It's not over yet. I still have the cabin to do. In the meantime, I patched an area closed to the keel where the aluminum had cracked when the welder had patched some holes. The Gluvit had seepin and it was watertight but I wanted to give it some rigidity and protection so I cut a round patch out of aluminum and used JB Weld. Hard as rock. Here's the picture before the patch:
Had to go to New York for 4 days. We got to skate in Central Park and we had 6" of snow. Awesome. The Project took a back seat and I got some rest. This is the patch aluminum patch. It's not riveted but coated with marine tech on both inside surface. I let it dry and added another coat on the seam. I feels hard as a rock when I knock on it.
I finished stripping and sanding cabin before I left. Some of the paint around the windows came off with paint stripper so I plan of using rustoleum flat black. I don't know if I should prime them first. I will cover the unpainted area with zinc chromate.
I also have two dings on the port side. I don't know if you can see them in the picture. I have to fix that before I prime the boat.
I'm replacing the bottom floor that goes in the cabin. As you can see the old one, which was pressure treated and the new one with marine grade plywood coated with at least with 4 coats on each side. I was surprised to see that Starcraft used pressure treated wood with their aluminum boats but they did. I was intrigued to see if I would be notice anything degradation of the aluminum in the area where the pressure treated wood was in contact with the aluminum. Nothing that I could see.
I don't think anyone else has ever found factory PT decking in their SC.... IF they used PT, it was likely the CCA Kiln dried PT that isn't corrosive to aluminum.
Interesting and quite fortunate: No corrosion and a great template too.
They are predicting snow again overnight into Sat here, probably won't be much, but I'm completely ready for winter 2015 to wind down..........
JbCurt00 - I was surprised as well. I went to their website and under "why Starcraft" and "aluminum boats" # 8 bullet - "7 ply Pressure Treated Floor/Deck resists warping and other effects of dampness".
I hear you about this winter. A lot of fellow Starmadians have to wait for spring to finally emerge to start/resume their projects. Here winters are great for working outdoors but summers are just brutal. I want to finish priming and painting before summer. Yeah, I'm getting pretty good at stripping aluminum boats.
Waterman - I hear you. It seems that my skills are better at demolishing than rebuilding. Anyhow, I'm retiring on August 1, so I should have more time to devote to the boat. Btw, somebody turned me on to PC-11 epoxy filler, it might have been you. I love that stuff. Reminds me of fairing compound.
My two sons helped apply two coats of Steelflex 9x from Fasco, on the bottom of the hull. We cleaned the hull with Aluma-prep 33. Applied Alodine 1201with sponges but they started to break down so we switched to towels. We let it dry. We applied the first coat lightly with roller followed by a brush. That stuff dries very hard with a high gloss. After two hours, we applied the second coat which was a little heavier.
Awesome looking paint job. Kinda liked it in the original alum as well...looked like a gunship of sorts. A lot of the grunt work is done...onto the fun stuff.
