Redoing My Floor.......Where do i start??

[Ranz1]

Well since my trust bearing decided to go on Laber Day weekend (within the first 10 min of the day) cry , ive decided to redo all of the jet and my floor. How do i do a floor?
How do i get the old floor up? What wood do i use (marine grade? & how thick?)? Do i fiberglass both sides of the floor? what do i do if there is a joint (not the kind you smoke smile_sp )? Anthony
[ September 06, 2003, 07:29 PM: Message edited by: Ranz1 ]

[johnboy]

We did my 21' Biesemeyer last year. To get the old floor out I used a skill saw, one I did not like very much, and a cheap blade just set it to the depth of your wood and start cutting and pulling out chunks. (you WILL itch like a mofo) I am thinking we replaced it with 5/8 marine grade (not positive late and to many silvers) We coated both sides with resin and put cloth on the stringers. When we got that far it was still pretty weak. So the next step was to lay cloth on the floor and resin it in couple of layers. That really stiffens the floor up, plus it seals any joints (both kinds) that you have. I wish we had put one more layer down but we were ready to get to the lake and West Marine was closed. Any good Marine supply place will carry bigs rolls of cloth you buy by the linear foot. We put an stainless plate under the throttle to help distrbute the stress over a larger area.
Make sure you clean the hull inside really well and then clean it out again and again before you put your floor down and then while consuming large quantities of beer clean out again. It took almost a year of unplugging the bilge pump every time it came on before all the little chips of wood were washed out!
I am sure there will be many more responses with much more info....
main thing just do it. It takes a while but it sure is nice when you get done!
John

[Mandelon]

Good idea to do the bottomside with resin to make it water resistant. If not done it will get fungus/mold/rot and odorous!
Is your existing floor rotted now?

[quiet riot]

I've replaced several floors/bulkheads/stringers and such in boats when I used to work at a marina. Its pretty much like johnboy says, the only things I'd add is, be carefull when cutting not to go too deep being mindful of cutting into stringers or underfloor gastanks, etc. roughen up all areas that the new floor will be glassed to with 80 grit sandpaper before final cleanup and putting floor in.
And I'd recommend doing the first coats (underside of floor and all joints) with a working resin (doesn't set up as fast and soaks into wood/cracks better) and then go over the top of the floor and all exposed edges with a finish resin to give the hard, smooth, and sealed finish.
jd
Oh yeah, once the old floor is cut out, check the condition of any floatation foam and stringers, as many times if the floor has rotted with soft spots, the foam will be waterlogged (very heavy and promotes future rotting from the trapped moisture) and the stringers will have some soft spots in them.
If the stringers or bulkheads(depending on how the boat was made as to whats under the floor) has a few soft areas, you can drill with a small bit every inch or two in the soft areas and then let it dry for awhile. Then a product called "get rot" can be applied in the soft spots to harden them up. Its basically a very thin epoxy resin that soaks into all the soft areas and stiffens them up.
If there are extensive soft (rotted) areas of the stringers/bulkheads then they should be cut out and replaced while the floors out or it can lead to big problems down the road. sorry for the long response, probably more than you wanted to read.

[Ranz1]

Thanks everybody, No response is to long....My old floor has soft spots and a couple of holes.
When you say "resin" the bottom of the floor do you mean with no fiberglass mat? Ive never worked with fiberglass so i dont understand the termmonlogy you guys use :) or what to buy. What kind of mat do i use? what is a good resin?

[THE BOSTON SIDEWINDER]

THE WEST SYSTEMS #105(AND #205/FAST, OR #207/SLOW HARDENER) IS KILLER. AFTER CURING JUST ROUGH UP ANY SURFACES YOU WANT GELCOAT OR APPLY CARPET ADHESIVE OR THINGS WON'T STICK TO IT. I HEAR YOU CAN MAIL ORDER IT AND SAVE $$$..BILL.

[johnboy]

Ranz1:
Thanks everybody, No response is to long....My old floor has soft spots and a couple of holes.
When you say "resin" the bottom of the floor do you mean with no fiberglass mat? Ive never worked with fiberglass so i dont understand the termmonlogy you guys use :) or what to buy. What kind of mat do i use? what is a good resin? R1, I did put a little cloth on top of the stingers/bulkheads and then put a heavy coat of resin on the wood, slamming it down and putting some STAINLESS screws through to the stringers. I used a cloth on the top, it smooths out better... Like I said earlier I wish I would have put a few more coats of cloth on the top side. On my hull there were a couple of drain holes in the bulk head just forward of the motor to drain water into the bilge, make sure you keep them open, or redrill and seal the edges with resin if you have to replace the bulkhead.
John

[flat broke]

Both Ken F from the old Banderlog board and Beached1 from around these parts have done and documented extensive floor/stringer work on their old Omegas. I would do a search for the subject on this boar and I'm sure you'll find more pictures and info than you know what to do with.
Chris

[BK]

Heres a link to Ken F's floor repair page web page (http://www.angelfire.com/mo3/Omega/FloorRepair.html)
If youd like to ask him some ?'s just post it on here Banderlog Board (http://www.banderlog.com/cgi-bin/banderlog/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?az=list&forum=DCForumID1&conf=DCConfID1) and im sure you'll get a response.