Re: Am I the Only One?
The bottom of mine has no strakes at all, the bottom is sort of concave just below the spray rail. It almost forms a pocket along both sides if you can picture what I mean. It almost begins to form a bit like a trihull on the side but returns to a rounded bottom at the rear. All those creases and curves make for a very strong boat.
I also own a similar MFG Niagara, after dealing with the MFG, I was surprised at how much wood was in this boat. The only wood in the MFG is in the transom and a 3/4" panel behind the driver's side dash to support the helm.
This boat has little tabs, sections of plywood, and 2x2" boards running under the bow deck, there's a single stringer of 3/4" plywood running down the keel, and a wood cored transom. Luckily the floor is the only wood that's bad. The transom is solid, no rot and no water damage. Someone apparently reglassed over the bad floor, while it appears to have preserved the stringers, the glass layer is too thin to support weight well. The floor is uneven and it sags over the stringer down the middle. It's rock solid if you walk on the dead center but if you step next to the seat boxes it flexes.
I plan to pull the old floor out, make sure the stringer is good and put in a new floor.
The one thing that surprised me is that this boat has no foam flotation at all, none anywhere that I can see. There's none under the floor, (Unless there's foam under that small floor area ahead of the foot rest panel?), there's none in the gunwales, none under the bow deck plate.
I also don't see any signs of where it may have been glued in or cut out before. I'm thinking of adding flotation to the inside of the gunwales and under the bow plate. I can cut a chunk of foam to fit under the bow behind the dash, and pour in foam into the gunwales. I'm not a big fan of having it in the floor unless its needed for support.
