Thread: 1960's seacraft restoration

Getting the original owner involved in your project is priceless. Well done to Original Owner for getting involved. Well done to Ricochet for accepting him

Richard

Cheers Richard! Any reccomendations as to what grade woven glass cloth to use? the 175 or 285 gm?

Chris

Originally Posted by Ricochet

Cheers Richard! Any reccomendations as to what grade woven glass cloth to use? the 175 or 285 gm?

Chris

Wouldn't have a clue. I'm a muggins at a lot of things and that includes fibreglass.

Richard

Hi Ricochet,
A little more for you. I was incorrect on a couple of things after speaking with the wise old one. It was given to him for his 30th birthday not anniversary as I first thought. The sister boat Spoiler was retained by the same guy that built Ricochet only he fitted it with a V8. he later sold this it to finance the building of his first plane however his son tracked it down years later and brought it back. I believe he is restoring / restored that back to original. There was a third one built as well called Eliminator and this was Supercharged. Unfortunately we don't know where this one ended up. Dad is going to have a yarn with the gent who built all three to try to get some more technical info for you. Be back onlline in a couple of days.

Cheers

Thanks again for that mate, look forward to hearing from you again! Anyone have any recommendations on the weight of woven glass cloth to use to sheath the hull?

Chris

Also, what kind of surface area (roughly) can you cover in regards to volume of epoxy when applying to plywood, and also when wetting out woven cloth?

I've been doing some research into epoxies and surface coatings etc. I've decided to keep all products from the same manufacturer, I'll be using bote cote epoxy to seal the ply, woven glass cloth and bote cote epoxy to sheath the hull, aquacote hi build primer to fair the glass cloth, and aquacote top cote as my "top coat". I spoke to a guy from boatcraft pacific today and got some rough coverage figures, maybe someone else could confirm or give their own opinion? Rough figures were approx 500ml of epoxy per square metre, whether sealing ply or wetting cloth. Roughly 3 square metres coverage per litre for the hi build primer, and 10 square metres coverage per litre for the top coat.

I also made some decisions in regards to paint scheme and glassing today. I will be laying woven cloth from chine to chine, not overlapping onto and covering the whole chine rubbing strake, but just the bottom side. The glassed area will be faired with hi build primer and then painted with either maroon or blue top coat. From chines upwards to gunwhales, will be in white top coat.

Some rough estimates i have made for paint and epoxy-

30L Botecote epoxy kit ($666)
4L Hi Build Primer ($118)
2L Topcote White ($148)
2L Topcote Blue or Maroon ($148)
Plus approx 10 square metres of woven glass cloth, weight of cloth undecided.

I plan to get the woven cloth and epoxy in the next week or 2, and have the hull from chine to chine glassed and epoxied before christmas.

Chris

seems like a huge ammount of resin, I applied 3 coats to all outside surfaces and used 6 litres (16' ply ski boat)! Maybe purchasing in smaller lots will save having a surplus at the end of the job. This was the advice of the boat coat dealer I purchased through and proved to be good. A copy of their hand book is also a good investment.

Don't know what the ply looks like after you have stripped it, but I could not paint over the timber once I stripped the white paint off my old boat!

Thanks for that Stringy, My hull below the waterline has had a lot of oil soaked into the ply for an undetermined period of time. I've removed most of the oil but still have some staining, not very presentable. I'll be sealing the ply with epoxy first off, then laying the woven glass sheath as some added abrasion and impact protection. It has been pointed out that laying a glass sheath is going to increase the overall costs to get her back in the water and is not necessary, but I would prefer to have that extra bit of protection. How did you apply your epoxy, by brush/roller or spray gun (if thats possible?) and what condition was your ply in? Perhaps the 12L bote cote epoxy kit would be better suited to my application. I'll be giving the bare ply hull below the chines a few coats, then laying glass cloth with a few coats (or maybe just one or 2?) and also using epoxy in a few other places internally. Haven't decided on the deck yet, i know i will have it as ply with some form of clear coat, still have to look into the application of varnish/epoxy and what would suit me best.


Cheers

Chris

I used the boat cote epoxy with non yellowing hardner then aqua cote clear to help protect epoxy from uv as recommended by boat cote. The clear is supposed to polish up, I left it as "off the gun" for my job (too busy using it).

Apply epoxy with foam rollers, if you have to brush an area due to access do this first then get a little foam roller in there to spread it out where possible! spraying is no go for epoxy. The aqua cote sprays and rolls well, If I was to do the job again I would only spray the inside of the boat due to all the fiddly structure and roll everything else as the paint flattens out and there is no overspray with the foam roller, the dark blue I used underneath was sprayed at first and did not cover (opaque) well, rolling gave a better result.

My ply was oily, there is a link to pictures early in this thread.

Thanks for the reply Stringy, sorry mate has been a while and I forgot who you were. Love your pics of your boat by the way, supercharged flathead looks nuts! Do you have any more information/pics on the rebuild of your boat?

How many rolled coats of epoxy did you apply to the bare hull exterior?

I am a little confused, below the waterline you have epoxy onto the bare ply, then aquacote blue as the top coat, and above the chines, you have stained the ply, then epoxied, then aquacote clear over the top, is this correct?

I remember you saying the stripes on your deck are painted on, did you stain sections of the deck and paint the yellow stripes, then epoxy then aquacote clear coat on top as well?

Chris

I did take a lot of pictures of the rebuild process, is there a particular area you would like to see? Probably best to pm me your email and I can send some direct.

The blower is slowly being completed, blower case pruning, water cooled manifold, bakelite insulator and carb adaptor are complete, currently working on drive snout/pulleys and intercooler.

3 coats of epoxy to the exterior of the hull (first coat with TPRDA as per destructions), tried to strip the interior without sucess so just aqua coated which has worked well. Although I used the uv/non-yellowing hardner in the epoxy it still needs a protective coating over to stop it going powdery from uv.

No you are not confused, epoxy bare/stained ply then aqua cote either colour or clear over the top.

Painted yellow stripes with aqua cote onto bare ply first (knew it was compatible with epoxy etc), then stained, this gave a boundary to stain to without bleeding of the stain. then epoxied over, then clear aquacote over that. Apply epoxy to unstained areas first then over the stain as the stain bleeds into the epoxy and will contaminate the roller/area you don't want stained if care is not taken, this is only relevant for the first coat which will lock the stain in.

How thick is the ply on the bottom of your boat?

Cheers,
James

Hey James, any pictures you could send from different parts of the rebuild would be greatly appreciated, as i've exhausted the 25 pics on your album already haha. My email is [email protected]

What made you want to go the whole hog with the supercharger??

Which instructions were you following that said to use the pentetrating epoxy first? I've read differing opinions on whether its any good over using straight epoxy for the first coat, what are your afterthoughts? You used aquacote top cote straight onto the internal surfaces without priming, only cleaning up what you could etc? How many coats did you do internally?

How many coats of aquacote top cote did you do below the waterline? How has the paint system held up since being in the water, moving on trailer etc?

I couldn't tell u exactly how thick the ply is, i'll take a proper look tonight and update.

Thanks very much for your time, as soon as i decide on the basic process to use, i'll be getting some epoxy and cloth, hopefully this friday and go from there.

Chris

What made you want to go the whole hog with the supercharger?? Always wanted to own a hot rod but for my family it would be impractical! I had a 5.8l XD, heavily worked and NOS when I was youngin, then moved away from cars and raced dirt bikes. Flatheads are poor breathers due to the valve setup so take well to supercharging and being in a boat I have access to large ammounts of cooling water that only requires a re-routing of the intake hoses. I'm aiming at a boost pressure of 2.5 to 3psi, so nothing radical. The boat is quick now, running at 170hp I'm aiming for 220hp, with the same engine 6psi boost equates to 300hp.

Which instructions were you following; The bote cote manual and advice from the supplier, yeah looking back this worked fine and I would not change the procedure. Have I mentioned that you need to buy their book/manual.

Aqua cote; Internal, didn't prime and 2 sprayed coats was heaps (similar colour underneath).
Underside, 4 coats due to the dark paints opacity.
Paint is good, has had a couple of altercations with the trailer, canoes running into it and waterski scratches, dented the timber but not broken the epoxy, did punch a 1" hole in the bottom, fixed and in the water the next weekend.