Cap on????

[wotan2525]

I did mine with the cap on. In hindsight, I'd pull the cap. But it's been 7 or 8 years and I'm still doing fine with the stringers/floor that redid with the cap on.

[Supranewbee]

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Here are some pics of my progress. The foam isn't wet until I get to the bottom 1" or so, except under the gas tank which seems to be wet all the way through.

[Supranewbee]

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Not exactly in the correct order but you get the idea. I've got 90% of the foam out as of this weekend.

[Kma4444]

So how rotty was it? Rotty, that's a good term

[Supranewbee]

The floors pretty much fell apart in my hands. All the cross bracing was raw wood so it was mush as well. Surprisingly, the stringers seem good. I plan on drilling a few limber holes so hopefully I don't find that the stringers are just mush inside a solid fiberglass casing.

[Supranewbee]

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It's crazy what can be hiding under a little fiberglass. The floor only had two small soft spots.

[Salty87]

Stringers usually rot where they're notched for cross braces. You're at about stage 4 of the rebuilders denial syndrome...the 'maybe I won't have to re-do all of it' stage. lol Stage 1-3 is do I have to pull the engine, do I have to pull the topcap, and it's only a few soft spots.

As always, I hope you get lucky. At some point you'll be so far into it there's no point in not doing it all the way.

[Supranewbee]

Ouch! Why do you have to be so mean😃

[Jetlink]

Ouch! Why do you have to be so mean��

He's just being realistic. Most "small" projects start out this way, and then you poke here and poke there and then you step back and realize that you have pulled the engine and trans out and split the top cap from the hull and wonder how that happened.

[Salty87]

Ouch! Why do you have to be so mean��

Just about all of us started our projects the exact same way, hoping for a small repair. It's wishful thinking and a few have gotten lucky but it's rare. Look at the Fluff and Buff thread. Mr Hunter knows all about these boats and he still found himself with a stringer job.