ya, I don't like the wood screwed into the deck there. trouble.

Yes I believe this may where my soft spot came from. They are the only holes anywhere near the spot. I definitely plan on remedying this as soon as possible.

Picked up a soda blaster today and 100lbs of media to start. Now I'm just trying to get my hands on a compressor to handle it. Says minimum air requirement is 8.5 CFM @ 90psi and mine only puts out 5. I'm sure it would "work" but would probably not work nearly as efficient.

heheh, now you're going down the hole of saving money

Worked 30 hrs Friday and Saturday so figured I'd better make some family time today. But I did get out there today and pulled the Merc rigging from the Green boat and got them mocked up in the cuddy.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4iyvmw4d.jpg

Unfortunately where the controls were mounted was too narrow for my controls. I had to move them forward and I'm planning on just capping off the old hole with some star board. They still just barely fit but barely is good enough. Only con is I'll lose my cup holder at 1/2-full throttle.

http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...pscjnmmcsi.jpg

A lot easier to mount the controls on starboard on top the existing hole and trim it out to look pretty good than move them forward in my opinion.

They really won't fit there. That ledge actually gets narrower though it's hard to tell in the pics.

Update time.

Got to work on the boat some today. Decided to pull the tank hatch and see what was going on down there. Here's what I found.
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6tmscitn.jpg

It's a 50 gallon poly tank. Obviously the owner got it from a buddy, closeout sale or something to make it worth relocating the filler neck. The first thing I seen was alarming. There was water nearly to the top of the stringers all around and in the middle holes of the tank. It appears they put some foam under the tank for support during install I guess and it actually blocked all the drainage. This could of been disasterous. I couldn't see the bulkhead from the back because of the battery tray but I was able to feel around under it with a metal rod. I felt something spongy like foam and figured hell with it and rammed her in there. Pulled it out and sure enough the dam broke. It drained water continuously for a good 45 minutes.

The tank hatch has been recored which is nice I guess. Seems to be done well. I went ahead and ran a new ethanol friendly fuel line even though I don't plan on using ethanol at all.

But in more exciting news the motor is hung!!
http://i1186.photobucket.com/albums/...psyjtd5e96.jpg

I got the controls all hooked up, fuel system plumbed and just need to hook up the wiring at the helm. Also I need to drain the fuel out as it's raw gas and I need to premix. Was told it has roughly 20 gallons of non ethanol that was put in it 9/16 so if it don't smell too bad I'll just throw it in the pickup. I'm hoping to have it out next Sunday as it's suppose to be a beautiful day.

May pick up a gallon of epoxy resin and try injecting the deck this week. I pulled the pieces of wood he had holding the "cooler seat" in place and to my surprise the screws were in dry wood. I thought for sure that's were my soft deck came from but it doesn't appear so. It's weird because other than that there is nothing attached through the deck anywhere near the bad spot. Puzzling.

Anyways I'm glad I got this thing going in the right direction and hopefully I'll have some underway pics/vids this weekend coming up.

When I redid the underside of my deck because of several soft spots there were no holes in the deck at all. The problem was that the PO never vented the bilge, even during the winter, so any water (and there was a lot of it) that evaporated was just trapped underneath . Eventually the condensation caused the wood on the underside of the deck to just rot out. You might be having a touch of the same situation.

The tank compartment is not a bilge area,. It is meant to be a dry compartment.
The hatch must be sealed with silicone(not 5200 because you should inspect it annually).
Tanks were foamed in place. There is a pvc pipe running under the tank to allow water from forward bilge to stern.
You say you unclogged a hole and it was a gusher. Sounds like the pvc pipe was clogged. Water came from forward.
That pipe clogs alot on old boats. You should probably cut an access hatch in the fish box to get at the forward end of the pipe and remove the piles of junk that are blocking it.
Then put a hose in there and blow out the pipe.

Did you see water drain from tank compartment? if so, there has been some modification.... or you poked a hole in the bulkhead...

Be aware that since your filler is to the stern, you probably will not get a full tank before the vent spits.


It would be a good idea to remove your gunnel rod boxes and reach down in there and clear the holes between the cross frames too. You need long arms....