Tying in Loose Ends

Installment 32 of Mako 19 restoration

Mako feels solid. She's got new stringers, new transom and several layers of new glass in the hull. Before we re-deck this old bird, we want to make sure everything below is shipshape.

Reinforce the chine

To transition that added stiffness from hull bottom to the sides, we reinforced the chine with fiberglass tape over the exposed sides.



We laid in 7-1/2" wide strips of quadraxial cloth the length of the hull from transom to bow.





This area will soon be inaccessible once the decks are re-installed.



This extra reinforcement spreads the stiffness to the sides and should quiet hull flex considerably.

Transom Wrap-up

We glassed one final skin inside the transom to prevent engine bolt creep and maximize stiffness. To recap, our new transom has two layers of 1708 laid on the inner face of the outside skin, two panels of 3/4" Penske core, equaling 1-1/2" total core thickness, then two more layers of the same 1708 biaxial cloth. One more final layer completes the laminate. We laid 24 oz cloth with Trevira backing cut for a generous wrap along sides and bottom.


The cut drapes over the top edge, and the bottom has a generous 8 plus inches overlay on the hull and stringers. This encapsulates those tie-in strips from the stringer installation.



We also wrapped the cut another foot along the sides for added beef.


All cured, it's a huge difference. Any hull deflection around the corners is nearly gone. Extra material on the corners compensates for the missing fish box corner structure left out. It also prevents the symptomatic stress cracks in the transom corners seen in most old boats.



The structural phase of the hull is complete. We're going to move our attention upwards to the gunwales and deck, once we've completed one last dressin-up. The sanding dust in these pictures is prep-work for our next phase- painting the bilge.