Deck Structural Repairs

The decks, including most of the wood reinforcement, were intact and in good shape for the most part. There were a few areas of localized rot around the bottoms of some of the plywood reinforcements, and a few places where the fiberglass tape used to tab the deck stringers in had been broken. The plywood around where the seats mounted was pretty much rotten all the way through, and needed to be replaced.


In some areas, the rot was very localized, and removing all the plywood was not necessary. I used a spiral saw, set to the depth of the plywood, to cut out the areas, then a chisel to remove the rotten wood. Replacement plywood is laminated in place, using thickened epoxy. All of the plywood- Old and new- Will be sealed with a coat of epoxy then painted.

New plywood panels laminated in place in the forward cockpit and jump seats The centers will be cut out with a spiral saw, following the edge of the fiberglass. Then, Everything will be epoxied and painted.


You'll notice that I used pieces of plywood that cover the entire openings in the seats, even though they will have cutouts in them to allow the seats to fold up into them. It is a LOT easier to laminate the new plywood in place like this, then cut out the center, than it is to try to cut the plywood accurately and then laminate it in place. I'll just use a spiral saw to follow the edge of the fiberglass

Before I reassemble the boat, I'm going to prime and paint the undersides of the deck. The original builder painted, but without a proper primer it flaked off in most places- And other areas that were 'out of sight' didn't get painted at all. A good coat of paint will protect new wood from from rot, as well as preventing the old wood that remains from degrading any further. Plus- It'll just look nice!

The same primer and paint system that I'm using on the rest of the boat is going to be used here- A high build primer, with a low-gloss white paint.
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