1988 Supra Mariah: Floor and Stringer Restoration and more...

[flipz96]

Coming along quickly! Seems like your boat is in a lot better shape than mine, mine was just plain old nasty inside and under the floor. It was wet everywhere, I would even have to stop cutting the stringers so I didn't get electrocuted because water was flowing out of the stringers that badly. Then I would have to vacuum it all up and start over. The stringers that my exhaust tubes went through didn't even exist anymore, just a little bit of the fiberglass shell was left.

Any chance you'll vacuum bag your boat since you probably have the resources? I know I sure as hell would have if I could have.

It was pretty muddy when I first started. Once I realized that I was removing all the stringers, I drilled holes in them to let dry out a little. I also threw the debris from sanding the foam blocks and saw dust to soak up any remainder. It was still a little wet in there...just not as bad.

I probably wont vacuum bag the stringers. I might however vacuum bag the floors. The Airex T90 I have access to is 3/4" thick. So I'll have to offset my stringer height to accommodate that. I'm still deciding what I'm going to use for the floor. It would be nice to have wood free stringers and floors but its really not necessary. The more I think about it, it really just needs to be properly encapsulated (as you are doing) to get the job done. Using all this lightweight material is going to require me to buy more ballast since I don't have the weight of the wood and soaked foam.