There was a metal brace glassed to the deck as reinforcement. However, it was non gal or coated steel and sat in a little recess in the floor with no drainage. So the bottom was just a rust puff. So we cut it off and will look to reinforce another way.
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Last edited by haven_snickers; 4 weeks ago. -
With the Benny Hill theme song ‘Yakety Sax’ playing, and few beers for encouragement we lifted the deck off. With the amount of sanding and repair work now needed it was just getting in the way.
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The first round of supplies turned up. Flowcoat, Resin, Styrene and Catalyst. Then just need some glass and can start on the repairs and reinforcements on the edges of the floor and bilge. Picked up a spray gun to try out. Also sent away a small piece of the deck to the local get coat vendor for colour matching to Silver Cloud. Ordered a few different fillers to test out.
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Bow to Stern sanding in 40grit paper. It’s very uneven, really no smooth or level areas to start with. So we slapped some ProEstaBond on it to test how that sands up.
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Foam filled the little cut outs in the rear lockers. The hard tanks are long disposed of as they had cracked and leaked. We had to grind out a bunch of sloppy Nautique boat building around the cut out drain holes. It’s like they missed parts of the layup in that area. Then added two layers of structural woven glass as reinforcements.
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Found some considerable delamination at the top of the strut. Probably from hitting a tree stump at Lake Eildon many years ago. It was an insurance repair and they must have only repaired from the bottom. So we grind that out ready for new glass.
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First round of major glass work in the port locker. Two layers of structural woven glass strips along the edges. Then two layers of chopped strand, and a little filler in between.
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Two layers of structural glass along the starboard stringer and more layers for the area above the strut.
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First layer of auto shop styrene filler. Nicer to work with than the EstaBond. Then a full 40grit sanding to try and flatten it out.
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Wow, incredible amount of work and very interesting. Are you posting this up post build or real time? If real time you are an absolute machine. This would take me at least a month to get this far, maybe (probably) longer.
A couple observations.....
When it comes to some of the cracks and uneven floors, you have to remember that while Nautique's were expensive back in the day, they were still production boats and built to the level required by the design. Does it surprise me that the floor was not finished well when carpeting was going to be installed over it? Not at all. Newer boats with Sea Deck type materials have an inmerliner to accommodate the higher level finish required by the Sea Deck. The price of the newer boat with the innerlinter is reflected in those build changes which is part of the reason we're seeing these boats hit the astronomical prices they're at today.
As far as cracks and delamination goes, the boat is a 2006, it's now 2026 so the boat is 20 years old. That's 20 years of most likely "spirited use" as demonstrated by the statement about the stock tanks being lone gone and I can only assume more ballast was added during this change. That the boat looked as good as it did is a testament of the care you gave the boat during your stewardship however no amount of waxing can overcome 20 years of stress placed on the boat in it's entirety let alone the log strike. I'm actually hard pressed to think of anything I've purchased that would stand up to 20 years of what would probably be considered aggressive use this well.
I do love seeing you do all this work and the level you're taking it to. When finished you should have a boat that will last at least another 20 years and preform even better than the original. Thanks for posting your journey!Last edited by bturner; 4 weeks ago.Comment
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Hi bturner,
correct, the boat is about a month ahead of this thread at the moment. So trying to catch up. But yes we have been working like machines, two people most weekends for the last 5 months. Few hundred hours so far.
agree we didn’t expect it to be perfect under the carpet, but also didn't expect this level of rework. But it’s not really a complaint. We’re rebuilding it as an enjoyable project and to have a very beautiful OG to enjoy for another 20 years. So more as a hobby and something to waste free time on. Our other boat was damaged and in the shop for repairs so have been going for it on the OG instead.Comment
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Applied some flow coat to the port locker to see if it’s suitable to level the floor. Painted it very thick with a paint brush and see if could self level. But it’s very difficult to sand as it’s like polishing a rock. Very hard, but just a test at this point. Will hit it with some 40grit to smooth it out.
also glassed in the rest of the structural woven glass along the join of the floor piece to the hull. So it had now been reinforced from the transom to where the floor ends at the bow.
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Leveled the front of the bow with foam and then glassed over it with chop. You’ll see this area under the bow seats, so will smooth it out to look nice.
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Glassed in two layers of chopped mat bow to stern on the hull sides to give it a bit of added strength and thickness. Should also help when we fit the deck back on too. To get a nice tight fit and stop any buckling of the deck.
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Two rounds of filler and 40grit sanding to get the sides into a reasonable state. Not worrying too much here because we will add EVA nonskid to the sides in addition to the floor.
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