Page 7
Got busy with the grinder and cutting wheel some more. First order of business was removing the recessed panels on my side boxes. Pretty quick and easy with a cutoff wheel in the grinder.
Flipped em over and ground/tapered all the edges so they're ready for glass.
Next to go was the in-deck livewell. I had hoped to get it all out in one piece so it could possibly be put to use elsewhere, but no dice. I had to hack it up pretty good just to get it out of there. I'll build a false bulkhead as Wart suggested and pour the void full of foam.
I also spent some time glassing in and leveling out the transom. Mostly old screw holes, thru hull fittings and a few areas where I cut too deep with the circular saw. You can see the remnants of the in-deck livewell in the background.
The damaged areas around the strakes also got reglassed and a touch up from the grinder. These two areas are in the corners of the bilge. There was a little wood shelf here for mounting batteries and oil tanks and the like.
And finally, I made patterns of the missing section of the transom and the recessed panels that were removed from the side boxes and cut them out of a donor panel a friend gave me. The donor panel was perfectly flat and smooth, exactly the right thickness and had a gel-coat finished on one side. Only problem was that it also had a balsa core and inner skin. So, I spent some time removing all that stuff.
It was a bit of work but with some sweat and a crowbar, I finally got all that stuff off of it. I even got the pieces cut and the edges ground and beveled. Hopefully, this will save me a lot of fairing in the end.
