transom and stringer wood sealing

[all yeah boy]

I am going to prep the wood for the transom and stringer rebuid this weekend, and have a coupl-a questions.

The old transom was one piece of 3/4 and a piece of 1/2 nailed together then glassed in. I was planning on use the same size plywood. Should I nail them together then expoy seal them, or no nails and just seal them together?

Does it make sense to expoy seal the new stringers as well? They will be glassed to the bottom of the boat but not all the way up the sides of the stringers.

 

[Coors]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

I am going to prep the wood for the transom and stringer rebuid this weekend, and have a coupl-a questions.

The old transom was one piece of 3/4 and a piece of 1/2 nailed together then glassed in. I was planning on use the same size plywood. Should I nail them together then expoy seal them, or no nails and just seal them together?

Does it make sense to expoy seal the new stringers as well? They will be glassed to the bottom of the boat but not all the way up the sides of the stringers.

Epoxy the ply together, using micro balloons, and clamps. You need the balloons to fill the voids- don't clamp it real tight, as to squeeze out all the epoxy.
Epoxy the stringers, but why aren't you glassing them all the way over?
You get the strength doing that.

 

[oops!]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

another way you might want to consider is fiberglassing them togeather. using matt in between....check out the hull exetnsion post and look at the transom building section.....it may give you some diferent ideas

cheers
oops

 

[ondarvr]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

It would almost be a waste of time and money to not cover an entire wood stringer when doing a complete rebuild. The reason for the rot in the first place is water came in contact with the wood and it stayed wet. The least you would want to do would be seal the wood with epoxy to help protect it.

The strength is also much greater when the top of the stringer is covered, think I beam.

 

[all yeah boy]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

I will end up covering them all the way with fiber glass. I was thinking of the orginal structure. Onginally they were not covered all the way, thus the rot.

How do you connect the floor to the stringers with out piercing the encapulation? I was thinking of a cross beam type set up that would fit (be glassed into a notch on the stringer. Then screwing the floor into the cross beam.

 

[Coors]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

Over drill the holes, fill with epoxy, then re-drill the smaller screws into the hole-filled epoxy.

 

[JMRuth72]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

I would lay down a section of the floor so that you can find the stringers. Predrill all the screw holes making sure that you use a drill bit no larger than the shank of the screw. You want to make the hole small enough that all of the threads bite into the wood. Fill the holes with a penetrating epoxy, then screw it all together. It will seal the screw to the wood doing two things. Creating a barrier against water getting in the wood and locking the screws in place. You will not be able to remove them later, but you should put a layer of fiberglass over the whole deck once you are done anyway. Depending on how fast the epoxy dries though you will have to either work quick or have a helper. Good luck and have fun.

 

[JMRuth72]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

Over drill the holes, fill with epoxy, then re-drill the smaller screws into the hole-filled epoxy.

I am not particularly fond of this idea. To me you are essentially creating a plug of epoxy that could pull loose instead of screwing into the actual wood and sealing that. IMO it is just not worth the risk of it pulling up somewhere later. I think that I would look into high strength construction adhesives and just glue it down first. I have no idea how well any of them resist breaking down when exposed to water though.

 

[Coors]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

If the wood is sound, screw into that epoxy plug, and attach a come-a-long, and pull.
The screw will pull out first, as it would if in wood.

 

[JMRuth72]

Re: transom and stringer wood sealing

Really!! Learn something new every day. I may have to try if for fun though.