starting my 1972 20' seacfrat
 

i am starting my first seacraft. I have no experience and am planning to tackel most myselfe. Mainly prep work. I will have pictures soon and am open for advice.

"Another one bites the dust, another one bites the dust"

Ahhhh.....the SeaCraft addiction has hooked another one!! Good luck!!!

thank you, i need all i can get.

the cobia are starting to show up and is slowing down my project

here are some pics

not sure how to free gunnel cap from transom. is it okay to cut it??

here are some more pictures

i'm thinking of cutting the remaining 2 inches of floor and install the new floor before i put gunnel cap back on, then 5200 the gunnel cap to floor

to remove the gunnel cap i was thinking of bolting 2 by 4s across the gunnel and using a come along to lift it up, but am still scratching my head on how to free it at the transom and where the rear boxes are glued to transom. was thinking of taking my dremel and cuttin along the corner where it is blued to transom. is that ok?

You should plan on several days of reading the repair section here. Lots of good stuff

does anyone know if i should cut out my boxes on the transom to help free up the gunnel cap?? thinking of closing in transom.

In the following pict you will see where I cut out the transom boxes and removed the last two feet of inner liner to redo my transom. The "back rest" part of those box seats were glued to the transom with thickened resin. There was also alot of thickened resin on the top edge of the transom. I had to cut the side edges of the transom and use long chisels and pry bars to break that thickened resin loose. This was a huge pain in the ass. I had to get creative and use the straight tire iron from my chevy truck to reach in and get the parts farthest from the inside edge that I opened up. It seems some people didn't have nearly the trouble I did. I guess it just depends how much thickened resin the builders used when dropping in the inner liner. Good luck. You might get lucky and it will come out easy.


http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k3...DSC00291-1.jpg

http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k3...DSC00289-1.jpg

Is there some reason you have to remove the cap? If you have to replace the transom, why not go at it from the outside? Just cut thru the outer skin about a 3" from the edge all the way around to leave a flat surface to fair the new skin to. Much easier than removing all that stuff on the inside.

there is a weak spot on the corner of the casting platform near the fish box. i was recomended since the floor and fuel tank was out that it would be a good idea to remove gunnel cap, flip it upside down sand it and put a new layer of glass on the bottom side of it. i want to do it once and do it right and was told that to remove the cap was a good idea, trust me i am not looking forward to doing it.

got the gunnel cap out last sunday. now going to start the cleaning up process. Going to replace the transom and make it 25". No bracket. Any suggestions on what wood to use for new transom??

I used AB fir ply on my transom rebuild...Also PLEASE read Strick's "Here we go again"..... read it about 10 times!!!
You need to build a jig for your hull or get some type of support on hull to keep sides from "ballooning" out on you...might want to measure cap and get sides back to square one before continuing!!
-Fred

Sage advice right there.

got some more sanding/grinding done today, but damn it was hottt!!!!!

First off, congrats on your Seacraft!

I bought mine and ended up making a lot of repairs to it. This forum was a tremendous help. Like others have said, READ as many threads as you can that relate to what you are trying to do. In particular the aforementioned "here we go again" thread. Take your time and focus on getting it done RIGHT, not just getting it done.

If you are unfamiliar with working with fiberglass, epoxy, etc. Go read the West Systems How-to manual(available on their website for free). Read through all the different projects to get a basic understanding of the different techniques. For your first project try to do something simple. For two reasons: Something simple will obviously be easier, but also if you screw up you will not have wasted hundreds of dollars of materials and a ton of time if you have to re-do it.

I would highly recommend US Composites for your fiberglass/reasin needs, as they are much much cheaper than buying your epoxy at West Marine. Their tech guy is also super helpful and will give you advice on how to do it and what materials to use. I have been really happy with their products and customer service.

Good luck with your restoration!

got the transom out last night. Looks like about 80 percent of it was replaced but the old part near the floor was very rotted and am glad i am replacing it. the wood stopped about 1 food from gunnel and was filled with foam. i am going to put the new one all the way to gunnel and floor all around

Look out! with pictures like that you will attract the wrong type of attention!

almost ready to start re-glassing. going to remove the center stringer tomorrow and get a new one cut and ready to install. I alson have some touching up to do with sanding. next on to gunnel cap, wich i havent started yet.

Dan, I'm itching and can smell fiberglass at my house. Looks like you have done a lot of hard work. I say close the transom in and bracketize! When your done, i'll bring the 23 over so you can get on it!
dude

your a funny dude, dude. haha

got the gunnel cap sanded and ready for glass. now its time to start puting it together.

thought i was ready but i geuss i have to cut out the old wood on the casting platform and under the bow. seems like a good idea, but more grinding! grr!

Are you just recoring the casting platform and bow area or do you plan on recoring the whole cap?
If you were just planning on recoring the two mentioned areas..could you have left the cap on boat & in tact and done repairs from outside?
Just curious!
-Fred

i am new to this and not sure what you mean by recoring. but the casting platform was real weak around fishbox and on the gunnel around the bow. the gunnel is pretty wide towards the bow and would like to be able to stand on it. I took it off to see what was going on under it and also to remove the old wood that is glassed in and replace with new, and am also going to glass in more wood under gunnel. It was actually very easy to remove gunnel cap. Now i have it completely stripped down and i can re-do everything.

What you describe is recoring; replacing the wood core in the laminate.
Dave

then yes i am re-coring under gunnnel. i just want to completely re-store it. there are a few weak spots

a little progress
 

transom is done, used 2 sheets of 3/4 penske. new center stringer, just waiting on fuel tank so i can get the floor done, hopefully next week. I still have to re-core the gunnel cap just need to figure out a way to get it to the shop.

talk about starting with a clean slate....some nice work here! Keep it up

I see where that is a 1972 and it has the box stringers,when did Seacraft go from the 4 smaller stringers to the 2 box stringers? I thought it was 1973. And does one type have an advantage over the other.I have a 74' and a 72 and am just curious.

this is my first project, and have very little knowledge. I really know nothing about the foam stringers, whether good or bad. I just found the boat on craigslist, looked at it for a few weeks and scratched my head got some ideas from this site and some friends and started tearing it apart.

thanks hermit, hopefully ill have some more pics up in a couple weeks. still waiting on a fuel tank before i can get the floor done and i need to figure out how i am going to get the gunnel cap across town to the shop where im getting the work done. was thinking about calling a toe company and getting a roll off over here and puting on that and strapping it down

Depending on your trailer, you might able to screw plywood sheets to the bunks and transport it on there?

"Tear out bad wood. Put in good wood."

- Delbert McClintock


Sorry. Feeling a little geeky this evening. :D

Nice work, Dan!

Paul

That's what I thought too - have never seen a '72 with the box stringers. Does the boat have a HIN engraved in transom at top outer area on stbd side? If so, it's a '73 because they weren't required in 72. Of course if the transom was previously replaced from outside, they might have removed the HIN. Boat has obviously been apart before because those longitudinal ribs on hull sides were not OEM.

I personally think the 4 smaller stringers would provide more uniform stiffness to the bottom of the hull. They would also create a stiffer "I-beam" when deck is bonded to top of stringers because you'd end up with twice as many vertical ribs in the beam. The box stringers probably require less glass and resin, so I'm pretty sure they were a cost savings. However the basic layup in all the Moesly and Potter boats is so stout compared to the average boat that either stringer configuration is way more than adequate!

ya when i got the boat the top half of transom was replaced and they cut off top 2/3 of the skin and left the bottom 1/3 of the rotted transom so there is no hin but my title says 72'

ya i was thinking about that, but i think the easiest thing is to spend a couple bucks and get a roll off over here.