my buddy just purchased a pontoon 21' (used) got it home and noticed foam in the toons.anyone got any ideas? the only thing i can figure is its for bouyency.
the toons are round aluminum 21' dont have a clue why this was done but i pretty much figured it wasnt a good thing. thanks everyone for the input ill relay the bad news to my buddy.
Run a small sharp pipe or something similar into the foam if you can to retrieve a plug of foam. If it is dry it is fine. Foam in the u-shaped logs contribute somewhat to to structural strength of the log.
my buddy and i checked out the foam in the tubes, took several plugs of it at different depths until we hit bottom and everything came back dry.these are 23" tubes and look to be not original for the boat. they how ever did a fine job of installation. just still cant understand why the foam and only in the front chambers? kidding around with him i said, "guess you'll find out why the first time out" we just laughed and had another heineken.
I bought a 1985 Sylvan and it had foam inside the toons. It was to keep you from sinking if you had catastrophic leak. It had a drain plug in the rear. I got curious onetime and unscrewed the plug. There was no water and the foam was dry. I put teflon tape on plug and put it back, never to be removed again. Sold the boat in '09 guess it doesn't hurt
I have a 22' G3 toon with foam in the tubes, I got it new about two months ago and didnt realize that foam in the tubes was a bad thing until getting on this forum. I hope I dont ever get a leak as it seems that its unfixable with foam in the tube.
My 1985 Starcraft has foam filled U shaped toons, and it is a very buoyant, efficient hull.
Building a U shape toon is far less expensive than building round tubes in sections and welding them together. U shaped toons use thinner aluminum and the foam is for safety AND it provides structure. U shaped toons are simply bent into place, where rolling aluminum sheets into round tubes and extensive welding is very labor intensive.
It all comes down to cost. I think the round tubes are more structurally sound, however.
Workerbee, if you have a question start a new thread don't jump onto one that is 3 years old, old threads are like library books, they are good for information but you don't write in them.
