Replacing Floor in My Fiberglass Boat.

[wishinferfishin]

The floor is bad In my Glastron Fiberglass Runabout. This is a good boat and is worth repairing. Any Idea's On who replaces boat floors? I'm in Northern Minnesota.

[Shack]

Sorry, I do not have any images of doing it, but what I did was remove any and all carpet, rotted flooring and any other wood (I.E. rod locker and storage sides) in the area. Cleaned out all debris and prepped surface. I left any good floor board that was left as a shelf to get a level floor and to have something to adhere the new sub floor to. I forget the grade board I used (This was about 9-10 years ago), but I remember it was at that time the large priced wood I had purchased. I had called around to some metro area boat repair shops and asked what grade treated plywood to use and went with what was repeated. It could have been 5/8", but I swear it was 3/4".

Once every thing was ready, I cut and formed the treated plywood to fit like a glove in the total open area of my flooring, even though I had only a 2'x3' removed area (open hole in the middle of the flooring after all soft wood was removed, to good solid wood), I replaced the entire area which took up a 4'x 8' sheet pretty much. The existing flooring was molded right in the fiber glass if I remember and again I just cut out the rotted stuff until I was to good solid flooring. The new floor just sat in top of the old flooring. Basically, I brought my floor up ¾ of in inch. Just remember to take it easy when removing the rotted wood/area, you never know what supports could be under that area. You want to save as much as possible of the orig. sub structure as you can. Also you do not want to cut thew the bottom of the boat!

Then I used a recommended sub flooring adhesive for the project at hand and applied an ample amount to the top of the cleaned and good flooring that was still in the boat. After this was done, I laid the cut and formed new sub floor right on top, then proceeded to screw, screw and screw the new flooring into the old (non rotted flooring). I used stainless or galvanized (again, what ever my research had come up with prior to the project). I think I over screwed, but it is held up great over the years.

I then proceed to seal area and apply carpet. I also replaced any and all bordering wood panels I had removed. I changed carpet colors and needed to it anyways.

After this, I have gone to great lencths to make sure the flooring is protected during storage and during use.

Good luck and take some images. Let us know how it goes.

Good luck!

[boatfixer]

Sounds like you should take it to Shack's place

[Shack]

Ha Ha Boatfixer

I got an image of the area I replaced, with some Mn river clay still in it :

Only about a 2'x3' area in the center was rotted, but the surface you see is new floor board, with the good stuff still under. It had held up great for 10 years now.

[Borch]

I just did the floor on my Aluminum boat with marine plywood. It turned on very nice. If you current floor is soft get it out as intact as you can for a pattern. I did give the plywood two coats of polyurithane(sp)to help seal it from moisture before using adhesive and carpet. Make sure you get stainless steel staples and screws/rivets as well as the standard ones don't last long especially if you go the treated route. It ended up being a three day project for my boat and it's good to have an extra pair of hands as well.

Good Luck!

[wishinferfishin]

Looks like something I'll try myself. Thanks for the help

[Steve Bakken]

Also, do a search on this forum for replacing floors. You'll find hours of reading that'll help you through it.