Hi oh Gurus of fiberglass, I'm about to start a transom and floor on my bayliner capri 16 Cuddy. This is the perfect size boat for my family - big enough for all of us and small enough to be hauled behind our minivan. I'm redoing the transom and replacing the floor and I think I have a handle on that based on what I have done and all the great stuff I have read on here. My question is this; my father and I like to fish and currently the only way for us to both fish on this boat is for me to be on the bow and him on the stearn or the transome ends up sitting like a half inch above the water and I have water coming into the outboard well scuppers. This winter I plan on building a pod to do two things, add much needed stern floatation and to move the outboard all the way out of the boat for more quiet and more room. A side benefit may be to go to a larger outboard - not yet sure on that one but it seems that 150 hp engines are readily available and relatively cheap these days. The issue is that the Capris transom does not go all the way across the stern and even with the big knees I am worried about the transom handling the additional leverage of the pod and the the additional sideloads as the transom is not really tied into the sides of the hull and transfers all it's thrust through the stringers. My thoughts are on this is - thicker knees coupled with adding additional ply on the outside of the knees extending the transome all the way to the hull and possibly even glassing another half inch piece of ply onto the hull sides tabbed into this. Possilbly add gussets horizonally tying the knees into the side portions of the transom and the hull. I understand that it would not be as strong as a full width transom but because of the interesting stern shape of the Capri it is really the only option. The future pod would correspond to the shape of the stern mimicking the lines. My goal would be to have a nice bench seat/storage across the stern, possibly a live well and enough floatation for dad and I to both stand at the stern in anything other than a flat calm lake and fish and talk. Something about semi yelling from the front of the boat just doesn't do it for having personal conversation - talking about wives money life etc. I expect a few naysayers and just "buy a bigger boat" sorta responses - and believe me I have thought about that but I am very interested in going this route first. After reading oops's thread it seems like with desire persistence and support anything is possible.
Thanks
Renny
PS - still say oops should turbo his boat (ducks head)
Thanks
Renny
PS - still say oops should turbo his boat (ducks head)
