Exposed stringer foam at transom
 

Hello all,
I'm about to start tearing into my 89' Tracker 20 soon and noticed that the stringers that extend to the transom are open on top exposing the foam :confused:. The boat has been sitting for a while and a little rainwater has been collecting so do you think it's a significant issue? I worry that the foam has absorbed it's fill and I need to remove and replace the foam.
Go easy on me as this is my first owned boat and my first attempt at restoring a boat as well. I'm patient and handy with some common sense so I'm hoping this will serve me well - Along with advise from this form

Consider drilling some inspection holes at the bottom of the stringer with a small hole saw to see state of foam. My experience on older 20 and 23 was that the bottom couple inches was completely saturated but the top was dry. Still a lot of weight when you add up the volume.
Think the holes on top are simply where they pumped in the foam . Both my boats had holes every couple of feet in the top of the stringers where the foam was cut flat .

The rear 10-12" of the stringer tops were open on my 18 sf. Looks like the tops were sawn off. I cut the rear 5-6" aft of the height change to make room for transom replacement.

http://www.classicseacraft.com/commu...1&d=1614349568

Thanks guys! That makes me feel much better about that issue.
I'll be sharing some pics once I get started.