regalman4925

so i just picked up my baja 250 sport on saturday, the thing sat out for 3 years with no engine, interior or cover. we thought the transom and stringers were solid when we looked at it, wrong! the trnasom has a few moist spots but i think it is salvagable still, i pulled aexhuast tip out and it was damp but not rotted so i am thinking i will pull the fiberglass off where it is soft and let it dryout then recoat it with fiberglass. my question is on the stringer, they are shot and they look like they are only the length of the engine compartment and then tie into a piece that goes across from side to side and then there is a wider set of stringers that surround the massive 100 gallon tank. the stringers next to the tank have some soft spots but i have not gotten the tank out yet to find out how bad. now the stringers on the back, do i cut the tops off and hollow them out and fill with that sea cast stuff or replace them with wood then fiberglass over and i am good at that point?? and the ones on the sides of the tank can i dig out the rotted stuff and cut a angle into the wood and replace the rotted wood with new wood and fiberglass over that?? this is not how i wanted this project to start but i guess i have to now!

c_deezy

iTrader: (1)

I just started tearing my 88 240 Sport apart and found similar results. I've known my transom has been bad since shortly after I bought it just haven't had a place to tear it down until this year. I know the 250 and the 240 aren't identical, but I'm sure the construction is probably somewhat similar. See this thread to see stringer layout.

http://www.offshoreonly.com/forums/b...so-begins.html

I doubt you'll be able to top the stringers and fill them in, I know on my boat all my stringers had was one layer of glass on them, at least the ones along the fuel tank. I've haven't cut out the engine room ones yet, plan to cut the transom out next weekend and I'll know then.

jump_26transport

I have one of these boats and the stringers are designed to narrow and actually weak in the engine area.
We upgraded the stringers by actually cutting out the old engine ones and replaced with 4x4 treated then fiberglass.

The entire engine bay was sprayed with white epoxy gel paint that turned out very well.
If the transom on your boat is questionable I would go ahead and do it now. Stringers and transom your looking at $2000.00 by a good shop.
Depending on the horsepower you are running.This type boat can be very fast.

Depending on what type headers you are using these boats are very easy to get water on top on the stringer or when you wash the engine area out you cant drain it .Water stands on top of the stringer.
I suggest you add a small pipe at the back of the new stringers to allow water to reach the bilge. You can seal it off with resin around it to prevent the wood from getting wet.

Let me know if you would need any help once you get started, i can talk you through it.
But i recommend you let a fiberglass shop do it and let it bake.
What size engine are you going to use?

Jump__26 Transportation Services

regalman4925

the info on the 240 was a great help! i am running a 99 454 that use to be a mpi motor but is getting converted to carb with cam and gil exhaust, nothing major at all. right now i jsut want to have the boat ready for the season so the transom is going to have to wait til next spring. the stringers in the rear are for sure rotted but the are only like 4 foot long and then hit a support that goes across the boat, it seems solid so far, and i think a small portion of the stringers next to the fuel tank are rotted, can i get by with cutting out only the rotted wood and splice the new stuff in? i would pull the whole floor out but it is the fiberglassed and gel coated floor and i do not think it comes out so i am going to attempt this with the floor still in place and i think that is very doable from what i can see so far. when we first looked at the boat it all seemed solid, i think it was because it was cold and maybe frozen water made it all seem solid?? anyways, i am going to do it as best as i can and maybe next year if it doesnt come out well i will have the pros do it for me?? on the engine stringers should i re-enforce the stringers with some wood going horizotal maybe? the motor will be in tomorrow but we are getting a snow storm also so i wont be able to work on it for a little while yet. i will keep you guys posted. if anyone has suggestions please post them! oh yea, is normal fiberglass like the wal mart stuff ok to use? i have used it to repair jet ski hulls before with great luck! thanks, guys!

c_deezy

iTrader: (1)

I found out mine had issues shortly after I bought it in Aug of 2006. I talked to a few people that year, looked things over pretty good and let it go all of 2007 and all of 2008 seasons. In my case the area around my gimble was solid and my engine stingers were solid so I just kept an eye on things and I probably could have ran it another 2 years or so with minimal issues.

If you don't want to completely rip everything out and re-do, I would probably just leave well enough alone for the time being. Seal up what you can so it doesn't get any worse. If you decide the boat is worth ripping apart and rebuilding, then find a place next year to do it.

Also depends on where you boat and how hard you run the boat. I boat out on Erie and go out in the big stuff, even as crappy as my boat was it still handled things pretty good, it should be totally different this year when everything is solid. BUT everytime I went out that wet transom was in the back of my mind and i usually didn't venture too far away that I couldn't see shore and kept lifejackets at quick grab .

If you are just patching things, rock out with the cheap resin. When you are ready to completely rebuild it, this is a good place for supplies:

www.uscomposites.com
www.infinityfrp.com - mainly glass but the dude is a good guy. Prices are pretty reasonable if you buy full rolls.

Fixxxer22

i have a 1993 outlaw 24 and the stringer on the port side has kind of let the motor mount sink in about 1/4 of and inch... ive had the drive and gimbal housing off of it. ive also had the exhaust tips off and seen into the transom. all looked dry. it sits on a trialer mostly. should i be worried? these all seem like horror stories to me. i was just gonna cover the base of where the motor mounts hooked up with metal on both sides. with something thin. i was planing on fixing that top section of the stringer though. does all this happen to boats that sit in water for long periods. the longest my boat sat in the water last season was 3 days. other than that its out for 8 hours... then back on the trailer. also they painted the lower engine compartment white. but as you go up it fades to a crappy almost pink looking color. almost like its not painted at all. what can i paint all that stuff with at my own home? i want it white like all the newer boats

c_deezy

iTrader: (1)

Older boats were just built crappy. You can go in any manufacturer's sub-forum and see water/rot issues on 80's/early 90's boats, just the way it is. You'll hear more about Baja's but they sold more boats - moot point.

Fixxxer - Your boat is identical to mine. Your engine stringers are only what you see in the bilge area, a couple feet from transom to bulkhead. Pulling the motor is not that big of a job, I've never done it before and I had mine un-rigged and out in about an hour. Then just cut out your stringers, and put in some new ones, I would do it one at a time. If that's all you have to replace you could probably have it done and put back together in a weekend. Most likely you fell victim to the unsealed drain holes, do you have a lot of water in the bilge normally? Leaving the boat in the water a couple days at a time is no problem at all.

Ironically on my boat those were the only stringers that weren't wet

Fixxxer22

yeah i got the engine out right now. i used my ceiling crane in my bay here at work. i think it tool longer boxing up and marking all the nuts and bolts. whats an at home way to make my bilge look better

regalman4925

i am way confused, everyone has said to use 3/4" plywood doubeled up for my stringers, i tore out the stringers on the one side of tmy boat and they are made from 2x6s in rear and 2x8s in the center?? the support from one side to the other is also rotted so i am trying to figure out how to get access to that so i can replace it. i am really trying to avoid removing the gel coated floors but i will if i absolutly have to. i am going to patch the stringers in with the floor still intact if i can which seems very likely. why would my baot use 2x_ s raher then plywood?? i am thinking that i am going to use just regular grade wood and just make sure it is all coated well, i have been told by many people not to use marine grade wood because it can shrink and expand? either way i cant see normal wood getting moist any more then marine grade wood especially after seeing how rotted the original stuff was. what kind of resin and glass mat should i use?

c_deezy

iTrader: (1)

The idea of using doubled up plywood instead of 2x's is that the 2x's will tend to curl with the grain of the wood, whereas plywood won't have that tendency since it has no 'grain'. The older Baja's all used 2x's, I've noticed in mine that the 2x12's that run by the gas tank have curled with the woods grain. You can use some good, dry, doug fir if want, look at it this way the existing stuff lasted at least 20 years anyhow, right?

Me, I'm going to use doubled up plywood for my new stringers.

For resin and glass its up to you and your budget. I'm using mostly 1708 biax and vinyl ester resin, the vinyl is stronger than poly but cheaper than expoxy.