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#1
09-03-2008, 03:38 PM
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took her under the knife (need some opinions)
As I said in my other post, I was suspicious of my transom after drilling a thru-hull and what looked life coffee came out, so took advantage of the long weekend to do some investigating.
Took off the engine and put it on a stand. The engine bolts came out with a nice wet brownness all over them, and some probing around the holes showed even more that at least that area was soaked. Took some hardware off in other places (ladder mounts, kicker engine mount, etc) and the same showed there. Spent friday night taking off the old hardware on the back, pulling back the rub rails, getting her ready to go under the knife. Spent saturday morning fishing for king mackerel (which neither him nor mr cobia showed their face  ), and then sat night at a DC United game with some friends (tied 0-0). Came back sunday eager to work on her again and taped out my line and got to cutting.  After lots (and I mean LOTS) of chiseling, and prying, and using a floor jack to apply pressure, the "welds" finally popped and the back end came off. (My dad in the picture, he and my brother in law lended a helping hand in all of this.  When we pulled off the cut section this happened to fall off, and even though its a dead nest we got a visit from two very upset wasps that didnt like us cutting up their new home, after they were dispatched we went back to work.  Then it was time to get to work cutting off and peeling back the inner transom skin.  After cutting and peeling/prying off the inner skin (the outer skin was ironically completely delaminated, had I done this from the outside it would just have been a matter of cutting) the skin was removed to reveal an entire transom of this:  Not one part of the transom was remotely dry, and everything but the bottom inch or two on the starboard side was completely rotted and just fell off (which made it pretty easy to remove).  After some hours and some liquid encouragement,  my transom started to get clean (its completely clean and ground down now just havent taken a picture yet). My brother-in-law got bored I guess and decided to connect with his inner artist ala SeaCraft.  I have yet to weigh it, which I guess it might be wasted now since it probably dried out some being out of the transom, but filled up an entire transom of rotted wood chunks.  Now my plan was to do what you guys suggested and raise the transom 5", but my parents are extremely generous with their money, and unlike my sister's I've never asked them for a dime so after watching me search for a replacement lower unit (needed a 76-77 200hp lower unit for my old engine that neither I nor my local dealer could locate) for a month +, they decided to bless me with...  A new 2008 Suzuki 175hp 4 Stroke 20" shaft (they went with a 20" because they, nor I, knew the transom was bad so the plan was just to swap the engines out). Which I know you guys are gonna say thats in the upper end of power for this boat, but if you dont look one gift horse in the mouth, you sure as hell don't do it to 175 gift horses  . I also tried calling up the outboard shop they bought it from (they didnt go with our local dealer because a larger one about two hours away beat their price by $3700, which upset my local guy a bit but he admitted he would have done the same in my place and would gladly install it for me) and tried to see if I could trade it out for a 25", who gave me the run around and then said that they could but they only had 2009 25" now so it would be $1300 more (two days before they had 25" 2008's...  I guess thats what happens when you go for the larger cheaper less friendly operation though), which I don't have $1300 more to throw around (this transom rebuild is stretchin me now haha), and I'm sure as heck not asking my parents for anything right after they gave me this, so I'm building the transom back to 20", with some modifications. I'm going to close my transom notch to the smallest I can with the new engine and still be able to turn fully. I'm also going to build a splashWALL around the splashwell, essentially making the two hatches on either side seats and not allowing a wave to come over the stern into the boat, but rather just hit the wall and then drain out. My dad's 28' Master Marine CC has something similar. I've cad'd up a little diagram to help show what I'm talking about. Just built into the lip around where the splashwell is now, and along the sides of those hatches (but still giving them clearance to open) glass in a wall. I think I've seen another boat on here (maybe a 23') that did something similar, but cant seem to find it now. Most of my fishing in this boat will be in the inlets/chesapeake bay, maybe off the beach in the oceanfront on nice days (we have my dad's boat for offshore), so I'm not really concerned terribly about a wave coming over the back, but I think this idea will help keep me safer/dryer if that happens. So I would like some feedback, hows my destruction of the old transom lookin? I studied and studied the threads on here before starting and I cant even begin to say how greatful I am that this site and you guys exists. I'm gonna try and go back with Coosa vs plywood because of the weight I'm adding to the back of the boat with the heavier engine (~100lbs more than the 200hp Johnson that was on it), just the sticker shock is getting to me. I've also moved both batteries up to under the front console seat to help adjust the weight, anything else I can do to help with offset the heavier engine, is this gonna be a huge problem? Also when I cut the center stringer back to allow me to remove the old inner skin, I just so happen to sniff the wood block I cut out, and it smelled very strongly of gasoline. The previous owner said he replaced the tank (and did a botchy job on the outside at least, including rather than routing to the existing filling port, cut a whole in the hatch under the console and adding a port there), I'm not sure why he replaced the tank (possibly because the old one was leaking) but I feel that now I must rip up the t-top/console and investigate the situation, do you guys agree? Would a stringer still smell of gasoline from leaky tank replaced a year+ ago? As far as the rebuild, my list (tentative you guy's approval) goes:
How does that sound? Vinylester is ok to use for all of this yes? Also would it be wise to close up the thru-hull scupper holes and go ahead and change to thru-transom scuppers w/ the ping pong balls since I'm adding the extra weight and possibly screwing up the self bailingness of the boat? Thanks for looking and any advice/encouragement you have to offer, it took working up some courage to take a saw to her, you guys who have done it before me are brave souls indeed. 
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