Bad, bad news. Rotten Transom

[suzook12]

I wweren't at the time, then it happened on another post but someone had quoted it.....

 

[LostPiker]

I cut the floor back to access the whole transom. The transom below the deck level was bare ply so no great surprise it rotted

Deck at the back was solid fibreglass :

 

I cut the deck back and stripped the fibreglass from the inside, the transom looks to have had another layer of ply above the deck. I stripped the ply off to the fibreglass

 

Then last night I ground all the old crap off to a nice clean surface to start the rebuild with

 

So. Much. Dust

 

I filled a carrier bag with just dust that had collected in the bilge.

Got a sheet of marine ply on order, 10kg fibreglass kit and resin thickener powder stuff. Just need a bit of time with no rain to do it

[Andy135]

Well done Adam. It's a nerve-wracking moment to start taking a grinder to your boat, but you've done the right thing and the outer transom skin looks nice and clean now. Good work.

[Geoff]

Well done, as Andy said the transom FG looks much better now. I am surprised to see that the bearers do not go right back to the transom, but probably only as far as the splashwell. When you redo the transom I would suggest that you then bond in about 4 substantial gussets from the hull bottom to the transom, and possibly back to the splash well bulkhead and up to the deck level. Please ensure that any plywood is completely glassed in to stop any future rot and this also applies to any limber holes. Where you are joining on to existing FG the existing should be chamfered back and the new FG should be layered with each layer going a bit further past it's predecessor (I hope that makes sense. It goes without saying that in all cases where glassing occurs the substrate, ply or FG shoud be abraided to clean the surface and to ensure good adhesion. Looking good, keep up the good work and if I am teaching my grand mother to suck eggs I am sorry. Geoff.

[LostPiker]

2 minutes ago, Geoff said:

Well done, as Andy said the transom FG looks much better now. I am surprised to see that the bearers do not go right back to the transom, but probably only as far as the splashwell. When you redo the transom I would suggest that you then bond in about 4 substantial gussets from the hull bottom to the transom, and possibly back to the splash well bulkhead and up to the deck level. Please ensure that any plywood is completely glassed in to stop any future rot and this also applies to any limber holes. Where you are joining on to existing FG the existing should be chamfered back and the new FG should be layered with each layer going a bit further past it's predecessor (I hope that makes sense. It goes without saying that in all cases where glassing occurs the substrate, ply or FG shoud be abraided to clean the surface and to ensure good adhesion. Looking good, keep up the good work and if I am teaching my grand mother to suck eggs I am sorry. Geoff.

Not at all Geoff, it's all welcome. The bearers holding the floor up appear to be a molded piece that was put in and then the deck laid on top rather than made up of ply as I was expecting. We plan to use some celotex type foam to make up some more supports to join the transom to the rest of the underfloor structure and support the new bit of deck. I'll wrap the foam in 2 or 3 layers of fibreglass to make it strong. The white you can see on the sides is where I have sanded back to solid fibreglass for the layers on the transom to go up the sides.

[suzook12]

Looking good dude, seems we have very similar boats by the sounds of it