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1987 Enforcer I/O - Floor Replacement

Nforcer240

Member
Hey everybody! I've been a member here for a little while but I haven't really posted much. I purchased a 1987 Enforcer back in August of 2013 and have enjoyed every minute of it so far. Below are a few pictures of the boat shortly after i brought it home.

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I knew the floor would have to be replaced eventually since it had a few softer areas so I have been putting it off. Well I finally decided something needed to be done since the pedestal seats we starting to move around more than I felt comfortable with.

As I was tearing into the floor I discovered that a previous owner tried to get away with screwing down a piece of 1/4 non marine plywood over top of the original floor as a cheap fix. Obviously that didn't work out very well in the long run. After spending a couple hours removing the interior and tearing into the floor this is how it looks. I still need to go around the edges and remove the outer most section but I just didn't have the cajones to set the skill saw deep enough :rof:


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I'm starting to wonder if this is the factory foam that was installed. I cannot find any moisture in the foam whatsoever and everyone says it is always soaking wet. Ive used a 1' paddle drill bit in a few locations and everything appears bone dry. This goes against all logic as the original floor is practically disintegrating in areas and in some placed you can literally squeeze water out of the wood. I also checked the stringers and they appear perfect everywhere I have been able to look so far as well.

I guess my questions are what are the chances the foam is dry? It doesn't seem likely but I honestly cannot feel any moisture in the foam. 2nd question is does the foam provide any structure? The foam is rock solid and seems like it would add quite a bit of support to the floor.

I apologize for the novel but this is the first time I have replaced a floor in a boat so everything is new to me and I'm just looking for some advice and opinions along the way. thanks! :cheers:
 
You can use a cutoff blade on 4" grinder to "score" the floor where it meets the hull. Basically you're cutting the bondo the factory uses to fill between the floor and hull.Then take a hammer and chisel to break the floor loose from the hull. The foam isn't structural, just for floatation and to deaden the sound of waves slapping the hull while running.
 
Thank you for the information. I wasnt exactly sure where the seam was so that picture helps alot. The current plan is to pull the motor tomorrow so I can get some easier access to the floor in the engine compartment.

I'm still undecided on what to do with the foam. I honestly can't find any moisture in the test holes that I have drilled and would rather not have to mess with it if I don't have to. I guess I don't need to make that decision yet so I'll see where it goes after I get the rest of the floor out
 
Thank you for posting your thread. lots of good information in there!

Last night I was able to get the motor out and everything went pretty smooth with that. I also decided to remove all of the foam in the boat. While I can't see any water in the foam there is some under it. Now i just have to decide if im going to replace it or not. I'm learning toward leaving it out but I'm concerned with how much louder the hull will be going over waves.

Hopefully today after work I will continue tearin it down. My goal is by the end of this weekend to have everything stripped and ready to start rebuilding.
 
I own the Enforcer that Rob redid now and it isn't really noticeable the extra noise going over waves. The wind noise and motor noise even with my stock outboard are usually more noticeable. The only time I can tell a difference is when running on a cool day in 6" wind chop when im tucked down under the windshield hiding from the cold!
 
I own the Enforcer that Rob redid now and it isn't really noticeable the extra noise going over waves. The wind noise and motor noise even with my stock outboard are usually more noticeable. The only time I can tell a difference is when running on a cool day in 6" wind chop when im tucked down under the windshield hiding from the cold!

Well that makes me feel better about leaving the foam out. I'm just scared that the boat will sound like a aluminum fishing boat going over waves. :rof:
 
Tonight I got the majority of the foam removed along with the gas tank. Definitely was not the most fun I've had on the boat haha
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Ended up taking 6 large garbage bags out and each one of them weighed roughly 40-50lbs each. Boat should float a little higher now! :rof:
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Tomorrow I plan on removing the rest of the floor around the edges. Then it's time to start planning materials and getting this boat back together
 
Well it has been a little while since I last updated this thread so I thought I would check in and show the progress I have made so far. I have been so focused on getting the work done i have been terrible at taking pictures lately.

Outer boards installed

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Top boards cut out and set into place

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And a little sneak peak of the new engine :devil:

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My goal is to have the boat back in the water by July 4th. Still alot left to do but things should start moving a little quicker now. More updates to follow!
 
She's staring to look great. Hope I don't have to go through that any time soon. The engine is beautiful. What are the specs on her?
 
She's staring to look great. Hope I don't have to go through that any time soon. The engine is beautiful. What are the specs on her?

Thanks for the compliments. Getting the upper boards cut out and set in there was definitely a motivation booster. Hoping by the weekend they will be glassed in place.

As far as the motor goes it's a 350 bored .030 over. It has a nice set of worked over World Product heads, Comp Xtreme Marine 270hr cam & a Wieand Stealth intake. Compression is right at 9.25 to 1. It's nothing to crazy but should be a nice upgrade from the tired mercruiser 260 it had in it. I was going to put together a nice 383 but since this only has an Alpha and I would really like to upgrade to a Convincor within the next year or two it just didn't seem worth it.
 
So my habit of not taking many pictures as I work on the boat is continuing but I have made a ton of progress since my last post. Since then I have installed the fuel tank, put down the last piece of ply for the floor & glassed it all in. After everything cured I then painted the bilge and prepped it for the motor. I didn't get pictures of every step but I did remember to snap a few.


Before the multiple layers of 1708 mat was put down. Apologize for the terrible picture quality on this one..
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Painted Bilge waiting for the new motor...
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Friday night I decided it was time to set the motor into place. Just barely had enough height in the garage to get the motor over the railing. Not an easy task holding the motor where it needed to be while also controlling the hoist.

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After many cuss words and general frustration the engine finally made its way to its new home. I should have asked a buddy to come by but I was to impatient and decided to just do it myself.
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Saturday morning I work up nice and early and headed straight outside. Spent the entire day getting everything put back in place. Mounted the batteries as well as the power trim pump and finished hooking up the remaining electrical components. Overall everything went extremely well. Almost to well as I was waiting for something to come up but luckily nothing did.

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And a few hours later that evening it did this...
https://youtu.be/TJb83KXI_xA
 
The past few days I have been working on the seat mounts and finally made some progress last night. I couldn't stand the thought of putting holes into my brand new floor so I needed to come up with a new way of mounting the pedestal seats. After looking through Rob B's Enforcer thread I really liked how he handled the seat mounts so I copied that with a few minor changes.

I used some of the left over 3/4" ply from the floor and cut out (2) 12" square pieces. I then transferred the seat bolt pattern the the wood and drilled out the holes. I then pressed in some stainless Tee Nuts from the back side to put some nice threads into the wood. This should make the seats very easy to remove without any risk to damaging the threads or needing to rotate the seat some each time I remove them (which hopefully will be never again but we all know how that goes...)

Picture of the Tee Nuts that I used.
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Picture of the plywood with the Tee Nuts installed.
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I then marked out the floor and prepped the area then put them down.

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This evening I am going to put a few layers of glass over them and then they should be good to go and ready for a test fit of the seats.

If all goes well I'm hoping to do a shake down run in the boat this weekend on a local lake. I'm really pushing hard to get the boat "done" by 4th of July weekend. We'll see how that goes but everything is looking pretty good at the moment :D
 
A major milestone has been reached. I put the final layers of glass over the pedestal mounts Wednesday evening and with that I believe I am 100% finished with fiberglass!!!! :banana:

So now its time to focus on the interior. I really wanted to go with the rubber floor but I was able to get the carpet extremely cheap (co-workers brother runs a marina so I can get most parts at cost) so if I decide to upgrade in the future it wont be that big of a deal.

Last night I tore down the side compartments and got them re-covered in the black carpet. I already feel that black was a mistake. Every little fuzz is visible and will probably be next to impossible to keep clean. Oh well...

First one finished. Really wasn't all that hard just had to be careful not to get any of the glue on the top surface which is easier said than done when you have glue all over your hands and you making sure to pull the carpet tight. End seams will not be visible when installed since it sits up against the front bulkhead.
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Old next to the new. Definitely a big improvement
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And test fitted in the boat.
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This evening I plan on doing the side carpet and cut out the carpet for the floor. If the weather holds out tomorrow morning I plan on dropping the boat in a local lake for a test run!! It's getting close...
 
Awesome work! Can't wait to see the final pics. And I know you may be regretting it but I think the black looks great:cheers:
 
Fantastic job on the resto, looks really good!!:thumb: Did you add a pad for the battery as well instead of mounting the bracket to the floor?
 
Fantastic job on the resto, looks really good!!:thumb: Did you add a pad for the battery as well instead of mounting the bracket to the floor?


Unfortunately no I did not. It completely slipped my mind when I was redoing the floor in the bilge area and I didn't think about it until after I had everything painted. Oh well...
 
Progress has been continuing at a pretty quick pace. Friday evening I finished up some little things on the engine and got everything ready for a quick water test Saturday morning. Unfortunately the weather was crappy and rainy all day so the water test didn't happen but it did give me a chance to finish up all of the carpet in the boat as well as recover the bottom rear seat frame.

I didn't take a before picture but it used to be covered with white vinyl that had seen better days.
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I couldn't find a way that I way liked to carpet the seat bases so I just painted them black and cut the carpet out around them. Turned out good enough. This where I left off Saturday night.
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