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Just purchased this '83 Outrage and would appreciate any feedback on both the causes of all this interior cracking as well as remedies (provided the cause isn't terminal). I'd like to redo the boat this winter, but am concerned about all these cracks. Thanks in advance for any advice! Here's a sample set of pictures on my personal page: Cracking Up

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Dave,

There is nothing you can do to stop this process at this point and the only way to fix it would be to sand, fill with bondo or marine tex, and respray with gelcoat or paint..

Or you could try and buy spectrum's gel coat repair paste, clean out the cracks, fill, and wet and the whole area and buff it out. However you might have to call the order in to order by the pallet.:D Honestly the first option is the way to go.

Have a look at what mike is doing on his guardian. This is pretty much what the right way to solve this issue is..
20' guardian

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Derwd24,

I believe the cause of the cracks in the starboard side of the Guardian were due to water intrusion and going through I don't know how many freeze/thaw cycles.

Sometime back I bought the fiberglass repair DVD available on http://www.fiberglass-repair.com/epair.com/. It covers many facets of fiberglass and gelcoat repair including these types of hairline cracks. It is pretty interesting and the fellow on the DVD is really affable and has apparently been in the business a while.

The basics are:
1. Grind the cracks through the gelcoat to the fiberglass.

** I used my Rotozip with a bullet shaped carbide Dremel bit to grind out the cracks

**** Once there look to see that the fiberglass in dark in color. If you see white, this likely indicates that the fiberglass itself is damaged. If it appears damaged the area will need fiberglass repair. Covering it now with gelcoat will only result in the cracks reappearing.

2. Rough up the edges around the ground out area with a coarse grit sand paper.
3. Clean the area repair thoroughly.
4. Fill the area with gelcoat. (it may take 2 or 3 applications)
5. Sand, rubbing compound, polish and wax.

There are other factors in the gelcoat preparation such as hardener, wax etc... but this is just a rough sketch of what will be required for each and every crack. Not the least of which is color matching - which is definitely not my strong suit.

Mike

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What are your goals? If your goal is to have a picture perfect, never been in the sun looking boat you have a steep uphill climb. If you goal is to have a useable boat that will serve you well for many years, you can get there.
Before you put the boat in the water, any holes below the water line need to be ground out, patched (marine-tex is my current favorite) and then you can cover with bottom paint. For the rest of the boat, I would get a RO polisher and rubbing compound, finesse it II and wax really well.
If I was looking at this project in my yard I would do the following.
1. The last two pictures are the worse. They need to be ground out patched with either West or Marine-Tex or standard fiberglass matt before she goes in the water.
2. Picture # 2 you can ignore. At some point, you probably want to replace the rubrail, looks like they got one in pieces.
3. In the bulkhead shot, what are those hoses? The one looks pretty cracked and probably needs replacement. Take a close look at the bulkhead crack, does it go all the way thru the gelcoat? If it does, you might want to put it on the patch list.
4.See if you can patch the crack along the transom. If it extends under the outboard you might have to pull the outboard off to do it right. If that's the case, I would patch what i could see and put a full repair on the list for later.
5. decide what you want to do about the internal tank. The more I see here, the more I am inclined to belive you just have a bad fill or vent hose, and at this point, probably really old gas in the tank. Also, if the gauge is bad, the previous owner may not have wanted to risk not knowing how much fuel he had, so make sure you replace that if you decide to use the tank.
6. Go boating for this year and makeup your winter list as you wait for the fish to bite on some sunny afternoon :)

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Thanks for the replies, all points well taken. Though Jeff, some places do give DEEP discounds for very large quantity orders...!

Basically just wanted to check and see if anyone thought the cracking, especially the thousands of little hairline cracks, was being caused by a much more serious underlying issue. I'm also wondering if further wetness would make things worse as it seems an open route into the top layers now with all the tiny perforations. Eg should I take some action before getting the boat wet? My goal isn't to have a never in the sun finish (though that would be most excellent Kamie!), but I'd like to be able to make it into a uniform surface if possible as the cracks really diminish the look.

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Kamie, meant to reply that those hoses go over to the VRO supply tank, and will most likely be replaced along with a lot of other things on the boat, including the fuel lines (though I still have to trace them to see how he connects to the tank in the console as there's a T connection with a valve on it down back but one hose is cut and missing, main tank maybe...) . I think it's pretty much been a use-as-is boat for the previous owner and is in need of new parts. I added another shot of the transom crack taken from the top and am pretty sure it does go through the gelcoat as you asked.

And Mike, I just took another look at your Guardian pic's. I'd initially thought that they were gouges in the starboard side of your boat, but they're all cracks? Wow. Were you able to see a lot of water there as the root cause? As far as gelcoat on my boat, investigation yesterday showed it's been painted at least once, maybe more both inside and out, so new gelcoat in crack spots would really show up the difference. Would it be advisable to do a gelcoat patch with a painted hull? I'm going to follow Delaware Dan's progress as he gelcoats his hull and see what's involved with that. But I really like your use of the Roti-zip tool with the spade bit to open up the cracks, I have the tool and will be getting a bit before I start. Was wondering, with either paint or gelcoat, how do you deal with preserving the original non-skid textured surface on the floor of the boat? Or is that not possible?

Does anyone have a take on wether power washing would be OK to do?

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If it's already painted over, don't use gelcoat in the cracks. You can use spot putty and paint. But why not wait until winter? Use some West System Epoxy resin with Colloidal Silica filler to patch those spray rails (grind them out good first) and dunk her! If you want to, you can also squeegie on some fiberglass cloth for extra strength there, if you think you need it. Just wet it out with the resin, and squeegie it on... no dry spots, which will show up white. You can work out the mechanical issues this summer, enjoying the boat, and strip her down this winter and do her up nice for the spring.

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Thanks very much for the reply Dan, I'm in the middle of sanding down the rails now, took a break for a few min's... The sanding has revealed multiple circular "radiating" cracks around the holes and on the bottom at the end of the spray rail, which is to be expected from freeze/thaw, so I think I will put some glass on there after I fill with thickened epoxy. Also drilled some test holes up the keel just off center and I didn't get any floods, but it is wet in there. Interestingly, it drips better when I insert a drill bit up and leave it in the hole, must be surface tension related?

That's pretty much my plan, to get it water tight on the bottom, give it a good cleaning, gussy up the mahogany, and put her in the water. I just wasn't sure if those hairline cracks, especially in the bow area, would make things worse if they got wet as some seem more deep looking than others and I would take some action now if that were the case.

Back at it...:D

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Put the glass on at the same time as the thickened epoxy... otherwise, you'll have to wash the amine blush off of the first, and sand. Good luck with it. Looking forward to your splash report... might be sooner than mine! :o

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Thanks Dan, I'll do just that with the glass. I posted some pictures of the spray rail holes all sanded down at the bottom of my Personal Page and would appreciate any feedback as this is the first repair of this type that I've attempted.

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Derwd: Can't tell from the photos, but I think you're doing well. I'd feather that cutout where it's cut. You want a ramp about 2-3 inches from the edge up to nothing. Then lay progressively larger patches on it until you're built up. It's also a good idea to undercut the foam about a half inch all around (not a half in deep... only maybe an eigth deep), and try to get a patch to adhere to the INSIDE of the repair as well. You can do this with an old hex key chucked in a drill... roughs up the inside of the fiberglass.

Wipe it all with acetone before laying up, and if you let it kick and need to add another layer, wash first with water and lightly sand.

You can lay 3 or 4 layers at a time, if you can shape it OK. You'll get the hang of it.

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Thanks Dan, appreciate the input very much. The rear hole is on the vertical side of the spray rail and is longer and pretty narrow. Was going to use an acid brush to wet out the inside best I can with unthickened epoxy, then fill with thickened to the edge using a syringe, then glass over. Seem OK?

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sounds good to me

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I've been away from the site a couple days - sorry for the delayed response.



Yes alot of hairline cracks. Luckily no apparent damage to the fiberglass. The boat sat in the garage for nearly the last year. I drilled a number of holes and didn't get much in the way of water coming out any of the holes although there were a couple of them that showed evidence of damp foam in the drilled out residue.



I'm with Dan on this. It sound like a reasonable way to go.



I'm not sure how you would go about it. I didn't see a picture of your deck, but if it isn't too bad couldn't you just give it a good compounding and waxing?

Keep in mind that this is my first attempt at anything like this. So I'm just "testing the waters" too.

Looks like Dan really know his stuff - good to have the insight.

Thanks guys,
Mike

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Thanks for the replies, I'm very grateful for all of your insights. I had an instructor in college who always used to say that any day you learned something new was a good day, and every day I log on to this site is a good day!

Mike, my deck is hairline cracked everywhere, but strangely there's no cracking at all on the textured non-skid surface? I guess I could buff it out... If I could get a good enough shine, the light reflecting off the gloss would hide the cracks!