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Saturday July 15th, 2017:

I forgot to throw a tarp over her last time i was up, and we did get some rain later in the week. No big deal, everything was already rotten anyways.

Today was just about ripping out the floor and exposing the core underneath.
Core? What core? All I found was soil. Mush. And water.




























I think at some point in time a mouse had made a nest. This was under the floor forward of the dash. Who knows what else I'll find.













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A video for your enjoyment....



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Move along folks, there's no stringers to see here. Just a glass keelbox.







Since I'm being the good cousin and packing out my garbage for home, there wasn't much left to do in the boat. I already filled 7 boxes weighing almost 200 pounds total with pieces of floor, foam, glass, and what used to be the core.
I figure i'll still have many more boxes to fill.

Since I'll be splitting the hull, I started working on the rubrail removal.
I should have done this while she was still upside down. The rivets have the knobby end exposed on the underside, which makes getting a drill bit to bite almost impossible. I had to flatten them with my Dremel, and doing this while laying on my back was awkward to say the least.









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Next visit: Removing the rest of the rubrail, then removing the deck. We'll see what else I'll get done after that.

AdamDK wrote: ↑Jul 16, 2017 9:34 am

Looks awesome! Looks like you're gonna have it pretty easy with how rotten that thing is.

What part of the boat is that? Looks like gel I see there.

That's the deck in front of where the windshield would be. You can see where the windshield/bottom rail rivet holes are on the top left side of the picture.

[ Post made via Android ]

There is core in the deck!?!? I personally haven't seen that. I have seen people add it when redoing the boat for added strength so you wont fall through if you walk on it or something. My Vulture and Vector dont have that. Just thick deck. Crazy.

Oh, no. That's just a piece of the glass laminate over the core that I put on top of the deck for a close-up picture.

The only wood in the deck I've seen is a strip of wood, probably plywood about 6-8 inches wide the runs down the centre.

I may use leftover balsa from my future core job to strengthen the underside of the deck.

[ Post made via Android ]

Got ya. Dont mind me... My eyes were playing tricks on me. I had to go back and really look at it.

Saturday July 22, 2017:

With the hull right side up, I spent some time re-aligning the 2x4 supports under the hull. For some reason, the Viper's hull didn't sit perfectly on them even though i built the cradle while it was upside down to conform to the hull/strakes.

I continued today in the awkward position of laying on my back and/or crouching with my Dremel to grind down the knobby rivets on the underside of the rubrail.

Word of advice to anyone who chooses to do a rubrail removal in the future: do it with the hull upside down!

After a few hours, I had all the rivets ground down and drilled out, and the rubrail removed.











Even though now I was simply sawzalling the seam, I knew it would create dust and particulates. Time to don the respirator.



This took waaaay longer than expected. I went through 2 bi-metal cutting blades (18 tpi) and was on my third by the time I finished. It There were some sections along the seam that had a very healthy dose of hardened resin...



...and then it seemed to be hard resin all the way around the bow.


Cutting through it all was an arm and hand numbing ordeal.
But I got er done.









However, I am still not done.
Now I have to get in her and cut the inside seam along the underside of the splashwell before I can lift off the deck.

Until next time.....

Thats going to make the tear out, clean up, and the installation of all the important parts so much easier. Looks awesome.

Hippie459MN wrote: ↑Jul 23, 2017 6:29 pm Thats going to make the tear out, clean up, and the installation of all the important parts so much easier. Looks awesome.

That's why I did it. I don't want to spend hours cramped up under the deck grinding out everything and laying glass and all that and getting covered in dust. Plus I want to build an airbox up there with extra wood and possibly fashion some sort of battery tray/hold-down. Since the Viper is smaller, I don't want to have all the heavy stuff at the back. A full gas tank will be heavy enough...I don't want to add a 60lb battery back there too.

The deck needs major work - replacing the dash, filling in all the holes near the splashwell, etc. Much easier to work on when it's separated.

Saturday October 28th, 2017:

Okay, its been a while. A lot has happened. Firstly, the weather all summer was crap. It rained practically every weekend, so I haven't touched the Viper since my last update. My wife's grandfather passed away in August so we moved into his house. I now have a garage. Which means I can work on her daily, or when my wife lets me. So expect a lot more updates a lot more frequently.