1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

[coleman kayak1]

Recent motor issues lead us to decide to end the season semi-early and do this project.

For about 3 years now a couple spots on the 'toon deck have been getting soft. At first it was no big deal but after a couple seasons it got to be pretty bad, especially in one spot right behind the helm. It was so bad we had to patch it just to get through this season without a potential (ly wet) catastrophe.

We decided to just replace the entire deck. We found many more soft spots and patching would be a temporary fix at best. Material was pretty much obvious, factory spec 3/4" marine grade plywood. Floor covering we had some debate over. Problem is carpeting and vinyl come in 6' wide widths, which is practically useless for a boat using 4 4x8 sheets of decking. They did sell pontoon versions which were 8' wide but at the price they should be gold plated (25 a foot for vinyl). We ended up deciding on cabela's Tuff Skid Coating. It seems like it should provide a durable nonskid coating which is what we are shooting for. In addition, even though its a lot, its pretty cheap relatively speaking.

While we're at it I'm planning to replace the lights with LED models. The incandescent ones would corrode and quit working at least once a season and they haven't worked in 10 years or so.

To accompany the new lights we're redoing all the accessory wiring. The way the boat has been wired is just basically running a wire clear to the back for everything. I think there are 4 positive and 3 negative connections, not including the motor. I plan on installing a nice switch panel and running just one primary wire up to the helm.

Docking lights and a new seat are just icing on the cake.

Grandpa and I pulled off the top yesterday, wasn't too bad its not any heavier than an aluminum truck canopy I don't think, still was good having two people, here is the boat with the top removed

Here is a picture of the patch we did

And here is a picture of why (you can't really see it but the unfaded part of the floor used to be inside that aluminum piece) :shock:

Got started early this morning on it. Took all the sides off. Had to take this picture, wouldn't the boat be kinda cool like this?

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Next I took the outside trim off. This piece helps give the deck support from the outside. Lots of drilling rivets here

Peeled back the covering to reveal some of the rot. About every sheet looked like this

Next I could begin removing the deck pieces. Once the side rails are gone there are three carriage bolts which hold it to the stringer. Of course most of these just turned and I had to drill them out. We did finally get every piece out, though the one with the helm on it was particularly hard, because we had to remove the steering, wires, and for some reason it just decided to be hard. I took this picture before removing it, but its gone now

Just waiting on parts to come in to get back to work , whatcha think?

 

[EGlideRider]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Thanks for the pics. Be sure to send ones as she starts going back together.

 

[lncoop]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Can't see the pic(s), possibly because I'm at work. Guess it's academic now, but did you check out the redeck kits at Pontoonstuff?

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Will be sure to keep the pics coming. Have a lot of little side projects eg lights wiring refurbish the helm that I will also document.

I checked out redeck kits from everywhere. I thought once freight was factored in I could easily do the job cheaper with parts sourced locally, which is so far proving to be true, we got all the marine grade plywood today and got some epoxy primer on order.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Got a small side project done. The original octapon logo had seen much better days. The writing was long gone and we were changing the color of the floor from blue to gray anyway, so I thought I'd come up with a new logo. I have poor photoshop skills but came up with an end product I think is very nice. I e-mailed it off to a vinyl shop this afternoon and it should be done in a couple days.

Before:

After (The white will actually be clear):

 

[lncoop]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Very cool. I'm sure there won't be another like it anywhere. Since you mentioned how cool it would be to leave the deck wide open I thought I'd show you this. We spend a lot of time on a little lake named Catherine. It's a two thousand acre lake and there are several of these on it. We refer to them as Lake Catherine specials. Pretty neat. This is the nicest one. There is one that has PVC lawn furniture and potted plants on it.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

^ Wow thats quite the boat, too bad that honda on the back probably cost more than the rest of the whole setup lol

On another note, I have never in person seen another octapon. I've only heard of them a couple times, scouring the internet don't turn up much, just a lot of mine actually. Really quite an ingenious design of a pontoon really.

 

[lncoop]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

^ Wow thats quite the boat, too bad that honda on the back probably cost more than the rest of the whole setup lol

You should see the gazebo up close. The guy custom fabricated the whole thing. It's unbelievable.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Wow, that is something lol. Guess if its what floats your boat (no pun intended)

Anyway, got the helm almost done today. Still need to put the protective clear on and properly attach the side piece. But I had to mock it up to see how it turned out, I think good

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Sorry its been a while since an update, but its been a heck of a couple days... lots of lessons learned (some the hard way unfortunately), and though I'm sure its not professional quality, I'm happy with how its coming along.

we started out priming the cut sheets of plywood. We used Tuff-Coat CP-10 Primer from cabelas. It ran about 22 a quart, and 3 quarts was just enough to do all 4 sheets on all sides. I like this stuff, its water based so easy clean up. It comes in two parts which you mix together, I used a piece of wire bent clamped in my drill, for lack of the proper tool. It applies white but dries clear, and should provide a tough long-lasting coating. I'd recommend it for any application, but I think it works out especially nice on pontoons.

Here are all the pieces primed, yes we used the boat in lieu of sawhorses

Then we began the process of bolting it down. The first sheet went incredibly smooth, all the holes lined up and it popped right in. Good. Then everything went down hill....

I'm not sure if its a gregor specific design but I hope so. The sheets are attached by 3 carriage bolts in the middle of the sheet to a stringer. Thats fine. But, the stringers between sheets have a "T" welded to the top essentially forming an "I" shape of which a sheet slides into each side about a half inch. In the factory, I'm sure they just lined it up and pressed it all together. Unfortunately, we didn't have that luxury, and once you put one sheet in, the other side of the "I" bends down, making it impossible to get the next sheet in.

A combination of processes, including sanding the edge of the plywood, bending up the lip with a 3/4" piece of steel flat bar, and lots of pounding the sheets in eventually got all the sheets in place. Unfortunately, they were a little crooked. The front sheet is about 1/2" off to the starboard side. Fortunately, with the trim on it is very unnoticeable, and I do not believe it warrants a full tear down to fix. Again, not professional work here.

You can tell I used about every tool in my shop in the process

At this point, we're kind of on hold until pay day (the first) when I can order the tuff-coat non-skid coating. After that we can do the railing helm etc. I have a couple small side projects I may do in the mean time, I'll post those as they get completed. We had another change of plans on the helm so I will probably post that here in the next few days.

 

[lmuss53]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Thanks for a good thread and the Tuff-Coat link, I like the looks of the Tuff-Coat products for the gunwales and interior sides in my Sea Nymph restoration. I also think I'll go with the Cabela's vinyl for the deck.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Only time will tell how the topcoat is (I'll be sure to post), but if its on par with their primer, it'll be top notch. I'm sure you saw they also sell a primer for metals. I'm not sure how crucial a primer is, especially if you clean up the metal, we did it mainly to seal the plywood. Also at 80 a gallon we didn't want much, if any, of the topcoat getting absorbed, much less flaking off cause it didn't adhere well.

As I mentioned we considered vinyl but it ended up adding up to be way to much for our budget, and we thought the ruggedness of the tuff-coat would suit our needs better.

 

[5150abf]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Good job so far, those tubes are crazy and I am sure glad I don't have weld them.

I am in the weld shop at Bennington and can't imagine trying to get out 27 of those a day, round tubes are hard enough and yours have miles of weld on them.

I am sure that is what kept them from getting bigger, just the production costs on those tubes had to be crazy and I am sure they had to be a nightmare to get put together, we make an elliptical tube and they can be quite a challenge to get together.

Good choice to skip the vinyl, in additon to it being expensive it can be a challenge to get down and have it stick, the Tuff Coat should work out really well.

Glad you saved the old gal, it sure is a unique pontoon.

I rebuilt my Sea-Nymph from the keel up and it is very satifying to run a boat you built yourself, no matter where you look on it you can say "I did that", good job.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Man, you ain't kidding about the pontoons. I can only imagine how many man hours went into even one of them. That said, I think the design is revolutionary and would have caught on more. Our neighbor has a round pontoon about 20' long and I like ours much better. Performance is better, and waves tend to come over the bow more on his.

All-in-all, I think I will be happy with how it comes out

 

[Dakota Dave]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

When I did mine I used a 5000 lb Cargo strap to pull the sheets into the panel splices. just go all the way to the front of the boat underneth, wrap the strap across the top and ratchet the panels together. add another sheet and do it again.

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Been a while since I last update, but lots and lots to report.

First, I had a buddy of mine who does vinyl make up some decals for the boats name ("The Reel Thing"). I think they turned out pretty killer

Then we got the tuff-coat and applied it. Here are some tips:
1) Use a paint shaker. The lumberyard here was nice enough to do it for us. Without it, you will spend hours stirring and not get very far. We did two five minute intervals with stirring with a paint stick between intervals.
2) The stuff is thick. Very thick.
3) Two coats are manditory. The first coat was so spotty I was worried. The second one smoothed it right out, though there are spots that have more than oters, it doesn't concern me too much.
Other than that, I like the stuff a lot. Its water based so very easy clean up. Covers good, seems to be very non-skid, and should be pretty durable. It says 50 sq ft per gallon, which is spot on. We had 128sqft and got 3 gallons, and have about a half gallon left over (we'll use it to do the back deck, and still have some left for touch ups if ever needed)

The drying time is 24 hours, but 5 days for a "full chemical cure". Today I pulled all the masking tape off, but I am going to wait for the 5 days before I mount the railing. The thicker spots were still very slightly tacky.

And here is just a close up of the texture, should be very nonskid

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Did a little side project. Top hadn't been cleaned in 30 odd years. It looked pretty nasty

30 minutes, a stiff bristle brush, and some oxy clean, and it looks almost new. Would've been better if the paint wouldn't have been coming off in places lol

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Got all the Sides on today. Ditched the #10 screws and hogged everything out to 1/4" and used bolts. Will pay off I think.

Some will notice the smaller piece on the front is on the side, we often take wheelchair-bound people aboard, so want the wider section to be the gate

 

[coleman kayak1]

Re: 1985 Gregor Octapon Redecking

Tied up a bunch of loose ends today. I am still waiting on the switch panel to finish up the wiring, that and the top are all that is left.

For starters we bolted down the helm and installed the new seat. As I said we still need to button up all the wiring, but cabelas thinks that can wait as they have still not sent me my switch panel :evil:

Next I applied the new decal, which was not nearly as hard as getting the old one off :?

And we replaced the board across the front of the trailer with a new PT board and new hardware to boot

We're really closin in on this project. Just have to wire in the switches, lights, and put the top back on, and we will be good. I'm hopeful we will be completely done by the end of this week, as we are just waiting on parts to come in