84' Ski Nautique 2001 Rebuild

I just noticed you were in MA. Where abouts?

Mcrosby33 wrote: im also ripping up the old carpet, floor, and foam and redoing it. I hope to put some pics up soon but im stuck at college for another week -_- Thanks!

I have to ask- why are you redoing the floor and foam?

If you have any soft spots (between the engine box and battery box, where the front seats screw down) then youve got rot going on. Ive yet to see a boat with rot in the floor that had not spread to the stringers. I would anticipate replacing everything while youre in there, if I were you.

Also, if youre planning on leaving the foam out when you rebuild, you'll need to replace the structural support that it gave to the hull-floor structure. The most common way to achieve this is to add horizontal ribs between the stringers and hull walls. Theres a lot of info here discussing foam vs. no foam and other aspects of full structural rebuilds. I would encourage you to search the site and do a lot of reading before going much further.

I work about 20 min from Congamond. A buddy of mine grew up on Otis. Small world.

The reason the only soft spots will occur between the front of the motorbox and the back of the battery box is because thats the only part of the floor that has wood in it. The rest is glass directly over the foam- so it wont get soft, even if theres water underneath. I would inspect the stringers very carefully before buttoning it back up... it would be a shame to tear it apart twice.

Mcrosby33 wrote: and the top fiberglass layer of the floor had cracked along the side of the boat creating a wobble in the floor.

TRBenj wrote: The reason the only soft spots will occur between the front of the motorbox and the back of the battery box is because thats the only part of the floor that has wood in it. The rest is glass directly over the foam- so it wont get soft, even if theres water underneath. I would inspect the stringers very carefully before buttoning it back up... it would be a shame to tear it apart twice.

gun-driver wrote: As he decribed it sounds like the floor has seperated from the wall. Not good.

Matt,
I agree! Keep digging and investigating.

Since there is a TON of info on this site, buried deep within other peoples rebuilds, which may or may not get repeated in this thread, Ill reiterate:

TRBenj wrote: I would encourage you to search the site and do a lot of reading before going much further.

No on the marine ply- its 4x the cost of regular exterior ply and is unnecessary for this application. Both marine and exterior grade use waterproof glue.

Going back with a ply floor is fine. Glassing only the top may or may not be ok (I would glass both, personally), but not because "you want the underside to breathe". Do not walk, RUN from whoever is giving that advice. You will want to CPES and coat the ply with resin. regardless of how much glass you put on it.

I would be very surprised if you cant find some degree of rot in the stringers. That has not been the case in any of the CC's I have torn into up to this point.

I just pulled the Carpet up, and I removed the floor completely, I had no use in trying to clean it up.

If you foam then the floor is not going to breath.