how can I know if a Skater 32 is a vinylester or Epoxy lay-up, so as to decide whether the tanks need to be redone or not?

call skater with the HIN.

Polyester resin is the most common resin in boat building. Gasohol eats the tanks. A quick way to know is pull the water seperators filters and look at the top of the filter for gooey material. I had a Motion that was so bad it killed an engine when the filter klogged up. Epoxy has issues also. Vinylester is the good stuff for gas tanks with alcohol. Do a Goggle search on those resins.

Like Steph said call Peter H @ Skater he knows his boats ,and you probably dont want to hear it but it will need to be going back to Douglas






Dreyden Performance Marine

Can someone educate me as to why they are not using aluminum tanks? Is it that much of a weight savings to accept the potential grief.

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on which part of the hull is the HIN found?

I would say mainly for weight. A 3/16" aluminum tank with foam weighs about 1 lb per gallon of capacity. Many of these boats (i/o's) were not cg approved with these tanks. The reason for not using a bladder (also usually not cg approved) would be cost as the added weight is very small and if the bladder failed the fuel would be in what they are calling a fuel tank anyway. I am surprised they never used the bladder foam in these cells as it burns like a candle rather then the big blowup.

This was an easy area to save a little money and have a 200lb or more edge on the competition.
Steve

Allum. tanks fail also...