covering up the woven material in a few spots.

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

I could take some pics, but all you'd see is everything inside painted white. Even the bulkheads and sponsons have been painted inside, its weird. I can see quite a few repair jobs too, its taken a beating in its day. I think he said its vinylester?? Does that sound right? I'd have to check the email again.
The conversation was so rushed, i cant remember it all.. Its whatever product IS NOT affected by ethanol, because he said my fuel tanks don't need to be redone..

 

[oops!]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

it is possible

ve resin......if the the boat is mostly fiberglass with a little carbon and kevelar is ok.....but not optimum....(for a race hull)

that hull gets beat......i mean really beat..lots of stress....ve is a strong resin....and will work well with glass....but cf and kev demand the stregnth of epoxy. as well.......epoxy is not used in production building.....but i believe your boat was a custom job....

the repair jobs are either from a crash, or cracking from stress.....(i would hate to have to pull out the calculator and figgure out the stress on the transom).

i ment pics of the repair under way. we are just a bunch of junkies here.....lol.

by the way.......what are you using the boat for?,,,are you racing it?

 

[Woodonglass]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Hey waterboy, I have a good friend that lives on Grand Lake and I'm going to be visiting him over the Xmas vaction time. Would love to Stop by and see your boats. Let me know where you're located so we can touch base.

 

[oops!]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

yeah woodie......would love some shots of that.....including all the stuff you know i wanna see.....(we are such boat junkies)

go visit

 

[waterboy222]

Short response because I'm using my iPhone..

Unfortunately theres no classes available right now that allow a 24' outboard cat. But I will be racing it in special events. The teardown is to get it ready for the offshore Miami to Bimini race in June. They allow any style of boat and power to run. And the water gets pretty rough that far out! A lot of through-bolting and replacing screws to secure everything.


I'm in Disney on Drowning Creek. Let me know when you head to the lake and we'll catch up! I could use some pointers on my IMP project (in my other thread)!

 

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Got some work done over the weekend on the raceboat. Still trying to get it prepped for the miami-Bimini race in June. The battery boxes were glassed in and had no way for water to get out. Someone had installed the Optima battery hold downs with 1" screws that eventually wiggled loose and wore large holes into the fiberglass as the boxes were allowed to move from front to back about 2". The weight of the batteries held the screws down and they really did a number. You can see the balsa core in each hole. I am going to clean the holes out, feather them away from the center and fill with PB. I'm moving the trim pumps forward of the bulkhead so that they are easier to access (and maybe help with flying more level).

I pulled out the rotten boxes, ground out all the old glass and getting ready for paint. I will be moving the batteries further forward and outboard of its old location. With the heavy motors on the back, I'd like as much weight further forward as possible.


My next issue is that the boats will be crane-loaded instead of off a trailer. So I need to repair the front eye hook. I have absolutely no clue how to fix this and I'm scared to death you guys are going to tell me I need to pull the cap, which there is no time for..

Theres no way to reach this part of the tunnel from inside the boat. I don't want to cut a hole in the deck either! This little eyebolt has to support the boat while suspended in the air from a three point connection. So its a pretty critcal..

Any ideas fellas?

 

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Photo of the eyehook didn't post, here it is.. Its been pulled loose and has rotated forward, even though the picture shows its pulled towards the rear. Someone got a little too aggressive with the crank on the trailer.

And in this oh-so-crude drawing, you can see the location of the new battery boxes. My next concern is how to mount them since they will be sitting on top of the fuel tanks. The tanks in a Skater are built into the hull. No metal tanks. I definitely don't want to screw into the tank and screw things up. Any ideas? I was thinking shallow screws and 5200.. Heres the battery boxes I have.

 

[ondarvr]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

The battery boxes can be mounted a couple different ways. You can glass a metal plate with threaded holes to the top of the tank, then just bolt the boxes in place. Or, glass small 90* tabs to the top of the tank and bolt the boxes to them.

The bow eye can be done from the outside, but you will end up with a slight build up on the outside in that area to make it strong enough. Doing it from the inside hides the added glass needed to support the eye correctly.

 

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

What would be the best way to rebuild the eye from the outside?

 

[GT1000000]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

I imagine you need to reach the inside of the bow eye to screw/unscrew it?
If so, and you have room for your hand, and don't want to get into replacing wood and fiberglassing, I did a successful, albeit temporary repair to my bow eye using a piece of starboard and 5200, with some backing washers from the inside...my little bass boat weighs close to 2000 pounds, water ready and some of the ramps I launched from were shallow and put a LOT of stress on the bow eye and it held up A-OK...Basically I cut as big a piece of starboard, that I could fit through from inside the hull, pre-drilled for the bow eye...had a helper hold the bow eye in place...literally "spooged"/ Injected... a ton of 5200 all around the bow eye bolts where they came in, from the inside of the hull, placed the starboard backer over the bow eye bolts, added the backing washers and nuts, tightened it down and let it cure...

You could also use something like PC-11 Two part epoxy or some such...

Like I said, I did this was a temporary fix, knowing that one day I would be re-doing it the right way...but it worked.

Just a thought, hope it helps...

 

[waterboy222]

Unfortunately I can't reach the eye bolt from inside the boat, that would be way to simple! Thanks though!

 

[Woodonglass]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Back off a little and post another pic. How high up on the bow is the eye? I might have an idea but need to know the location of the eye.

 

[ondarvr]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Cut the current bow eye out and make the hole a couple of inches larger than the bad area. Make a new piece of glass the same size and shape so it will fit in the hole, only thicker.

Mount a new bow eye in the new piece of glass, use lock nuts on what is going to be on the inside the boat, screw on the nuts that go outside the boat all the way to the end of the threads so they are loose.

Grind an area about 10”x 10”, or maybe a little bigger depending on the size of the hole.

Place the new piece of glass with the bow eye mounted in it in the hole, you can use a hot glue gun or some Bondo to hold the piece in place (you only need a small amount).

Use some VE resin or epoxy to glass over the new piece, the part that needs some care is not getting resin and glass all over the new eye, so tape it off. Use 5 or 6 layers of glass, 1708 or 1700 depending on the resin you use.

Once cured you can shape the glass by sanding and fairing so the raised area looks like a finished part of the hull that is supposed to be there.

When you are done with this the nuts can be tightened down as normal.

This is not as detailed as it should be, but it gives you an over view of what should be done.

This will be strong enough to lift the boat.

 

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Thanks for the help. I'll be over there this evening and will take a few more pics. The problem is the height between the top of the deck and the bottom of the tunnel (where the eye is). Theres only a few inches of room in there. And even if i climb behind the dash and work my way towards the front, I get squished before I can reach the area that needs work.. I do like ondarvr's idea though, I hadn't thought about glassing the nuts in first.

Ive also decided I'm going to attempt to make a full hatch that covers the backseat and floor area. It will be hinged the same as the small hatch thats on there now so that I can swap the two of them back and forth. The hatch will fit between the gunwales and cover the length of the passenger compartment to the back of the headrests which will be formed to match the rear of the front seats. I will use aluminum angle through bolted in the gunnels to support the weight from the front.

You can see the racehatch in this picture. However it was cut up to make the smaller hatch and add a backseat in. I'm a little concerned about the weight addition. What should I use as the core that would be strong enough to hold about 450lbs?

 

[Woodonglass]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

that's what I was worried about. The pic will tell the tale. If you have enuf space between the top of the eye and the bottom of the cap then I think I have a modified version of ondarvr's method that will work and end up looking pretty good. Post the pics.

 

[waterboy222]

Re: covering up the woven material in a few spots.

Ok. Im leavin work here in about an hour and will run over to the shop and get some pics. I need to do some more grinding on the IMP anyways..Too many projects, not enough time!