Spring Project(s) 74 20SF

[SeaPlusPlus]

With the temp finally being in the mid 50's here in Va Beach this past weekend I took the opportunity to start on my spring projects for the SF 20. Project list includes:

• Refinish the console (currently has 200+ holes in it)
• Repair all the cracks and holes inside the boat
• Make new fore and aft hatches, fuel tank hatch is in great shape as it was redone last fall
• Port scupper has a very slow leak, rather than repair the straight down scupper design, I'm going to move them to drain through the stern and put the ping pong ball scuppers on
• Repaint boat
• Mount the trim tabs I bought for it last fall
• T-top

Trying to have this finished by June at the latest.

Tore her down this weekend with the help my dad and some friends (bribed them with beer and the "you fish on the boat, you work on the boat" motto). Couple of teardown pics:












The two huge open spots on the dash and where the wheel was were covered with starboard bolted on.




Previous owner swore up and down it was bottom paint that he put on it to sell, I just opened the can of stripper and it seemed to start falling off, seems my suspicions of a "home depot special" were true. The other layers of bottom paint are a little more rugged and will require some sanding.




Couple of our aquatic vehicles:



Rainy here all this week but hopefully get to work on the console some in the shop. Forecast for the weekend is another beautiful mid 50's and sunny so will be sanding away.

Oh yeah, color I'm going with is Awlgrip's Sea Foam:



I think she's gonna be purdy.

[DonV]

Ah yes.....the familiar sight of the ladder next to the boat for easy "in and out", I know it well. I also know all about the "200 holes" in the console.....a suggestion, buy the best sandpaper in the contractor size!!

Good luck!!

[apneadreams]

I can relate to your project..I'm in Yorktown but originally from VB and I've been restoring a 71' 20sf when weather permits...almost at the painting stage...as too the bottom paint...mine had about 3-5 layers of old bottom paint and I have found that the 15min gel style stripper from walmart works like a dream on bottom paint...just be careful not to gouge the existing paint by overly aggressive scraping....you will likely see me on the water in late April or early May...

[thehermit]

Wow...your haulin.

Nice 28 Moonie boat too

[wtenglish]

What type of bracket is that? How is the performance of the 175? That's the motor I'm leaning towards.

[uncleboo]

Coming along nicely! I'm up in VB 3 or 4 times a month making deliveries. Would love to come by and introduce myself sometime and see your work first hand.

[SeaPlusPlus]

wtenglish - the bracket is a D&D, price was very right and its solid, customer service when I had questions was something to be desired though.

uncleboo - you got a pm

after an entire week of rain and the threat of snow, the weather is looking good for this weekend and my shipment from uscomposites got here today (ordered on Tues and got it fri with the standard ground from FL to VA, not bad ups, also was impressed with the packing job by uscomposites, very solid). project SeaCraft refurb 2010 continues tomorrow!

shipment of much needed supplies.



got the 2 gallon kit because I have some left over from my transom job, and looking through everything I pretty sure I got two different waxes (what happens when I get excited ordering things I guess). also not pictured is 10 yards of 1708 and 10 yards 1708 6" tape.

mission tomorrow is stripping, sanding, and more sanding, followed by an evening of hatch making in my garage. stay tuned.

[SeaPlusPlus]

Spent all day Sat and Sun finishing stripping off as much bottom paint as the stripper would take and sanding the no skid off the deck of the boat. Got about 70% of the deck covered, plan to knock the rest that out early sat then move to the hull.

Wanted to have pictures up earlier but didn't have many of the first hatch I made as my girlfriend was eager to help and take pictures:



But after making a small man, a cup, and a horse out of molding clay and taking 3 pictures she lost interest in being in a garage that smelled like duratec.

She did get two decent pictures of the process (that was borrowed from strick's famous "Here we go again" post). Below is after I measured the O.D. of the hatch and screwed down 3/4" board to the MDF, took clay and rolled it out to about a 3/8" diameter and then pushed it in the corners of the wood, then a metal spoon was used to make a nice even radius all the way around.



Another angle (the 3rd and last picture she took )



So rather than post those 3 pictures I waited until tonight when I did the rest of my hatches and took more myself.

Hatch O.D. is formed out of 3/4" wood, and mold release wax is applied, and then buffed.





My anchor locker hatch (and fish box but that hatch is in good condition and I'm not remaking it) has indented rectangles where the hinge rests:



I used strips of 1/4" plywood to make a place in the mold for those.



Below is me test fitting the coring, on my first hatch I didn't bevel the edges and the fiberglass didn't like trying to bend at the 90 to go from on top of the core to the hatch, the 45 degree bevel made it a nice smooth transition.



Duratec (had no idea the "Grey" was gonna be THIS dark) primer is applied onto the waxed surface and the corner pieces of glass are pushed into place forming the corners.



Don't have anymore layup pictures after this but after the corner pieces are in place and the duratec is getting tacky I place 3" strips all along the edges and wet them out. Then I place a sheet of glass that overlaps the edges of the mold by about 1" on each side down and wet it out, after that is wet I lay down another sheet just like it on top. After that I wet out and place down my coring running 2" strips of glass along its edges so I can pour in thickened resin (thickened with wood flour) in between the coring. Then a final layer of glass is placed on top of the coring that is cut to fit the exact dimensions of the hatch so that it just lays on top of the other pieces and doesn't run up the side walls.

Here is a shot of them drying:



I'll be popping these out friday (ample time to set up as its a little cold here) and will take some pics of the finished product. This weekend looks nice so another weekend of sanding, scupper, and console work for me.

Thanks for looking.

[zach]

Looking good. Out of curiosity, how does she sit in the water with that big 4s on the back? I noticed no tabs, you have any problems running?

[SeaPlusPlus]

She sits a little lower than the other 20's I've seen on here, but she is still self bailing (original deck) with 2 people + gas (haven't ran with more than that without the plugs in the scuppers before). The port scupper has a very slow leak so part of this spring refit I'm replacing the thru-hull scuppers with transom draining ping pong ball style ones.

The DF175 is only 54lbs heavier than the DF140 that seems to be the go to engine for the 20 here on CSC. When I installed the engine I pushed my gas tank as far forward as it would go, moved the console forward 3" and moved the batteries from the stern to the front of the console.

She runs great with that engine, like a bat outta hell. No chine walking or porpoising at all. I bought tabs for her last fall from csc member josh_wellfleet but have yet to put them on because I really don't need them, but am going to install them before the summer since they will give me a lower planing speed along with various other improvements.