1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

By the way I glassed in the edges of the floor to the hull with three layers of fiberglass. Two layers of matting with one layer of woven sandwiched between them. That should make the floor and the hull bonded very strongly.

 

[ArmchairDeity]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

It's funny how involved I've gotten with your project reading your posts... can't wait to see the after-pics! The process pics have been really cool and helpful.

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Armchair, I try to post as many pics of each step as I can, but except for weekends I'm usually working on it by myself so there are only before and after pics for the most part. I do try to write up a detailed description for people so they know that I'm either doing it right or give me advice or warn me of doing something wrong before I do it. lol.

Since my goal is to get it out on the water for trials in 2 and a half weeks, I don't know if I'll get to painting the cap and trailer this year. I'd really like to do it all at once, but I know that if I get the inside and outside of the hull painted and ready then the cap can always be painted fairly easily. I still think that if I get the outer hull painted by the middle of next week I'll have time to paint the cap and inside of the boat the same day with my sprayer.

Tonight I have to make a run in the nearby town to get more fiberglass matting and resin. I have emptied the Home Depot, Menards, and Wallmart of all matting and gallons of resin where I live. This is what happens when you do a couple of months worth of boat rebuilding in a couple of weeks. lol

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Woodonglass. I got to thinking and I think that running a board down each side of the top of the hull and then just running a wire through the existing cap/rub-rail holes and through holes drilled in the wood would be the easiest and best way to maintain the approximate width for the cap to fit back on. I used it in just one section and it worked great and you can easily adjust the width with the wire tension. I'd say using an 8ft 2x4 on each side with holes drilled on both ends and in the middle would work great. I know it kept my sides in the approximate shape for the cap to fit back on. I left them about an inch too wide because I wanted to make sure that the top of the hull pressed firmly into the cap. What do you think?

 

[Woodonglass]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

I agree. Whatever it takes to ensure the Hull remains in it's original shape. Did you Glass the underside of the deck?

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Yes I did Woodonglass. I didn't take pictures of that however. I ran out of resin 80% of the way through and had to run in to get more when I glassed the underside. That was fun. The edges were a lot harder so I cut them long and then glued the board down in place and soaked the edges in resin and glassed them in. It should still be air/water tight what with 3 layers around the edges and peanut butter filling any gaps along the edges.

 

[North Beach]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

So instead of re-installing the wood you just filled most of the cavity between where the wood used to be with poured in foam? And now the wood deck is glassed in and tied into the sides of the hull instead of fastened to the ends of the wood bracing that isn't there any longer? Did you pour foam inside of the fabric areas where the wood used to be or are they now hollow cavities?

 

[ArmchairDeity]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Armchair, I try to post as many pics of each step as I can, but except for weekends I'm usually working on it by myself so there are only before and after pics for the most part. I do try to write up a detailed description for people so they know that I'm either doing it right or give me advice or warn me of doing something wrong before I do it. lol.

I should have said I look forward to the finished product pics... I think you're doing an awesome job of both doing the work and narrating/documenting it as you go. I hope that once I get to the point where I'm doing similar projects I do half as good a job at the documentation as you're doing.

So if I understand correctly there used to be a whole lot of wood under that decking but it all rotted away to the point that you didn't even know it was there? If that's the case, are you worried about structural stability in rough water with just the fiberglass superstructure in place? I know that the boat has extremely thick glass in the stringers, I just wonder how the wood that used to be in there braced or stabilized things.

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Northbeach. The way the boat was designed they just laid down wood over the tops of where the deck would be to use as forms for the glass woven material. The wood provided no structural strength to the bottom of the boat since it didn't even contact the bottom of the hull and just ran along the tops as forms. It appears that they used it also to nail the wooden deck in to hold it down when they glassed it as well. I just poured flotation foam in between the woven stringers as a safety measure in case the boat ever got swamped and to add some strength below the floor and hopefully quiet the hull a little bit as well. I waited take bead of PLN super adhesive along the tops of all the glass stringers to hold the floor down. I can use hundreds of pounds of bricks to hold the floor down whilell it cured and then I glassed in the sides to the hull. Believe me those woven glass stringers are incredibly strong as I was jumping up-and-down in dancing on them and they didn't give an inch. Lol

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Armchair. This is fiberglass Stringer design is extremely rare but incredibly strong. I've only seen one other boat design the same way posted on a forum. Another person decided to buy this type of waving and retrofit his boat to it instead of putting in standard stringers as well. If it was a standard wood stringer supported boat I would have replaced them but since the woods served no structural purpose I would actually be weakening the boat if I tried to put in wood stringers I contacted the bottom of the hull. The only place I put in a wood stringer that contacted the hull was directly in front of the transom where it formed the drain well. There was a piece of wood tabbed in there to support the back of the deck I believe and form the drain well so I glassed I would stringer into the hall as well as two pieces of wood to connect it to the transom in form the box for the drain well. I think it was a smart decision because it would support the back of the deck and help type the deck and the transom into the bottom of the hull there. I'm no expert but it seemed like the logical thing to do.

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

I glassed in 90 percent of the floor tonight but I ran out of both resin and madding and will have to finish the rest tomorrow. All i need to do is put on a second layer about 8 inches wide along one side, one patch on the back, and then glass the back edge into the transim and im done. Well that in the three small holes I drilled into the bow with .

 

[North Beach]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Northbeach. The way the boat was designed they just laid down wood over the tops of where the deck would be to use as forms for the glass woven material. The wood provided no structural strength to the bottom of the boat since it didn't even contact the bottom of the hull and just ran along the tops as forms. It appears that they used it also to nail the wooden deck in to hold it down when they glassed it as well. I just poured flotation foam in between the woven stringers as a safety measure in case the boat ever got swamped and to add some strength below the floor and hopefully quiet the hull a little bit as well. I waited take bead of PLN super adhesive along the tops of all the glass stringers to hold the floor down. I can use hundreds of pounds of bricks to hold the floor down whilell it cured and then I glassed in the sides to the hull. Believe me those woven glass stringers are incredibly strong as I was jumping up-and-down in dancing on them and they didn't give an inch. Lol

Hoffman, I was asking not judging. I'm a tinhead and I just find this particular glass thread interesting for some reason......

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Lol. Northbeach I was only trying to explain what I was doing. It seems my boat is one-of-a-kind so I feel like I have to keep explaining why I'm doing things so very differently than 99% of the people refurbishing boats. I figure if I throw out enough detail the next poor schmuck who gets a boat like mine won't have to dig around looking for information like I did. Lol. Do you think the amount of foam I put in the boat by filling the bow and most of the floor should prevent it from sinking in the event of a swamp by freak wave? I hate to think I put all that foam in the boat for nothing.

 

[North Beach]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

That plus you are airtighting that floor aren't you? So you'll have the air chamber as originally intended. And I just wanted to be clear that im fishing for info not flaming you so it's all good.....

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Northbeach. Don't worry I didn't feel burned. Lol. Yep it shouldn't have that air chamber restored as intended. When we bought it one of the plugs in the drain well had popped back into the hull and inside skin of the ball had a hole in it. So instead of an air chamber it had a water tank. Hopefully when I'm done it will ride much higher in the water now.

Unfortunately tonight I am too low on funds to afford more resin and fiberglass. I'll have to wait till Friday to buy more in order to finish glassing in the floor and back of the transom. Dang.

 

[North Beach]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Been there bud!

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

I finally got the floor of the boat completely glassed in. There're two layers of matting on top of the wood deck. I put in a small piece of woven glass between the two layers of matting on the seam between the two boards near the bow. That should prevent any cracking or flexing at the joint. Where the floor meets the transom one side has two layers of matting in a layer of woven but the other side has just two layers of matting because I ran out of woven. I'm pretty confident that the joint between the floor in the transom shouldn't crack or flex. When I started glassing the deck on Tuesday I put plastic bags around my feet and duct taped them to my legs. I was worried about stepping in the resin and getting dirt on the floor from my shoes. it looks funny but it worked. Since the last pieces were all along the side of the floor and near the transom I glassed the last layers by just bending over the boat. Much easier. I'll post pictures tomorrow after it sets up.

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Here's pictures of the boat floor roughly glassed in after it dried this morning. Today we are going to flip the boat over and support it with sawhorses and stools under the floor. After the boat bottom is painted we'll flip it back over and I'll roughly sand the floor and fill any blemishes and then get it ready to paint.

 

[North Beach]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

I suppose so far the work seems acceptable.....

 

[hoffmanuno]

Re: 1964 Starcraft Bahama Restore

Lol. North Beach. You crack me up!

We got the boat flipped today. We did it by making a form we roundtabled earlier in the week. We designed it to be like a wagon wheel without the wheel just the spokes and then bolting it to the transom through the motor mount holes.

Once it was bolted in place we lifted up the bow with a cherry picker and bolted to the transom well he lifted the trailer up with the Jack. Then we started rolling it.

Getting it on its side wasn't too hard but then the unbraced part creaked a bit and scared us. Once we braced the cherry picker against the front of my jeep the movement was eliminated and then we He-Man'd it over on its bottom.

We put a couple of sawhorses in the front of the boat with the 6 x 6 and in the rear the boat I used barstools, a 6 x 6, and a couple other boards to hold it up.