Cockpit Floor Replacement

[ThousandIslander]

Hi Everyone! Last summer we bought a 2007 Angler 22 out of an estate. The floor of the cockpit had some cracks and as we used the boat it became clear that we had some soft spots in the floor. I thought I would just share a few things we found as we rebuilt the floor this winter in case others take on similar projects.
1. The entire floor was balsa core.
2. There was no plywood or stringers of any sort (just balsa).
3. The moisture was able to spread over a large percentage of the floor.
4. We ended up replacing the entire floor from just behind the lip near the tanks to a few inches into the cabin.
5. We did find some delamination below the balsa on the inside of the hull which we ground out and repaired.
6. We built a much stronger floor with stringers, marine ply, structural foam and many layers of fiberglass.
7. We used a total of 14 gals of West System! We went way beyond what was needed...This floor should outlast the boat by a 100 years.

I should note: by "we" I mean my fiberglass guy...he did all the work, I just supervised and carefully laid $100 bills between each layer of epoxy!

[MikeR]

Nice write-up. Ouch, that adds up quick doesn't it? Replaced about 4' of floor in my 16, and had to keep going back to buy more epoxy (I used MAS, slightly less $ than West, but not by much) and all the other stuff that goes into it. Spent way more (and way longer) than expected but the peace of mind knowing you have a solid new floor is worth it, isn't it?

I saw the "before" pics in your album (and wondered what caused those cracks!), hope we get to see some of the project photos as well. Nice work!

-Mike