need help on floor repair

[jojodancer]

I bought a 1983 Glastron HPV-175 a few months ago and have been slowly doing repairs. The previous owner had started repairing the floor. The only spot left to finish is a small area in front of the fuel tank. My plan was to cover the area with a piece of plywood and to put a vent in the center of the cover. Then I built a base for the seats that will sit on top of most of it.

My question is; do i need to enclose the area around the tank? The rear of the tank extends in to the bilge area. There is a 1 inch gap on either side of the tank and looks like water is intended to drain underneath the tank into the bilge area. The seat base will go over the top of the rear of the tank but there is nothing covering the gap on the sides. Also do I need to fiberglass over the entire floor or just the edges and joints.

It has rained here in Texas for the last 3 days so I had to take the pictures under the boat cover. I will post more along with the rest of the boat later. Any advice will be appreciated, this my first time doing any type of repairs on a boat so I must admit I have no idea what I am doing.

 

[chargerboy]

Re: need help on floor repair

Welcome to Iboats!

I don't think you will need to cover the tank if you don't think it's necessary to keep things looking clean. Fiberglassing over the joints of the plywood won't do much. Doing the whole floor and tying it in to the existing structure will help make the whole boat much more rigid. What is that on the joints now? Looks like some kind of putty? Did the previous owner re-do the stringers? How do they look? Might be worth it to investigate before you commit to sealing up the floor. It really doesn't look like that work was done by somebody who knew what they were doing.

 

[jojodancer]

Re: need help on floor repair

Person I bought the boat from owns a auto body shop and I think he covered the joints with bondo. I am going to pull a section of the floor so that I can investigate underneath and then plan to sand the bondo off and fiberglass the whole thing. I have read a hundred posts about floor repair and saw where some people did not put resin on the whole floor but i plan to cover the whole thing.

 

[chargerboy]

Re: need help on floor repair

Haha, he owned an auto body shop and used bondo on plywood joints? Don't take your cars to him! That bondo will just swell and crack and hold moisture and rot the wood. You don't need to resin the floor or do anything to it, but every little bit you do will help make the boat stronger, and last longer.