Winding down

In a few days, weather permitting, the deck will be installed in the Batboat. Most of the heavy structural and grinder work will be finished.

In the duration of the last six weeks my car had been in the path of light clouds of fine fiberglass particles and saw dust. The morning dew and humidity made a sticky mess of it and those messy afternoons are coming to a close.

What a nice night to wash the car! Cool, breezy and slight overcast evening at the coin op car wash near my house. Its been the first time in a long while since its been washed.

Tomorrow it rains but I don't mind. :)

Fiberglassing tip.

Unfortunately, when in between fiberglassing projects sometimes left over polyester resin will begin to harden before I can use it on the next. I can't keep it in the bucket because I'll need it to mix up the next batch. What to do?

I found I can dump the left over resin in a damp spot of the gravel driveway. The combination of the thickened resin and water in the soil prevents it from seeping into the ground. Several days later I pick up the hardened blob off the ground and put it in the trash.

Batboat Rebuild: Day 32 July 13th, 2009

Two days later the adhesive had bonded the one stringer to the hull nicely. Today I spaced apart and linked the rest together to caulk in two others.

I ground off the excess fiberglass from the fourth stringer brace that I repaired.
The two longest stringers were temporarily fastened with cross braces and stainless screws to keep them all square.





PL premium adhesive caulk spread nicely under and along the sides of the plywood.

I weighed down the two stringers on each side of the one already bonded in to simulate a level deck. Over the winter they developed a slight bend. Forcing them to their original shape made the adhesive bond them in level and at a uniform height. This will make putting the deck in a little easier.

The original boat was not built with precision. Before doing all the caulking work, I laid the stingers in the boat perfectly measured and spaced. However, I moved one stringer into the position of the original and it made the deck level 2 to 2 1/2 inches higher on the drivers side.

The original deck line is still visible along the hull and it was higher on the steering wheel side and uneven in other spots.

If you are making your own Batboat keep in mind that the work you are doing is better than what was done in the factory. Don't split hairs if you make a small mistake!



Again, the cross braces, scrap ply and cans kept the stringers perfectly square, spaced apart and level as the caulk hardens. Yea, its overkill but took only a moment to do. ;)

You'll need this little gadget to save your caulk cartridge for the next day. I picked this up at Harbor Freight for $.99.


The next day I unscrewed all the cross braces and caulked in the last stringer (on the right). Again, plywood scraps, a cross brace and weights forced the ply level with the others bonded the day before.

Its suppose to rain tomorrow so I'll get the 1708 fiberglass cloth ready for fiberglassing the stringers into the hull.

Something you'll not see very often...

Two Glastron V-174s side by side.

The owner Mike M. plans to make one of them into a Batboat.

Congratulations, Mike!


edit: I spoke too soon. Here are two more in Logansport, IN. One of them will be a Batboat replica, too.


Batboat replicas seem to have just become the "in" thing to do recently.

The V-174s are getting hard to find. The hulls of the sterndrive models made in 1966, 1967 and 1968 are from the same molds.

The original TV Batboat was based on a 1966 Crestflite Stern Drive V-174 Super Sport made by the Glastron Corporation out of Texas.

Batboat Rebuild: Day 32 July 11th, 2009

Today the first stringer gets bonded to the hull.

At first I planned to use peanut butter (peanut butter = polyester resin mixed with fine saw dust called "wood flower") to bed the plywood in. Checking with the guys at the iboats.com forum, however, they recommended using PL construction adhesive. Its better and cheaper.

The two main reasons are the cost of the amount of resin needed for the job (including UPS delivery, the resin is $50 per gallon) and that the PL adhesive is more flexible. A rigid bond will harm the flexible Batboat fiberglass hull if it hits the water too hard too many times.

The PL adhesive was less than $8 per 28 oz. tube. That won me over and I went with that.

I'll need to go back to Lowe's! I'll find four 28 oz. tubes of PL are needed for this job.

Last year when I was grinding out the old fiberglass around the rotted stringers I decided to leave three small sections of one of the longest ones in. This was so I can clamp a new stringer to them, giving support to it and the others when they are bonded to the hull.

With all stingers placed in the boat and connected by the cross braces I took a shim to get the top of the long stringer positioned level, using the bottom edge of the dashboard as a reference.

After a few adjustments I got it where I wanted and clamped the ply to the fiberglass.


This is is better than what the factory did. I would find out later that the original deck was at least 2 inches higher on one side because the stringers were not set in square with each other.

I glopped in a generous amount of adhesive under and along the sides of the wood.

None of the stringers are completely flush with the hull. The original ones weren't eather (not suppose to be) and over the winter the hull lost its shape a little due to the missing deck. Now it is square from the improvements I made to the trailer, however.

I cut a shim and used it to smooth out the surface and to push the compound into openings.



The tube says it cures in 24 hours. I left it for two days and the ply is securly bedded to the hull. I broke out the old fiberglass the wood was clamped to by hand. Everything turned out perfect without the mess of using peanut butter.

The rest of the stringers go in soon, followed by the deck.

The best has yet to come!

Batboat Rebuild: Day 31 July 9th, 2009

As of today I was fed up with the slow progress but I kept reminding myself it will be over soon.

Nearly all the work on the stringers was completed. Before bonding them into the hull I took the Batboat to the river one last time and make sure there were no leaks.




The inside was as dry as a bone. Good.

A cleaned up hull with cross braces and stringers loosely positioned in place.

Today I made the last big fiberglass dust clean up of the hull using the air compressor and acetone in a rag. Acetone dissolves fiberglass resin so the remaining dust wipes up easy.

A day or two ago I waterproofed the stainless steel screws by laminating 1708 biaxial cloth to the large braces. Today the small stringers got 1.5 oz chopped strand mat and 1708 biaxial.

The grinder removed the excess and cleaned them them up nicely.

No water will get under those screw heads now.

The small stringers before I finished adding 1.5 oz and 1708 cloth.

The above photo shows a small stringer compared to the decades old original. The wood was fiberglassed in the the hull by the factory untreated. Bare wood with nothing added. The new one is waterproofed with polyester resin and 1.5 oz. chopped strand mat.

All of the original stringers I kept for reference seem to have broke and rotted in the cross brace area which is why I went the extra mile to add braces.

New stringers are cut for six inch wide cross braces. The originals had two inch.

There was another cross brace at the end positioned at the center of the hull, however, I'm not adding this for two reasons. The six inch cross braces I designed are overkill for this boat (I already have the extra wood laying around anyway.) and it will be impossible to adequately lay fiberglass cloth around all the angles.

I am completely happy with what I've done so far. :)

Batboat Rebuild: Day 30 July 5th through 8th, 2009

I didn't get much done during this time period. All work was focused on laminating the braces to the stringers. The heat and dehydration from being in overalls also convinced me to take a day off.

The work was slow going. There is one set of saw horses here so there was progress on one set of stringers at a time, one side at a time.

Joining the two ends of the longest stringers and didn't take much time to figure it out. This was easy. I placed them in the hull one at at time, lined them up with the remaining fiberglass layups of one of the originals and clamped them with a brace. I pulled the stringer out and drilled holes for stainless steel screws and screwed them in.

While demolishing all the old rot last year I removed all but three small sections of one of the original stringer's fiberglass from the hull. This was so I can clamp a new stringer, giving support to the others when they are bonded to the hull.

I flipped them over on the saw horse and laminated a brace to the other side using 1.5 oz chopped strand mat cloth.

Here they are steadily held in place.

The next day I did the other side and the day after ground the excess fiberglass off.

I finished up joining the braces to the small stringers I started on the 4th Of July.

The below photos shows how they all fit in the hull with the cross braces. Everything is perfect so far.




Now that they braces are permanently laminated to the large stringers, holes are drilled for more stainless screws for the other side. These things will be joined together long past my years.

The small stringers get less screws than the large because there is not much room.
The large got eight stainless screws on each side and the small have four. All positions were predrilled and counter sank.

All went in good and tight to the point where several screw heads broke off. All stainless that I couldn't drive in beneath the surface of the wood were ground flat. There is no way these are coming out! lol.

The lamination gave way on one of the small stringers when I was putting in its first screw. The holes I drilled were not big enough and the torque broke the bond! What a pain in the a*$.

Rebonding this added a couple more days of delay in fiberglassing them into the hull. This time I did it with peanut butter resin! lol!

Looking back....

Before heading off to sleep tonight I browsed through some old posts of mine at the iboats.com forum and found a photo not on my harddrive and this post.

"Reading various threads here it looks like replacing the deck and transom is easy, but takes a little time. Only thing standing in my way is the cold weather. Once it gets to the temp where I can properly fiberglass all the rot gets ripped out."

Me, March 17th, 2008, 03:38 PM

This was a little over three months after buying my Batboat and quite true.

Batboat Rebuild: Day 29 July 4, 2009

It was a happy Independence Day for me. I started the long process of getting the stringers ready to bed into the hull.

Stringers are important structural components to boat building. One of their functions is to have a solid place to screw the deck on.

Decks for boats like mine are generally made out of several 4 foot sheets that butt against each other for the length of the hull. To add strength and prevent the board ends from moving, cross braces are mounted in across the stringers. The deck sections screw down to them for stability.


One of the issues with the way my particular boat was made is that the notches for these braces created weak areas in the stringers. The smallest stringers were reduced to 3/4 inch in height.

Nearly all of those spots on the original stringers were broke and rotted. To compensate I designed braces that both add strength for the stringers and cross braces.

Also, the original cross braces were about 2 inches wide. The ones I'm putting in are 6 inches.

It took nearly all day to get it right and the results were great.

During the week I cut the marine grade cross brace braces into the shapes I needed. Today came the notches for those and the stringers. It took a long time to do this with my table saw.

Four of these braces will also join the sections of the longest stringers together. Marine Grade Douglas Fur Plywood comes in 4 foot by 8 foot sheets in this area, the two longest stringers in the Batboat are about 12 foot. So I have 8 foot pieces that the brace braces will join to their other ends, as shown above.



Stringer halves gets are joined and braced on each side of the cross brace notch.


The smaller stringers really need extra help as you can see above. The notch reduces them to less than 3/4 inch by 3/4 inch in that area. However, the braces will give them a total of 2 1/4 inch of strength in width.



The stringers seeme much more stronger and cross braces are more better positioned with the added braces.

The plan is to laminate all of the braces to the stringers with fiberglass, add stainless steel screws for added stability and lay fiberglass over that to waterproof the screw heads.

On this day I began fiberglassing the braces to the stringers. I have one set of saw horses so this took forever. One set of stringers at a time, one side at a time. It was a few days before I finished it all. The results, however, are very nice.

Batboat Rebuild: Day 28 June 23, 2009

BEFORE

I want this to be the strongest Batboat transom in maritime history.

I added 1708 cloth along the parameter to anchor the ply to the hull. Each strip of cloth is overlaps 1 1/2 to 2 inches, sometimes more. It is among the strongest fiberglass cloth weaves available.

This boat will not have trouble out on the water, at least not on that end. lol!

AFTER

When done correctly fiberglass laminates clear.

No matter what you try, fiberglass dust gets everywhere. Even on camera lenses. It is best to use the grinder on a boat outdoors or in a place you can easily clean. You can't completely get rid of it. Use an air compressor to blow as much of it off your work clothes before entering your house. Trust me.

BEFORE

I took the excess cloth off all the stringers, too.

AFTER