replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

[britisher]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

I did my 1989 SR 180 BR last year, full top 2 bottom resto as everything wood was rotten. I used friscoboater's SR resto thread as my guide and inspiration. My deck layout differs from yours as I have 2 ped seats not the back to back. I rebuilt following SR's original build layout with only minor mods. l sourced all my fiberglass stuff from US Composites and used poly resin. When I put in new stringers I tried plywood laminated to make it the full length of the boat, but the joints never worked properly. I bought solid timber instead which I could get in very long lengths. Everything was resin sealed before installation and the stringers were installed in the baot on a bed of PL glue with small foam tabs to keep the stringers off the hull floor by about 1/8". This helps with flex. When cured the PL was smoothed out and PB mixed and put round the base of the stringers making a nice curve to the bottom whenever possible. After curing and smoothing down, I used 2 layers of 1708 for strength along the base of the stringer and the hull then CSM wrapped over the whole stringer to well & truly seal it. There are small stringers which run width ways and I used the same process.
When it came to the deck, I used 5/8" ply again sealed with poly resin and a layer of CSM on the underside for sealing. The deck pieces ( I did 1 large one for the bow which ran down to the dash area, 2 side ones which ran to the rear and a panel for the gas tank). All were dry fitted and screw holes drilled, etc, before install. Following friscoboater, I used sheets of cheap foal house insulation as my templates on most ply items as they are easy to trim to shaped, then transferred the final shape to the ply. After making everything fitted OK, I bed the deck with PL glue and screwed down, sealing holes with 3M sealer. I left the usual gap round the deck and outer hull and filled that with PB. After smoothing off I laid 1708 tabbing all round then sealed the deck panels off with large panels of CSM (that was fun) I have used a large amount of SS fasteners and I found Jamestown Distributors to be the best value for SS fasteners of all kinds. They are really nice to deal with too. N body comes close on price. On the PB mix I used the resin, cabosil and Chopped Strand mat. My early attempts at making it were varied, then found my ideal cake mix recipe and stuck with it. One tiop, don't open Cabosil when it's blowy - the stuff blows everywhere. I also bought the glass balls, but found it produced a far heavier and gluey mix than Cabosil, so stopped using it. I also re-foamed my undeck spaces using pour in foam from US Composites. One other tip that I got from Friscoboater and that is build yourself a glass fiber roll holder. I re-used the 2 x 4's I had left over from installing the new transom and constructed 2 x inverted Tees with 2x 4's running top and bottome. I bought some metal conduit pipe, drilled the holes in the tee verticals and threaded the rolls on to the pipes. I held the pipes snug with hose clamps. Believe me that roll holder was worth it's weight in gold over the resto.
One final thing and I may be speaking out of turn here, but I see you are only redoing 2/3rds' of the boat and leaving the front untouched. I can appreciate that the front 'may be' solid, but surely when it comes time to sell, being able to show a full resto as against a part resto will count for more dollars. I know it would be more work and more cost, but why spoil the ship for an happorth of tar?
Anyway Good luck with the job, you'll learn so much.

 

[mcmarcia]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

Thanks for your response Britisher. Yes, I believe we have the same boat, sea ray BR 180. Mine actually measures over 19 ft long from the bow to transom, not sure what is up with that??

I was out camping for a few nights in the la sal mountains to collect and eat wild Boletus edulis (king bolete) mushrooms, yummy. Going back up this afternoon w friend to get some more and spend another night, but I am going to order some of the materials I speced out today so we can begin next week w the rebuilding next week. The 1808 fabric I found is the version w the 45 degree fabric overlay and I think it is almost the same as the 1708 that is popular here on iboats. Thanks for the tips on making the PB mix, I have used some cut up e glass fibers before, but not the cab o sil, so I will try it. Not real sure on the quantity of resin, 6-7 gallons seems like a ton of it, but I am guessing the 1808 and the PB will eat it up. My experience w fiberglassing is from kayaks from the old days before they had plastic kayaks and I would have to repair my kevlar/s glass boat every year and also using the west resin on wood paddles, oars, raft boards, etc. Did build a surfboards at age 11 w help from my brothers and also body work on a van I painted years back.

I think we will be able to get this work done without too much hassle, just bigger quantities of resin and thicker glass than I have experienced. I think we will stick to the partial rebuild as the boat is very solid and does not have the rot others have reported with this vintage of sea rays. I can always redo the bow decking if there is an issue, but it is so dry out here there does not seem to be a problem w the rot.

 

[mcmarcia]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

I called US Composites to get some info on coverage and resins and such and thought I would post some of the recommendations from their tech guy Steve. Steve recommended the 635 resin w the medium set 3:1 hardener. I will order the 6.6 gallon resin hardener kit for the project.

Steve says the slow 2:1 hardener will have a bit of flex to it after it sets up, so not good for decking that will be horizontal and subject to stress/weight. He thinks I should be fine w the ambient temperature in have in Moab now. He said less humidity in the air will slow up the working time and more humidity will speed up the working time of your resin mix. He says 1 gallon of their 635 resin w the 3:1 hardener will wet out 3 sq yards of 1708/1808 fabric, so that would be 43 liquid oz resin to 1 sq yard of 1708/1808 fabric. He gave some mixing hints that I thought might help others. He recommends hand mixing with a wood stir stick to avoid air bubbles (no drill attachment or egg beaters). He says to pour in the hardener first in your mix pot and then add the resin so the hardener is covering the sides of your mix pot and you can mix the 2 parts easier and get the hardener to blend better w the resin. He said you hand mix for 2-4 minutes until there is a "steamy white haze w some bubbles" and then mix one more minute after that. He said then to keep the mix from gelling up too quick, either pour it onto your cloth or transfer into a flat paint pan as a pot of the resin will produce exothermic heat and you will get more working time by getting the resin/hardener mix into a thinner container such as a paint roller pan.

He said for coating raw plywood for a seal coat, you let it sit on the wood for about a hour ( temperature dependent) until it is sticky and then you push on the cloth and add the mixed resin to wet out the cloth (this will keep the cloth from sucking the resin out of the plywood so you get good saturation for both the wood and your cloth). 1 quart or 32 oz liquid resin will soak into 1 sq yard of plywood for the seal coat. Steve did not think I would need any glass on the 3/4" plywood on the back side as he said there would be no flex. I will disagree with his expertise here as all wood has some flex, just depends on the thickness of wood and the amount of weight. I want to avoid any "microcracks" developing with age, heat and cold and other stress, so I will add 1 layer of cloth to the back side of my decking, even if overkill.

For the cab o sil, to get a mayonnaise consistency, mix equal volumes of the resin/hardener mix to the cab o sil. Chopped glass fiber added in will add some strength at the expense of more weight and he did not recommend it unless you really need the extra strength.

Also the 635 resin is half the viscosity of the west system resin and will be easier to wet out and saturate the cloth and hence use less resin and I would assume that you would get more strength ultimately as you would have less resin then thicker west epoxy (given the same cloth and layup techniques as less resin equals more strength in theory).

He warned my on trying to find a "deal" on the internet for fiberglass cloth and mat as the cheaper china made cloth comes apart when you try and work it to wet it out and sometimes the china made chopped strand mat has a lot of starch binder added to hold it together that will disappear when the resin gets to it and the mat will fray apart. Very interesting that not all cloths are equal or made to the same standards, buyer beware.

I hope this info will help others looking into using the us composite 3:1 resin hardener. Thanks for any feedback from any iboat "gurus" on this info.

 

[mcmarcia]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

Final Revision:

I am going to use the 1208 biaxial cloth as I can get 20 linear yards for 140 bucks shipped @ a 60" width, Fiberglass Industries SX1208R3 which is made in the USA in Amsterdam, N.Y., no Chinese made junk. W/ the 3/4" plywood and (1 )layer bottom and (2) layers decking top, I think it will be bomber stiff and waterproofed just fine. This 12 oz fabric is 0.0037-0.0040 thick, about 18% lighter and I am guessing 18% less resin used per yard and I should be able to conform it around the corners on the stringers better than the 18 oz biaxials and cut it easier to make my own strips and such, forget the CSM and all the extra weight of resin for little strength, everything will be the 1208 fabric.

From US Composites, 6.6 gallons of the 3:1 medium resin (320 bucks), 4lb tub of cab o sil (22.5 bucks) and 4 lbs of 1/4" chopped strand to beef up the peanut butter mix. I will put in the order in the morning, so if any comments or advise, please let me know tonight. Oh, I will get a 6" bubble buster roller as well and tons of plastic squeegees. I have always made my own squeegees out of minicell foam cut into wedge shapes, so I will probably try that as well since I have tons of foam lying around from outfitting kayaks in the past. Thanks for helping me w the epoxy and materials, for any new suggestions and your patience w my (OCD like)thinking out all this. I will be sure to post some pics and stuff of the work as it progresses.

 

[Woodonglass]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

Most all Marine Epoxy contains binders in the resin which allows it to remain flexible when cured. It will not usually crack unless placed under a High amount of flex. I seriously doubt you would need the 1208 cloth on the bottom of the deck. 2 coats of Epoxy would be more than adequate IMHO. 2 Layers 0f the 1208 on top is Way Overkill IMHO but to each their own!!!! The tabbing to the hull is the most critical area of the build. Two layers there would be mandatory with a nice concave fillet. The absorption and "Wet Out" ratio is usually a bit more than advertised so you might run a bit short on resin especially when you start mixing your thickened resin with cabosil. It usually takes a bit more than the 1 to 1 mix to acheive the thickness you want. More like 1.5 parts Cabosil to 1 part resin. Hopefully you purchased the resin Pumps. They work really well for measuring. I don't think there will be a 18% savings in resin between the 1708 and the 1208. You always pre fill any voids in your wood with thickened resin and then precoat it with resin. His advice was good. 1 Gallon usually wets out about 4 yards of Fabric. You should not have much waste since epoxy gives you a lot of work time. Make sure and pay a lot of attention to the edges. That's where water attacks first and worst. If the edges are sealed really well your deck will remain solid for a very long time with proper care and maintenance.

 

[mcmarcia]

Re: replacing deck on 90 sea ray BR OB/few questions??

So less is more....

Thanks for your advice woodonglass. I see you have a ton of experience w boat repairs. Maybe I just save some bucks and go with the single layer of 1208 on top and my friend wants to at least glass the bottom of the ski locker cutout to beef up the locker door frame. I was planning to put down a single strip of 1208 to tab in the floor to the hull and then run two oversized layers of 1208 when I did the deck, but I could lay in 2 strips of 1208 cut to 6" and then 9" tabbing the deck to hull interface and then overlap that tabbing w an oversized piece of 1208 that would cover the tabbing and go over the decking across the beam of the boat, probably go to where the vertical hull intersects the horizontal hull (is that called the chine?). I could save on the labor and time and the yardage of 1208. Still need the 6.6 gallon resin kit (w pumps) since the next size down is only 2 gal 85oz and I think I will need more resin.

I have a few quarts of west system resin w the 206 slow hardener that is thicker than the us composite 635, so I can use that for the peanut butter mix. Maybe then, I can get the smaller resin kit and save some money?? I will do some math.

I understand that epoxy resin has some flex to it, but Steve was pointing out to me that the 4:1 slow set remains a bit more flexible than their 3:1 after it sets up. I thought it would be better to get the least flexible epoxy that will work for our ambient temperatures. I am flexible as well and will take your advice on the layup. I assume then only one layer of cloth to seal up the stringers after the PB fillet. My friend who is helping was thinking we then seal up the decking to the stringers with some high end construction adhesive instead of using peanut butter as the construction adhesive will make a waterproof seal that will also help shock absorb the deck and stringer area when the hull is slamming thru big chop(??). Not sure which is better, construction adhesive or PB to bed/seal the decking to the stringers and bulkhead?? I have some stainless steel deck screws to use for the decking as well.

Maybe only a 10% weight and resin saving??? I was just guessing based of the weight difference of 1208 vs 1808. The sides of the decking will get 3-4 coats of just resin as I know what the edges of my old raft floor boards look like after sitting in water all the time, dry rot...surface cracks... and then wet rot when the plywood layers start soaking up water thru the plys. Is there a glass product that would stick to the plywood edges?? I remember my old canoe and raft guide paddles had a "dynel" sleeve wrapped around the shaft and paddle tips to stiffen the shafts and strengthen the tips for rocks.

Thanks so much for your help.