posted 02-23-2009 10:36 PM ET (US)            

Add Colloidal Silica and it will hang upside down no problem.

posted 02-24-2009 03:23 AM ET (US)            

Happened once, domino's are starting to fall.

Any chance you can wiggle a backing plate or a couple of SS fender washers in there and nylock a bolt?

posted 02-24-2009 08:36 AM ET (US)            

Through bolting was plan A, but isn't an option -- the area
on the back is curved.

posted 02-24-2009 01:13 PM ET (US)            

I kinda figured you covered Plan A.

A carpenter method is slip toothpicks covered with wood glue inside the egged out hole. In your case, you could use epoxy and pack in toothpicks until the hole is completely filled. Trim, drill new hole. Expect drips.

posted 02-24-2009 06:29 PM ET (US)            

Plan B will be to fill the hole with MarineTex, drill, and
put the original screw back in.

posted 02-24-2009 09:19 PM ET (US)            

This is going to be kinda hard to explain, but after drilling out and perhaps creating a void in the foam (I'm assuming there's foam there...), you make a, uh, "dam" with duct tape.

Stick the bottom of about a 4" piece of tape just below the hole. Bend the ends of the tape up slightly, buckling the tape and creating a slight "funnel" effect that you can slowly pour neet epoxy into the hole.

Only downside is that you'll end up with an odd shaped epoxy artifact that you can quickly grind down.

Clear as thickened epoxy?

posted 02-25-2009 03:01 PM ET (US)            

To avoid a mess, apply masking tape over the hole and the area around it then cut out the hole itself with a razor. This will allow you to shave the cured epoxy that is proud down to the level of the hull and then remove the masking tape for a clean finish.

MarineTex *is* epoxy and will be easier to use in this situation because it is in a putty form. Same advice about masking applies here too.

posted 02-25-2009 03:42 PM ET (US)            

I got it filled with MarineTex yesterday, tonight I'll
Spectrum the top bit, drill and mount tomorrow.

posted 02-25-2009 07:29 PM ET (US)            

What year is your hull?

I have two wood locating diagrams for 1990s Montauks. The one dated August 22, 1996 has three pieces in that area called out as:

3/8" PHENOL, PER PATTERN

The wood locating diagram dated August 5, 1994 has two backing pieces in that area called out as:

posted 02-01-2010 09:47 PM ET (US)            

I spent about 30 minutes this evening hogging out behind the
outside fiberglass. I'm about an inch and a half behind the
outside fiberglass and have made it to the inside
fiberglass, and it's been wood all the way. I have a '98
hull, so I'd be expecting WhaleBoard, but the hull started
life as a 17' Standard and got the console, rails, RPS, etc
off a wrecked '97 Montauk, so who knows what they did with
the Standard hull "wood".

The plan is to do a hockey puck of something (West?
MarineTex?) and screw into that. I want to get as far back
behind the fibreglass as I can so I can get a nice long
screw into it.

The bent nail works well in foam but is VERY slow going in
wood. I found that a dove tail router bit in my 1/4" die
grinder made short work of the wood, but I need to find one
with a really long shank. I got as as far back as it would
let me get, then switched to a 3/8 brad point drill.

Have a compressed air source to blow the wood chips out of
the hole.

I'm gonna stop at the hardware store tomorrow to see if I
can find a router bit that will let me clean up right behind
the outside fiberglass. I think that's a good place to have
really large contact between the hockey puck and the glass.

With 20-20 hindsight, Whaler should have attached this
higher up on the transom. Better support to the vertical
load.

Watch this space.

posted 02-01-2010 10:06 PM ET (US)            

All the professional boat repair people I know use West System. I have never had any faith in Marine Tex.

posted 02-02-2010 07:53 AM ET (US)            

There are several composites such as coosa board (http://www.coosacomposites.com/) that would be great for the puck, but since it's going to be encapsulated, marine plywood would work fine and it's a lot easier to find, and cheaper.

posted 02-02-2010 09:21 AM ET (US)            

One other thought, which may or may not be suitable given your diving habit. When I mounted my similar swim platform to my Montauk I unbolted and then reversed the positions of the upper and lower support brackets. This allowed an easy, flat through bolt situation for that all-important top brace. The lower brace then attached to a non-wood area on the transom but since it sees primarily compression type loads, I solved that by simply glueing (3M 4200) an appropriately shaped piece of teak there and mounting the brace to that. No additional holes this way below the water line and a very strong swim ladder indeed. I also prefer having the upper brace closer to the engine for several reasons; this may not be your preference of course.

posted 02-02-2010 08:02 PM ET (US)            

Current plan is that as soon as the Makita batteries finish
their recharge cycle, I'm going to hog out the last of the
wood and then fill the void with West 610 (See
http://continuouswave.com/ubb/Forum3/HTML/017781.html which seems like a really convenient
solution to filling the void (I hate mixing large quantities
of epoxy and then trying to get it into a caulk tube.).

Watch this space.

Chuck

posted 02-02-2010 09:00 PM ET (US)            

I was impressed with how well mixed the 610 came out. And
NO entrained air bubbles.

My only concern is whether it got all the way to the back
of the void. I think next time, I'll drill the sprue hole
to intercept the back of the void instead of the middle.

One final note: the mixing tips are not reusable, but West
Marine sells the separately. I carefully sealed up the
caulk gun tube (the original plugs seem reusable) and we'll
see. I used < 25% of the $20 tube.

Tomorrow: gel coat patch.

Watch this space.

posted 02-03-2010 09:19 PM ET (US)            

I'm really impressed with the 610. I filled the main hole
to within about 3/32" of the outside and slapped a piece of
packing tape over it. I figured the 610 would settle at least
a little. Nope, it's right where it was when I put the
packing tape on, and now nice and hard (I did put a spot lamp
on it for the last 24 hours, given it's about 45F at night
just now (sorry, those of you who are snowed in)).

Turns out I used about half of the caulk gun tube contents.
It's only about half full to start with (West says something
about that being a result of the metering mechanism.) That's
fine. At $20 for the tube, it was worth every penny for the
hassle avoidance.

Just did the Spectrum patch paste on this problem and a bunch
of routine chips. I'll probably sand tomorrow and install
the new swim step screw (2" instead of 1.5") on Friday. The
boat came with a self-tapping screw. I'm debating whether
to do that again, or drill and tap and use a machine screw.

And go diving Saturday, conditions permitting.