bedding the stringers
 

what should I use to bed my new stringers? 5200? subfloor adhesive? Thanks in advanced

Epoxy them in.

then what is this im hearing about hard spots in the floor if you dont put a buffer between the glass on the floorand the stringer? Ive read that you can split the hull if the hull is tweaked right. Im gonna glass them over after i bed them in. Im kinda new to this stuff so bare with me.

he might be talking about epoxy with some filler material in it?

http://www.fibreglast.com/product/Gl...res_22/Fillers

http://www.fibreglast.com/product/Th...ica_23/Fillers

my father in law used liquid nails construction adhesive outdoor formula for his stringers when he did them. He said it worked just fine.

You want to take epoxy resin and mix it with a filler to fill the gap. There are many different formulas but I use Epoxy and West System 406 for my glue and fillets. I use micro balloons and Aerosil for fairing.

The epoxy glue will be the thickness of peanut butter, spread it on the stringer and put them in place. Then use the epoxy to make a fillet along the side of the stringer.

There is a lot to learn but this will get you started.

http://www.epoxymethods.com/filleting.htm

Check out http://forums.bateau2.com/ for some more info on just about anything to do with boat repair.

very cool thanks for the help. I was gonna keep the existing"bed" with about 1 1/2 of the factory lay up there as a guide then use the 5200 to bed the stringer in the factory groove then glass over the whole stringer and tabbing into the floor about 6 inches. Is that a proper way to do it?

If you have it all the way down that far I would just start fresh. Grind off all of the old stuff and put down the new. It will probably be easier anyways.

Either way you don't want to use 5200 for a structural part. You may be thinking that the glass wrapped over the stringer will be enough but don't give it that much credit. 5200 has many great properties but shear strength is not one of them. You are gonna have to get familiar with epoxy glue, fillets and fairing anyways. Bite the bullet and get some epoxy supplies.

Curapa that bateau 2 link has some awesome info on there. Great link for someone getting started with this stuff. This is my first boat repair of this magnatude and Im just trying to do this the right way the first time. The previs owner just stacked a 1x4 on top of 1x6 and let her rip!!!!! LOL!!! so demo was very easy. Can i use the 1708 to glass in these stringers or do you recommend something else? Thanks for all your help

1708 would be great for that.

I was wondering the same thing when replaceing stringers ,,They allways say dont have any HARD SPOTS when replaceing them or your hull could blow apare while you are hitting the waves ,,,I could never understand what "they" meant by NO Hard Spots... Some things i read even says to leave a void between the hull and the bottom of the stringer while others have said lay down a heavey bead od 5200 construction adhes. ,,and i seen also where they dig out all the wood in the stringer and leave the fiberglass sides and fill the strings void up with the same stuff they use for the trasom ,, the hole stringer rebuild thing seems to be very very confuseing to me,,,, I Know we got some real fiberglass pros on here maybe we can come to a "THIS IS THE BEST WAY TO DO IT procedure" like what epoxy,,, what filler,, what mat,, etc ,,,,,With step by step instructions like fiberglass for dummies

I'm no fiberglass pro, heck I wouldn't even make a fiberglass rookie. But I do know that the stringers are the strength in a non cored hull boat. Without stringers the boat would just crack apart to pieces as soon as it was put under any sort of load. From what I know teh stringers should be firmly atatched to the hull bottom to retain max strength and rigidity. I know BERTRAM and some others played around with hollow tabbed stringers, but many have replaced these with cored stringers due to flex and cracking issues with the tabbed stringers.

i have another question for you guys while we are talking about resin thickeners and glueing. Im gonna be use a polyester resin on this project just to get that cleared up. The guy who gave me this boat runs a cabinet shop and rips and planes hardwood for a living. I was in his shop today and the fine saw dust in piles is ridiculous!!!!!!why cant I sift my own "wood flour" from his batches of hardwood fine saw dust? and what should i be paying a yard for 1708? how many layers of 1708 should i put on my floor "deck" ?

Do you think
 

Wellcraft used any special techniques? Or just cut some plywood patterns and throw a liberal amount of glass at it?

There are so many ways to skin this cat, everyone that does any glasswork has an opinion, myself included. Those sites are great Curapa.

Ridge im gonna be honest with ya there wasnt any glass work unnder this floor that impressed me at all!!!!! Huge pin holes in the glass to the stringers, looped glass over the secondary stringers that allowed water to penetrate and hold water since the first day it was splashed back in 1974!!!! anything i do to this boat from this point on is gonna be better than what the heck it was. not trying to knock wellcraft but in the 70's the glass work at factory was terrible unless my boat was built on a friday

I have no idea about wood flour, from the floor or store bought in the can. If it is dry,could be the same stuff. Try it on a test spot??:head: Then buy something you know will work. LOL. When you tally up the bill of materials and sweat you may think better of excursions into the unknown. Out of respect I will allow someone else to help/crush you with pricing.

Glad to see you made a choice on Resin. That topic gets ugly from time to time.. :clap: You could use chopped strand and cabosil for the wood free thickener solution.. What you have done so far is looking good. Keep it up. :beer:

thankyou for the compliments on the project thus far. As you can tell Im addicted to this web site and addicted to this build, I feel like with all my posts that people think im trying to take over this site!! lol!! I have looked and researched alot of other "boat building forums" and your right everybody has a different opinion on certain techniques to use when it comes to glass work.I am very opened minded and always appreciate all info and tips you guys give me on my project. I built a motorcycle last winter and have never even built a bike before i did it as a challenge just like this boat.

i dug up this thread from another website. they talk about bedding the stringers

http://forums.bateau2.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=25844

I understand leaving flex between stringer and floor deck...but he also says keep stringer OFF hull...WHAT??...:head:

Full floating stringers is another method of building Reel. Cut some wood spacers, place under your stringers and tab them into place with some cloth wet out about every foot or so. Let it kick, remove the wedges, touch sand and lay the glass to it. Anywhere the plywood stringer comes in contact with the hull is a potential hard spot. I don't like the void it leaves under the stringer but I would consider this route if the boat wasn't getting any foam flotation, just install the limber holes. I would also coat the stringers with resin just in case water finds its way into the void. Filleting is the same procedure and would need to be done after tabbing.
By bedding, you are putting a small flexible barrier under the plywood stringers. You can use small wood spacers here too to ensure no plywood is contacting the hull. I like it because it fills voids where the stringers aren't conforming to the hull 100%, and it holds the stringers firmly in place. The layer(s) of glass you put over the stringers overlaps onto the hull and distributes the load.
If the plywood stringer is flying in close formation with the hull but only touching the hull in one or two spot 2" long, after glassing it in place the plywood can actually be pressured up against the hull bottom due to shrinkage of the resin. Some small boats have obvious hard spots just looking at the wavy gelcoat but are perfectly safe for what they were intended to do. Hard spots tend to spider crack gelcoat before catastrophic failure and stand as the main reason I don't like bottom paint.(hiding agent)

Like what was said earlier about skinning a cat. You are not going to find that everyone agrees on what methods to use. Do some research and make the decision. I prefer the method of using Epoxy glue on the underside of the stringers so in a sense my stringers would be about 1/8" off of the hull also.

Wood flour from a cabinet shop would be fine as long as it is clean with no debris. Remember polyester resin kicks way faster than epoxy, you must thoroughly mix the resin before adding the filler. By the time the filler is mixed in, it's about at its setting time. It's nice to mix up some epoxy and have all the time you need to spread out one continuous fillet. You just may find that you will spend more on the polyester because of the amount you throw away. I would say at least use epoxy on the stringers, glue and fillets and switch over to polyester for the deck and such. I am not going to get into the epoxy vs. polyester adhesion argument as it has been beaten to death everywhere.

For the deck, I would just use some 20oz. cloth or so, no need for the 1708 there.

Agree with you Curapa. Not going into debating epoxy vs. PE VE. If PE or VE just know that the surface prep needs to be 100% as they lack the adhesion properties of epoxy. Rough the hull up with some 36 grit to aid in the mechanical bond. I purchased a 5 gallon kit of putty, and have seen others do the same with great success. Mixing the hardener in with the putty in small batches will give you some idea of your work time. Large batches take longer to mix and have a exothermic reaction that tends to harden faster so getting it spread out fast is the ticket. I know all too well about throwing out resin/putty that kicked in the bucket. Frustrating. All you can do is drop the pail and grab another.

Good exchange of info in this thread. I'd be interested to hear what Skools Out thinks about the stringer issue.

Looking good Kracker Jack, keep it up. :beer:

I second that Bradford. He tells it like it is. Where has he been anyway?

I just got a message from Skools yesterday. He has been keeping busy with other things and just hasn't had time to get on the computer.

I've been researching info on this very topic, and found a video produced by ShipShape TV. Although this video is about a specific product, the narrator mentions that wooden stringers should not be touching the hull directly (that part is towards the end of the video):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Muf7G3T7Z8

As RidgeRunner already mentioned, the bedding compound serves the purpose of keeping the stringers off the hull. I like the idea of putting small spacers (kinda like shims) between the stringer and hull before bedding it down. That would prevent you from accidentally pushing the stringer too far into the bedding compound. What kind of thickness would be appropriate? I'd guess 1/16", or would you want as much as 1/8"?

On a side note: The host from Ship Shape really gets on my nerves for some reason.

Factory stringers in my 74 are spot glued every foot or so. Read a thread on a forum lastnight that said a guy who has been building boats for 30 years has never heard of the floating or spot glueing stringers I thought that was kinda odd

I'm the same way...can't hardly stand to watch him cuz he's such a WEENIE...problem is that weenie knows a LOT about boats and his guests are TRUE EXPERTS in their fields...so I endure him to glean the info he offers up...his show is what lead me to a prop solution back in 2004 tryin' to match a honda motor to a V-20...called his company after seeing a Honda tech who told me which prop to use...NAILED it...:clap:

And this IS a great thread on stringers...thanks, Vic and others for the info!!...

http://boatbuildercentral.com/howto/repair.php

here's a good tutorial with pictures on bedding and tabbing and glassing.....but basically it goes, raise the stringer and bed it in and underneath with resin putty.....make nice wide transition fillets and tab it in with 2 or 3 layers of 6 inch wide 12 oz tape first, then cover the whole thing with 2 or 3 layers of 17oz biax

While we are on the subject of stringers anybody ever seen a stringer run right down the center of the hull ,,I have seen them midway up the hull but never right in the middle ...my buddy pulled his floor and thats the way it was layed out ..Seem odd to me just wondering if it was normal or if it was redone years before and it was added

Skinny Water flats boat has a center stringer. Improper trailer adjustment from day one, broke one of the outer stringers at the chine and cracked the hull on my best friends boat. Get the floor out and bingo, there it was. It did not go any further fore than the start of the front deck. Used to support the center of the floor. The stringers were wood and all were touching the hull. Lightweight design IMO, no ribs (bulkheads) and the outer stringers were very small. 2x3 pine maybe??

I have never seen a stringer placed in the very center of the hull dont know if its normal or not

yeah...its done....but mostly for cost purposes IMO......instead of putting multiple layers of glass and beefing up the keel, they made the keel the same thickness as the rest of the hull and used the middle stringer to help stiffen things up...it was cheaper than more layers of glass and resin.....but it does work in many an application

Ship shape tv is reruns of infomercials. Very rarely do I see a new episode, or learn about something other than why brand x, presented by paying advertiser, is better than all others. Like the avg do-it-yourself is looking for $5k nightvision?