhesive is using too much. In construction for instance, when gluing foam insulation on a concrete basement wall, you just draw a series of...
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    1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS

    Re: 1979 Champion Bass Boat - Tear Down and Restoration -- with PICS First thing to do is take care of those surface voids. For adhesive, I'm using Loctite PL Premium Advanced Construction Adhesive. Instructions say that it can fill a gap up to 3/8" thick. These surface voids are only about...
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