96 185 Pulse restoration.

[SunTime]

Rotting from the bottom side up it looked like. Stringers were well on their way as well.

[SunTime]

As cmpulse170 had some balsa repair to do due to the the seat base blots being to long so do I. Both passenger and helm side.
Maybe a trait on the Pulse bolts?

[SunTime]

Again the foam in the rear boxes on the Pulse makes a great water trap.. The boat is quickly shedding pounds!
I plan on introducing new foam when it's time but it won't be done like this was.



I filled 7 large trash bags of this stuff so far. A little bit of a pain to rid this stuff..

[SunTime]

Last for today. A 4" diameter area of transom rot about 3/4 of a inch deep at the worst point is all I can find. (bottom left of picture) Not sure it's enough to totally remove the transom as I think I can fix this to make it as strong as new if not stronger then new. (opinions?) All other boring holes were dry. In this area the fiberglass actually bubbled away from the wood like it went thru a freeze thaw cycle.

[bigredinohio]

In my conservative opinion, why chance what you can't see...especially if you're this far into the boat and if you have balsa core and stringer rot!

But then again, I'm no expert. My .02 worth.

By the way, you are doing a great job.

[JW]

I see some black around the tie-downs also. How about the engine mount holes, are all four surrounded by dry light colored wood, or were the bolts surrounded by soft dark/wet wood?

[cmpulse170]

SunTime,
I was lucky in that my transom was ok. The water was coming in thru the cable boot getting into the foam boxes, mine was a saturated mess. You've made great progress so far.

[SunTime]

Originally Posted by JW

I see some black around the tie-downs also. How about the engine mount holes, are all four surrounded by dry light colored wood, or were the bolts surrounded by soft dark/wet wood?

Good eye JW, port side tie down bolts were wet when I pulled out the transom tie downs and starboard dry. This is making my previous thought to pull the deck much easier, as even if I did not have to redo the transom, the rest of the job would be so much easier since I planned on replacing the rub rail/insert and doing some thru bolting and resealing of the shoebox fit anyway. Motor mount holes were all dry. Like on cmpulse170's boat the foam exspecially on the port side was saturated and the foam just happened to be covering the transom tie down bolts. It looks more like I'll have my first crack at replacing a transom.

In my conservative opinion, why chance what you can't see...especially if you're this far into the boat and if you have balsa core and stringer rot!

But then again, I'm no expert. My .02 worth.

By the way, you are doing a great job.

Agree totally, since I have till next summer to complete the project it does make sense since I don't want to cut corners to "get by" so to speak. With a couple months of decent weather left I better get grinding soon!

SunTime,
I was lucky in that my transom was ok. The water was coming in thru the cable boot getting into the foam boxes, mine was a saturated mess. You've made great progress so far.

Yup, I understand the need for flotaion in the under 20' boats but if they just waterlog before the sinking do they do any good?

[SunTime]

Work will slow the restoration but I'll post as we go. Decided to pull deck and do the transom and all and also to enable me to get rid of the rest of that flotation foam all along the gunnel much easier..
The 10,000 rivets I think they used in the shoebox fit will be replaced with thru bolts/locking nuts thru a backing plate and my plan is to fill all current holes filled with marine tex before drilling for the thru bolts on the deck to hull joint.

[robwkamm]

damb thats sick. pulling the top off. never seen a pic of that before. Love it. keep up the good work!.