23' Fish Nautique Restoration Project

Foam War is over...
Today I got the rest of the foam up and some what cleaned out. There is still a few areas in the corners that I have to dig up. I also have to peel the foam off the side walls. I even had some time to cut a few of the front bulk heads. Almost made a big bobo when I was cutting the port front area, thought I was cutting the wall but I was cutting the bottom hull..... Thank god I realized and stoped. Well have to work bell to bell for the next few days so no work is gonna get done until Thursday..







Here is the link to my photo bucket gallery. I am posting all the photos here. There are more photos in the gallery then I am posting.

http://s576.photobucket.com/albums/ss210/jzarski/23%20Fish%20Nautique/

I forgot to post these here. I put them up on m blog, just forgot to do it here.

Well today with the help of a great friend Rob, Who must have lost 50lbs in sweat today, we got alot of the foam up. The bow section is done the bottom is done and we only have about 3 feet remaining on the starboard side.

Welcome to the site, here is a little inspiration.






Good luck, post lots of pictures.

jzarski wrote: So what do you suggest for supporting it in order to keep the shape? Can I doing one stringers at a time or will that cause more problems?

John,
You need to start reading some of the very good threads on stringer replacement! But, here's a recent thread on home made boat stands

Ignore the metal ones. They are just stabilizing the trailer. It was a misunderstanding.

BTW, I'm serious about you taking a look at the stringer threads. We don't want you to go off in a bad direction.

Jzarski, I got your email but cant reply- you didnt include your email address in your message and you have it set to "private" in your profile. Just FYI!

Regarding the "oilcanning", Im referring to the deformation of the hull when pressure is applied to it. Kind of like the bottom of an older oil can.



When we had our BFN stripped down to the bare hull, it would flex quite a bit under the weight of one person. Actually, when sitting on the trailer, it would flex under its own weight- to the point where we decided to support it better to keep the shape in tact as we rebuilt it. The ribs go a long ways towards keeping the v-hull in the proper shape, and the hull-foam-floor sandwich everywhere else keeps everything stiff and prevents deformation. Just make sure you dont decrease the rigidity of the structure with your new additions under the floor.

Like I mentioned earlier, you may want to take a look at a few of the Barefoot Nautique rebuilds, as it appears the structure is pretty similar to the Fish. "The Grinch", "Hasbeenskier", "BuffaloBFN" and myself have all documented rebuilds of these boats- lots of pictures to look at.

SNobsessed wrote: JZ - If you need that kind of range, maybe you want to consider diesel power. Not a popular option with ski boats but you have a whole different need.

You know, I did look into that. One major problem, the cost is outrageous. You can find like a 5.9 cummins for 2000 but after you make it marine ready your in the 6000 range. Good friend has a Dusky that he put a diesel in and he loves it but he did complain about the cost. I think with 100 gals of fuel I will be able to do what I want. The real range issue is I want to be able to goto the Bahama's and fish for a weekend and know if the tank is full when I leave I will make it Other then that all my fishing is inside 30 miles of the coast.

Dads '85 Shamrock was a 20 foot conwalk with a PCM 302 and 2 25 gallon tanks. Best cruising speed got 4 miles to the gallon.Both tanks fed into one Fram filter/water seperator with valves at the filter to select tank.The tanks on his '77 were just held in place with foam and the floor screwed down over them.The fill pipes are in the area of where your rod holders are in the gunnel with fiberglass covers over the fill and vent hoses,which I can get pic's of if you need.

jzarski wrote: The Tanks are being made out of Alum. I will build bulk heads forward and aft of the tank and fill the remaing empty area with foam. Most of the structure that I am removing is going back in, just in the way of composite instead of wood. Main stringer will be the exact same location and size. The secondary stringer is being lowered for Gas tank fitting reasons. It will be made out of carbon skinned composite.

Glad to hear that you have given this some thought. I found that our v-hulled Barefoot Nautique oilcanned fairly significantly once the glass from the old stringers had been removed. We did not refoam, so we spaced our new structure much more closely (~12" between ribs instead of ~30") in order to keep the structure solid. I think the foam played a major role in keeping the hull shape in tact.

Be careful with the material you use to make the tanks. I have heard some problems with ethanol and fiberglass tanks.


Tim

when having two tanks..are they conected or run parallel? or they work as 2 diferent units..with 2 filler etc? how do you work the weight distribution?

Ok I reworked the floor plan.. Sat in the boat and measured a few things out. I think that saddle tanks can be done without having them the lenght of the boat. Any input is great.

floridainboards at msn dot com

You can always trim tab a bow down but you can't trim tab a bow up with weight forward!!
Fish Nautiques are really bow light anyway and a lot of them I have run across have tabs on them. I have a set to put on mine along with Hynautic steering.

When you were over at the composite place, did you by chance talk to them about incorporating fuel tanks into the composite lay up? I know many boats used glass tanks before the advent of ethanol but resins have come a long way since then. Internal baffling inside saddle tanks could take the place of secondary stringers as well as port to starboard ribs.

You can always trim tab a bow down but you can't trim tab a bow up with weight forward!!

I don't think trim tabs would help. You can trim a bow down with trim tabs but not up generally speaking. I am afraid the tank is going to need to be in the back somewhere similar to where it was.