Sealing Screw Holes in Hull

[tpondal]

I recently stripped my 89 Sportfire hull in preparation for gel coat reconditioning. I got the name of someone local that is supposed to be good at this. A few questions:

- When I get to putting all of the hardware back on, should I squirt some silicon into any below waterline screw holes before inserting them? I was wonder if there is something else that works better. One example of this would be the screws used to fasten the lower portion of the swim ladder.

- I haven't taken the rear decals off yet but guess that I'll need to. Does anyone know if I can find equivalents to replace these? On both sides it says CHECKMATE. It also has the horse head Icon. These are sliver with red boarder. I have ordered reg numbers from decalzone.com before. Are other options available for replacing the original stickers? Oh, yeah, how do I get these off http://www.checkmate-boats.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_confused.gif

- The Aluminum jackplate is pretty stained. What will take the years of scum off of this?

Thanks in advance

Allen

[tpondal]

I recently stripped my 89 Sportfire hull in preparation for gel coat reconditioning. I got the name of someone local that is supposed to be good at this. A few questions:

- When I get to putting all of the hardware back on, should I squirt some silicon into any below waterline screw holes before inserting them? I was wonder if there is something else that works better. One example of this would be the screws used to fasten the lower portion of the swim ladder.

- I haven't taken the rear decals off yet but guess that I'll need to. Does anyone know if I can find equivalents to replace these? On both sides it says CHECKMATE. It also has the horse head Icon. These are sliver with red boarder. I have ordered reg numbers from decalzone.com before. Are other options available for replacing the original stickers? Oh, yeah, how do I get these off http://www.checkmate-boats.com/infopop/emoticons/icon_confused.gif

- The Aluminum jackplate is pretty stained. What will take the years of scum off of this?

Thanks in advance

Allen

[Chris]

Checkmate decals are probably available from the factory.

[F150GT]

aLLEN
Good quality silicone is probably the best for screw holes.
Checkmate factory can supplie you with new decals, one problem is I dont think they can supply your original style only the currant lettering. At least that was all my freind was able to get last year.
Is your jackplate clear coated or plain aluminum? If it is uncoated you can use aluminum cleaner like for Mag wheels.
F150GT

[tpondal]

The jackplate is bare aluminum. Thanks, I'll take this advice. Are there any tricks to getting those stickers off? I'm thinking a hair dryer will speed things up but haven't tried it yet.

[fastskipper]

Just hit the dock too hard like I did.....they come right off http://checkmate-boats.com/6/ws/,s,8626072361/Graemlins/brickwall.gif

[Craig]

Try 3m Marine fiberglass adhesive. Good stuff.

-Craig

[Flash]

applying the silicone to the base of whatever your are re-applying is also a good idea....a heat gun is a good idea to remove the decals and trust me....the new decals you can get from the shop are much better than the old....just an opinion...

[175checkmate]

3m makes a decal remover that works great. I used it to remove the mecury stickers on my cowl.

[tpondal]

Thanks again for the feedback. In case others are tasked with this, I ended up using a hair dryer to warm up the decals while carefully peeling them off. This worked pretty well. I assume the checkmate stickers have been on since new '89.

The Sportfire is at New England Fiberglass getting a buff, etc. I had some upholstery work done too. Next, I'll get the 135 OB running like a champ, new prop, .... I'll send in some updated pics when done.

[Brian]

Yeah like everyone is telling you silicone works the best.

[play2win]

What would work best to seal holes is drilling them out slightly larger than original size, filling in with epoxy (wset sysytem) and filler (406 if using West Sysytem), then tapping them when epoxy is cured. No water will ever get in!