drumset5994
Cadet
- Joined
- May 18, 2017
- Messages
- 6
I've been working on this 14' Mirrocraft I picked up from my brother-in-law's father. Pretty solid boat. When I first got it, it absolutely reaked of rat ****. It was incredibly discouraging thinking "what did I get myself into". But each week on my days off I would work on it little by little. I was checking out this forum for weeks and found a bunch of people over the years who restored these boats with different means. Saw the one guy with the yellow and white one. Saw another red one with a deck built. I decided to build a deck for this, but as a sheet of plywood. I decided to use the plywood to raise the seats, and be able to place my feet on the bottom of the aluminum boat.
I started off gutting the boat completely. For anyone inquiring, the only way I was able to get rid of the smell of mouse urine was to completely remove anything wood that had been in the boat. Now that it was pure aluminum, I used a power washer, Mr. Clean, and Simple Green over, and over, and over, and over. Each week I would wash it, let it dry. Wash it, let it dry. It took one complete month for me to absolutely rid the boat of mouse smell. It did not help that they had made a nest in the foam in the bow, which is another story, but once I was able to cut out the nest, the smell was gone.
To start, my father had been fixing boats up since before I was born. He had an old wood boat when he was a teenager he rebuilt, then a couple others. Ironically he had a similar Mirrocraft like this just before I was born in the early 80s, but sold it for the 83 Blue Fin I remember. He gave me some tips as to what he did, and what I wanted to do, and guided me. Even some things I did were my own ideas, and surprised him.
I built a main beam right down the middle of the boat. It took hours of measurement to make sure it was level from front to back. Once that was done, I used 2x4's to build a frame from the deck. Then carpeted the deck and installed. It lays within aluminum channels. I used them while i built it to use a piece of 1' x 4' plywood to slide front to back to gauge where my supports had to be...very useful tip from my father!
This afternoon I just finished carpeting the deck, and decided to carpet the back deck as well. I'm moving the battery up front, so it made sense to clean up this back deck where the tanks will be. I know It will eventually get dirty, but it just cleans the whole look.
I thought of vinyl, as my dad's boats have vinyl, but his are worth much more (16' Lund Rebel XL tiller, 19' Starcraft Superfisherman), and this boat wasnt worth the extra cost.
I used photobucket, and its uploading as we speak. I'll see if it works in a few min...
I started off gutting the boat completely. For anyone inquiring, the only way I was able to get rid of the smell of mouse urine was to completely remove anything wood that had been in the boat. Now that it was pure aluminum, I used a power washer, Mr. Clean, and Simple Green over, and over, and over, and over. Each week I would wash it, let it dry. Wash it, let it dry. It took one complete month for me to absolutely rid the boat of mouse smell. It did not help that they had made a nest in the foam in the bow, which is another story, but once I was able to cut out the nest, the smell was gone.
To start, my father had been fixing boats up since before I was born. He had an old wood boat when he was a teenager he rebuilt, then a couple others. Ironically he had a similar Mirrocraft like this just before I was born in the early 80s, but sold it for the 83 Blue Fin I remember. He gave me some tips as to what he did, and what I wanted to do, and guided me. Even some things I did were my own ideas, and surprised him.
I built a main beam right down the middle of the boat. It took hours of measurement to make sure it was level from front to back. Once that was done, I used 2x4's to build a frame from the deck. Then carpeted the deck and installed. It lays within aluminum channels. I used them while i built it to use a piece of 1' x 4' plywood to slide front to back to gauge where my supports had to be...very useful tip from my father!
This afternoon I just finished carpeting the deck, and decided to carpet the back deck as well. I'm moving the battery up front, so it made sense to clean up this back deck where the tanks will be. I know It will eventually get dirty, but it just cleans the whole look.
I thought of vinyl, as my dad's boats have vinyl, but his are worth much more (16' Lund Rebel XL tiller, 19' Starcraft Superfisherman), and this boat wasnt worth the extra cost.
I used photobucket, and its uploading as we speak. I'll see if it works in a few min...
