The fore deck
Next on my list was to repair t he fore deck. As you can see in this picture a couple of large holes were cut in the deck. I have no idea what the purpose was and there was nothing in terms of boat parts that fit there. I do believe that at some point in time somebody had access to an 8 inch hole saw, since that was t he size of all the big holes cut into the boat.
Removing the fore deck.
So there were two options to attacking the fore deck.
1' Cut out from the underside, add new core and fiberglass..
2. Cut out rom the top, replace the core and fiberglass over.
Or in other words, lay on my back working overhead with dripping epoxy in a dark cramped cuddy space or work outside, from the top.
I decided t o go from the top.
Since the glass on the deck was fairly thick, I cut it out using an angle grinder and cutting wheel. Here is the top removed. in this picture it looks pretty good and I had hopped to reuse it. But since there was no support under it it was pretty cracked and when I went to flip it over it broke in half. I decided just to rebuild the fore deck.
Under the covers
After removing deck fiberglass, this is what I found. The fore deck was cored with end grain balsa and it was completely deteriorated. Since balsa doesn't do well wet, I am sure those two 8 inch holes didn't help.
Time for more marine plywood and 1708. For this repair I'll be using epoxy resin since I want this area nice and sturdy. For all the epoxy work I used Total Boat Epoxy
Under the covers
With all the coring removed we first have to deal with the holes. Then I'll cut out the plywood to match the piece cut out. A small space will be left around the outer edge and that will get filled with thickened epoxy. There are also to areas of reinforcement for deck hardware that will be replaced as well.
Replacing the core pieces
area of reinforcement for deck hardware, I'll use half inch marine ply here.
Backing the holes
area of reinforcement for deck hardware, I'll use I wanted to get the underside as smooth as possible so I decided to backing pieces on the underside of the holes. I used some 1/4 inch scrap plywood and covered it with Peel Ply
Peel Ply is a nylon fabric that acts as a release agent. You do your epoxy layup and when it is cured you peel of the fabric. It leaves a reasonably smooth surface.. To make the repair I sanded back a couple of inches around the hole at a slight taper. Then I cut a couple layers of 1708 to fit.. I epoxied in the glass and smoothed out the top surface and let it cure before epoxying in the plywood core.. Once the patch was cured I removed the screws and backing plate and epoxied in the plywood.
Fore deck repaired.
The repaired fore deck waiting for sanding of the fairing compound. Much sturdier than what was there. No cracking sounds as I walk across or jump on it. Lay up consists of existing fiberglass cuddy ceiling, bed of thickened epoxy, 3/4 inch sheet of marine plywood, 5 layers of 1708 and Total Boat Total Faire faring compound.