Water in boat

[Griffnate]

I am new so I apologize if this is not how I am suppose to do this.
I just bought a boat, 1976 bee craft b5000, 16ft, I noticed a soft spot in the floor and after some research found out it is very expensive to repair. I was just going to rip up the carpet and seal the crank and lay plywood over the old floor just to get some use out of the boat. I paid 1500 dollars for it. When I pulled the carpet I realized the soft spot in the floor was a previous repair and was not sealed or done correctly. I was able to get the broken piece up and found another repaired piece under that. I then removed the four screws holding that piece down and found the whole area is filled with water, and not a little water but water that looks to have been in the boat for years, I was told that I should just suck the water out and seal the old floor and put plywood over that and use the boat, I am concerned that the integrity of the boat is compromised. My question is, should I scrap the boat and chalk it up to a lesson learned or can the water be sucked out and the boat used for a year or two. I have attached a couple of pictures.
Thank you for your help.

 

[fhhuber]

Well.. step 1 is get the water out.

Then drill the stringers and see if they are wet wood or dry.
If the stringer wood is wet the fix is more expensive than another cheap hull, but another hull might have the same (or similar) issues.

 

[kcassells]

Major OUCH! This will end up being a total rehab from the pics you showed. If you're up for it great! If not try to get the $$ back from the seller. You're right the the next buy could be the same condition but if YOU do the rehab then you'll know it Perfect and better than factory. Lots of great guys here to chime in and get you going.

 

[Watermann]

You can bet that the stringers and transom are rotten in this one. All that black around the cesspool doesn't look good at all to me. If this is the boat for you then tear into it and make the repairs if not maybe move on to an aluminum boat that doesn't have the huge expense and labor involved. You canuse this one as a donor for parts too if it has a good motor.

 

[redneck joe]

Pics do not look promising.

 

[Woodonglass]

She's 40 years old. Unless she's the "Boat of your Dreams" and you're in LOVE with the way she looks you might want to consider taking the advice of the others. As previously stated, she's more than likely gunna require a total rebuild which means about 200 man hours of hot, itchy nasty work, $1,500 - $2,000 more dollars of cash outlay (If the motor is Ok, if not then more money will be needed) Now the GOOD NEWS!!! If you do this, you'll have invested Approx. $4,000 and have a boat that's LIKE NEW and will last for decades.

 

[Griffnate]

Thanks for the help, I got all the water out and the stringers are still firm and seem okay, the floor is bad and I am trying to repair that. Once again, thanks for all the help.

 

[lckstckn2smknbrls]

You won't really know the condition of the stringers until you drill some test holes to see.

 

[Watermann]

Yeah Ick is right, you need to do some exploring before patching it up and hitting the waves,

 

[Griffnate]

I drilled into the stringers and there is definitely water in them... I am not sure if they are rotten. It took some force to get the drill to go through, the bottom part of the stringer is definitely more saturated then the top... Also the flotation foam is fully saturated, and from what I read the only way to get the foam out is to redo the whole boat. At this point I am not sure I want to do anymore work to it. I surely don't want to redo the whole thing, seeing the boat is so old. Thanks everyone for the advice

 

[mickyryan]

after lurking around here awhile I came to the realization if its a used boat expect the worst, because more often then not it winds up like that,
and you wont be let down when you find out they are rotted.
like others say, cool part is it is fixable so if you decide to go that route you will have a greater feeling of safety when you are out on the water and know its all fixed properly.