Chaparral 2000 SL Sport floor, and more?? [SPLASHED Sept 2017]

[kcassells]

Give it a night to rest I'm sure It'll mellow out. Looking good BC!

 

[Baylinerchuck]

Adding the heat with the heat gun worked. It was kind of weird though. Some areas thickened up fine, other areas needed heat. Strange.

Back at it tomorrow. Time to start tabbing stringers.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

Operation stringer tab commencing.

Started out by knocking down the nubs with a small grinding disc on my drill. Vacuumed all the grindings and gave everything a good wipe with MEK. I also prepped the area around the bowhook.

After two layers of 1708 and three quarts of resin the fore area ahead of the front bulkhead is done. My knees are killing me. I think this was the most difficult area to tab, so I'm glad it's done.

 

[Slager]

Looking good. Did you fill the strakes underneath the stringers? It looks like you were able to get the glass to conform to the shape of the strakes where it crossed. How difficult was that? Would you fill the strakes with pb if you were to do it again? I'm trying to decide if I'll fill my strakes when I get to that point. The manufacturer of my boat just left an air gap under the glass where it crossed the strakes, that filled with water or excess resin depending on the location.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

Looking good. Did you fill the strakes underneath the stringers? It looks like you were able to get the glass to conform to the shape of the strakes where it crossed. How difficult was that? Would you fill the strakes with pb if you were to do it again? I'm trying to decide if I'll fill my strakes when I get to that point. The manufacturer of my boat just left an air gap under the glass where it crossed the strakes, that filled with water or excess resin depending on the location.

Well, yes and no. The stringer is up off the hull, (strake), by 1/4" in most places, 3/8" in some places. I used disposable pastry bags to force thickened resin with 1/4" chop under the stringer. Like your boat mine had an air gap covered with heavy roving where the stringer came out of the strake and up the bow. I was concerned that if I didn't fill the strake I'd have a tough time glassing, more over it would be a weak, crappy job. I filled the strake with thickened resin and 1/4" chop. I couldn't see using all that resin so I used some UHMW strips as filler.

As a note, I like using the 1/4" chop strands in my PB for the additional integrity, and to prevent shrinking. I had some PB crack on me in a few places when it cured. I'm guessing maybe I had it on too thick. Never had that problem again when I added the chop. It's really not much harder to work with in my opinion.

I added some pics in case my explanation is muddy.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

Tonight's lovely weather had me glassing again. I wanted to get the CPVC pipe I put in the keel glassed in. The CPVC pipe was bedded in PL about a month ago. Tonight I added filets using thickened resin with 1/4" chop. Once that kicked I covered it in 1.5oz CSM then two layers of 1708. I'm really happy with how it turned out.

 

[mxcobra]

why did you put the pvc pipe high in the bow? when I did mine I went from the low spot in the boat to the bilge

 

[Baylinerchuck]

why did you put the pvc pipe high in the bow? when I did mine I went from the low spot in the boat to the bilge

The factory had glassed in 8" long pieces of wood that were milled to fit the profile of the keel angle the entire length of the bow. I decided I did not want to stray from that design thinking Chaparral engineers determined they needed extra support there. I didn't, however, want to use wood. I chose CPVC since it is more chemical resistant and flexible than PVC. The extra benefit of using pipe is that I can use it for drainage. If, for some reason my bow loop starts leaking a little and is not noticed, the pipe will carry the water through the first bulkhead toward the bilge. So the pipe serves two purposes. I will drill drainage holes in the pipe just forward of the first bulkhead to drain the anchor locker I'm putting in.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

All prepped and ready to go for some tabbing tomorrow.....

My 15yd roll of 1708 is about done. Looks like I'll be making a trip to pick up more 1708, resin and some white gelcoat. I also need to place an order for fuel tank parts, out drive parts, and urethane foam.

It's about to get expensive around here.

 

[mr300z87]

HI I just finished reading your thread, your work is awesome. The Chap is going to be better than new when done. I don't think I will be able to add much right now as my experience for fiber glassing is minimal but I love watching and learning for future project that might come up in my future. Permission to come aboard. Mike

 

[Baylinerchuck]

HI I just finished reading your thread, your work is awesome. The Chap is going to be better than new when done. I don't think I will be able to add much right now as my experience for fiber glassing is minimal but I love watching and learning for future project that might come up in my future. Permission to come aboard. Mike

Absolutely Mike. Thanks for reading, glad to have you aboard. Busy tabbing stringers today. More pictures later.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

Got a LOT of tabbing done today. Seemed like I was never going to get done. All I have left to do is the center of the bulkheads. My back called it quits. After about 10 hours of glassing it's time for a beer, or two.

 

[Shakedownscott]

Great job BC looking real nice. That was a marathon of glassing, you deserve a cold one. Adding all that tabbing should really stiffen it up for future work.

 

[tpenfield]

In terms of wetting out the tabbing, if you can't see the fiberglass cloth, then you are doing a good job. So, nice work :thumb:

 

[Baylinerchuck]

Thanks guys, it's going to be a marathon. This past week temps got the mid 70's. Made me realize spring may be closer than I think. Tabbing will be done today and I can move onto less mundane things. Still a lot of work ahead of me. Thanks for the encouragement.

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

Hit a milestone today. Stringers and bulkheads are 100% tabbed.

Next on the agenda is to trim out the keyhole and ensure its at least 2" thick. I need to order the studs and special carriage bolts for the gimbal housing as well as the seals to mount it to the transom. I need to get the gimbal housing mounted to the transom to ensure my motor mounts are perfect. I don't want to take any chances with this.

 

[Roady68]

Looks great!

 

[Baylinerchuck]

No Title

A little problem I discovered tonight. I cut out the fiberglass covering the keyhole on the new transom I put in. After two layers of 1708 I'm exactly 2" thick at the top to 1/3 of the way down. I'm 2" thick at the bottom of the keyhole. I'm perfectly flat on the inside. If I run a straight edge on the outside, I run 1/8" low at the middle bolt hole, both sides of the keyhole. Mercruiser only wants 1/16" so I'm 1/16" out of spec.

How should I fix this? My thought: since it really only needs to be perfect where the gimbal housing mounts, I could grind down the gelcoat and fare it up then gelcoat. I could make the Woodonglass faring compound for this as I'm getting the micro balloons. The only other thing I can think of is using body filler, but I'm not sure the water resistance.

 

[JASinIL2006]

A little problem I discovered tonight. I cut out the fiberglass covering the keyhole on the new transom I put in. After two layers of 1708 I'm exactly 2" thick at the top to 1/3 of the way down. I'm 2" thick at the bottom of the keyhole. I'm perfectly flat on the inside. If I run a straight edge on the outside, I run 1/8" low at the middle bolt hole, both sides of the keyhole. Mercruiser only wants 1/16" so I'm 1/16" out of spec.

Are you sure about that? When I did my transom, I thought I read their specs to say that outer surface had to be perfectly flat. I thought the 1/16" allowable variance was in the thickness, but the outer mounting surface had to be flat. I don't think I'd be happy with a 1/16" gap on the outer surface. Those gasket on the gimbal housing isn't that big and it's pretty soft. I would not want to count on one to seal much of a gap.

 

[tpenfield]

Do you think you bowed the transom when you installed the new core (wood) ? I too thought that the transom had to be flat, but the inside and outside surfaces within 1/16" of parallel and nowhere over 2" thick.