BILLYsobx
Cadet
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2014
- Messages
- 11
My dad bought a new boat 5 yrs ago and let me have his old 20' Astro. The transom is completely gone, you can grab the lower unit and make the whole transom and back deck flex terribly. It was so bad when we parked it the top speed had dropped from 67 mph new to 55 mph with the wind by myself. He took it to a reputable Merc mech./racer. He checked the 200 2.5 xri and said the compression was still like new, the merc wasn't the problem, the transom was flexing so bad when you trimmed up ,to get more lift, it was just flexing more so the bow never fully lifted. On top of all that every piece of wood throughout the boat is completely rotten and water-logged making it a lot heavier. One question first, the cap cracked all over after he had it about 4-5 yrs, he checked into it and was told Brunswick had a whole line of these boats that were shot too hot to get them off the line causing the clear and or gel-coat to split after a while and the cap only had a one yr warranty,has anyone heard of this? Also my buddy, who has boat building exp., said everything on the interior was shot with a 'splatter-gun',I think, you can see voids and can actually see the glass texture. He told me that all the rot came from the interior of the transom seeping water from the bottom hold. Same with all the stringers and plywood on the floors. It sat from 99-05 cuz he had two car acc. and allot of personal family affairs, It just sat there and deteriorated. We finally got back to fishing, He bought a new aluminum trailer, new minn kota, gps, and had the cap re-shot. It looked great except for the growing transom cracks on the splashwell and from a distance you couldn't see all the cracks in the cap.Fished two tourney trails and used it almost every weekend. A few trips in some 2-3 ft waves and we were concerned, you could watch the back deck flex all the way to the live-wells. He went for broke and got a new triton,no wood=no rot right. I siphoned all the gas out over that summer for the mower. Three wks ago I added fresh 93 oct. , put some quicksilver in the cylinders,cleaned the plugs, new battery and she fired right up woo hoo. Now that I know merc is solid time to pull it off and tackle this beast. This is the very large model, 95" beam and the bow flairs out to about 9', sits very high on the water, the front deck puts the tr20xhp's to shame. I can crawl under the bow and go to sleep comfortably no kidding. I'll post some pics of the damage tomorrow. From my explanations how much time/money do ya'll think I'll have in restoring and repainting hull and cap. Was thinking about no carpet and spraying the decks like they spray the salt water decks, since I live near allot of saltwater and we love to striper/drum/speck. trout/flounder-fish. Allot easier to spray off than shop-vaccing carpet. Is that achievable?
