1977 20' Master Angler Restoration

[diverjon123]

bought this boat two week ago in the middle of Georgia (i live in the Melbourne Florida area. I got the boat for $2500 with a motor and trailer. Previous owner told me the t top was lag bolted down and also told me the tires on the trailer "could make it to California and back". Well, ended up having the center console and t top blow off the boat on a Georgia back road and had three tires blow on the way back to Florida.

the boat has problems; soft floors, no gas tank or gas tank hatch, but its transom was redone and is rock solid.


Finally got her home and decided to start in on the center console. Bought some half inch ply, 1708, 1.5 CSM, and some polyester resin. first thing was to sand the inside of the console where i would be reinforcing with ply. got her sanded down and wetted out the surface, applied mat, ply, and then 1708. Then i started to long journey of fairing and sanding and got her pretty close to where i want before gel coat is applied.

last weekend i decided to tackle the soft bow area with a technique i saw from a you tube expert. this technique included taping the soft area off and drilling holes ever couple of inches and injecting the void with epoxy to stiffen the area and it did work. but the area around where the t top and console were bolted down are very soft and with so many holes, using the epoxy method would not be the best method.

i decided to call a few of my buddies to help remove the cap and floor. well a few buddies turned to 6 buddies as the floor was a lot heavier then expected.
tomorrow i will begin to cut out the fiberglass and rotten wood from the back side of the floor as to preserve the aesthetics of the gel coated topside.
the cap is also soft but will be done while installed on the boat as i do not want to build a jig to recreate the contour of the boat hull.

wish me luck!

[Vezo, Part II]

Wow! Looks like you’re ‘77 has the same red carpet as my ‘79 inside. Nice project. One thing I learned the hard way is the soft floor forward of console seat to casting deck, was not actually soft, but not supported by the stringers. Bazaar I know but stringers were not tall enough at that point. Think I have a pic. After cutting a large portion of the floor out, it was reinstalled after using Coosa, or similar, to secure it to existing floor. In other words, floor was not soft at all, just floating. Had been that way since I bought the boat back in ‘96. Keep us posted with progress pics and Best Of Luck!

Vezo, Part II

[diverjon123]

thanks Venzo for the help. previous owner told me he reinforced that area. when we took the cap off we saw that he had used a 4" PVC pipe that was 5200 down to the stringers as reinforcement. no joke.

this previous weekend i cut all the old wood out of the floor and it kicked my ass! i advice to anyone to NOT use the epoxy method to harden up soft spots in boat floor. when i took out the back side of the floor, i could see my epoxy work had just gone around the rotten pieces of wood. not ideal.

i then cut the ply to size and wetted out the surface then applied poly filler with milled fiber to fill any viods. matt was applied then the wetted out wood, then lastly 1708. this weekend i should be able to install remaining wood and get it glassed in. from there i will decide whether to put another layer of 1708 over it.

[diverjon123]

deck re-coring was finally complete, with all areas glassed over and sealed up.

the problem i am facing now is when i pulled the deck of my seacraft, the deck and the stringers had epocy "blobs" that were about an inch think that elevated the deck. those blobs were removed during recoring process of the deck so i removed them on the stringers as well.

in its place i used spacer but were actually foam filled stringers that were about 4 inches in width and one inch in depth. i cut these to length and glassed them into certain areas where i new the deck would be making contact with the stringers

when i placed the deck back in the boat however, the deck was very bouncy, i checked to see if the spacers were touching the stringers and they were slighty but the outward edges of the decks had no support and the cap between the hull and the edge of the deck had grown to about two and a half inches. the bow deck area sits flush along the hull.

should i remove my spacers? will this allow the deck to sit flush with stringers or will bottom of gas tank bottom out on the center stringers before this happens?

i have also thought of poring void with 4lb foam and letting the deck rest on that.

any help would be appreciated,

thank you

[Vezo, Part II]

I hope that I am reading this wrong. Did you keep the hull sides at the same dimension as before removing the inner liner? If not, the hull has “splayed” open while you were working on the liner. I hope I am wrong, but 2.5” on either side sounds possible. Be back tonight or tomorrow. Again, I hope I am wrong.

If not, there are photos on this site of 2x4’s or 6’s standing vertical, with grooves cut in underside to slide down over the hull’s top edge after removal of the cap. I can pull measurements off my ‘79 if this is the case. Hope not.

Michael.

[diverjon123]

Venzo,

when you say liner, are you describing the deck? i was under the impression that 20' Master anglers did not have liners.

is your deck sitting directly on the stringers? or is it supported by epoxy blobs that are between the stringers and deck?

attached is picture of gap between edge of flooring and hull side. also attached is picture of hull and stringers before white epoxy blobs were removed. they can be seen on the stringers

this gap may also be caused by the elevated flooring caused by my installation of spacers.

[uncleboo]

The strap is addressing that issue.

[Vezo, Part II]

Your reference of epoxy blobs is Potter Putty injected into spaces/voids as a filler. I really do not have first hand experience on this subject, but as a member for years, you may want to research this site until the more experienced chime in. I see the ratchet strap in place so hopefully I was wrong about the splay.

Also, I could be wrong, but SeaCrafts are a three part hull. The hull itself, the liner you have upside down, and then the cap. Been wrong before. A lot.

Gotta get to work. There’s a wealth of knowledge in the search feature. Keep at it. Answers will come.

Michael.

[FLexpat]

The 'blobs' of polyester putty on top of the stringers supported the deck from the tops of the stringers. You need something in there to provide support. I don't know for sure but would not expect foam to last very well in that role unless it is encased in fiberglass (all sides) like the foam in the stringers.

[diverjon123]

i appreciate the replies,

so foam as a support is a no go based on the information supplied here.

i will continue to do research on the site to see if any have found a replacement to the potter putty.

As of this moment, there are foam filled fiber glass stringers attached to the bottom of the deck that were suppose to support the deck and act as spacers between the deck and the stringers (see attached photo). but the spacers are not behaving well, with the port side rock solid and the starboard side a trampoline.

can the deck be laid directly on top of stringers with No spacers?

also, why is there such as big cap between edge of deck and the sides of the hull?