1988 seacraft rebuild

[strick]

Perfect engine for that boat...no speed demon but she will start every time...

Strick

[No grave but the Seacraft]

I cut out and rounded the edges of the coosa board pieces for the rod holders/gunwale supports as well as the rear deck cap. The gunwales will be roughly 8" wide at the stern and will increase in width as the bow flare increase moving forward so that it is plumb with the deck.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

The cap went under the knife today. The core was ~75% rotten. You can see roughly how it will be laid out. I will be cutting the coaming off completely at the stern and have it increase moving forward of the front rod holder/ gunwale support so that it is 3-4" tall to allow for some foam padding. I will have to do a bit of trimming and make a few relief cuts so that it will follow the new hull shape before re-coring it with 1/2" Divinycell H-80. The deck portion will be supported with the remaining pieces of the pre-form battens. I was surprised with the difference they made stiffening the hull sides. I think the easiest way to do it will be to cut all the foam to shape, glass the undersides, lay it in place, set the cap on top, screw it back to the hull and finally glass it all together.

[JBASS02]

Looks good! What are you putting in the bow area? That cap looks like you'll have a lot of head scratching and dry fitting ahead of you.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

I think I got most of the head scratching out of the way. The bow storage area will be for life jackets, towels and eventually batteries for a trolling motor.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

As the demolition of the cap continues I took some time to start building the cover for the fuel fill and vent lines. I would have preferred to use coosa but the scraps I have left are too small to be useful. I was able to use a single piece of nidacore without having to fill the edges by making a couple of miter cuts and folding it into shape before fiberglassing it.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

I'm still grinding away on the cap. The outer section that screws to the hull is taking longer because the areas that don't have any wood coring is thickened resin. I'm having to grind it level with the rest of the cap so it will sit flush with the new divinycell foam core. The good news is that it with the core removed I should have no problem getting it to follow the new shearline with out any relief cuts. In other news, my Strykker swing back leaning post arrived. I'm pretty happy with the quality and the price was right. I did have to make a slight modification to make it more user friendly. The bar under the seat that stops the back rest is a bit too high from the factory. Because of the this it feels like you're constantly sliding off the front. I drilled new holes about 2" inches lower on the side supports, ground a bit of material from the bar to accommodate for the bend and the back rest now goes back far enough to sit comfortably. Now I just need to countersink the new holes so the screws sits flush.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

A few quick updates and some pics. The bilge is nearing completion. The seachest is in and wired. A few more hoses to plumb and it will be done. Relief cuts were made to the old cap so it will follow the new hull shape. The new coring material is laid out upside down and glassed. The deck portion was supported with leftover preformed battens and was given a bit of crown to better shed water. I'm hoping to set it in the boat this afternoon. I will need all hands on deck for that maneuver.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

Ok, the new cap core material is in place. With a minimal amount of weight you can see it takes it's shape quite nicely. Once I finish grinding the other half of the cap, I will glue and glass it all together. Also, you can see the front access hatch and cooler. It's a Kenai 65. I went with this one because it had the sleekest lines and smallest footprint for it's size. I'm trying to mount the console as far forward as I can.

[No grave but the Seacraft]

So I finished grinding the rest of the cap and made some relief cuts so it too will follow the hull shape. I made some clamps from a 10' section of 6" PVC pipe in preparation of glassing the core material to the cap sections this weekend.