Ok guys to start off I’m not here for you to do the work and I’m gonna sit back and do no research. I am and I will. With that being said

i have a 1995 wellcraft nova 23’
who ever did the thru hull exhaust and any additives to the hull didn’t do it correctly years ago and now I found some spots on transom is soft on inside. it’s not 100% rotted out just some upper spots. So wile fall is coming up I’m going to attack this before I destroy the boat.

I’ve done lot of reading over the years, and looking into how this job is done just for my own knowledge. I’m here reaching out for some questions I’m not 100% sure about, also products to use and things along those lines. This might help out people out with questions just like I have.

I’m cutting out the inside gutting it up to the outside fiberglass and replacing the wood then the inside fiberglass. Questions are!

1.what kinda wood? Regular plywood? Or do I use pressure treated(I would assume no because I’ll be fiberglassing it and sealing it so don’t want the moisture) or do I use something different

2. how thick of plywood do you guys go with? I’m not 100% the thickness of my transome at this moment. It looked pretty thick about 2” maybe. So would you go with like 1/2( first i would say to give it structure along fiberglass) 3/4 3/4 to get to 2” or would you go with thinner?

3. would you guys once the wood is cut to size would you resin the entire thing and put fibglsss sheet on it on both sides wile on saw horse before installing inside the boat, on each layer? Or just install each sheet till thickness is made then seal that?

4. when installing each sheet do you guys recommend an expoy to seal the sheet to outside shell then expoy each sheet together? Or would you use fiberglass? Or some sort of glue to keep together till final thickness then fiberglass? Is expoy is used what kind would you go with?

5. I’m going to be cutting the top of stringers apart to inspect them, not saying they won’t be anything wrong. I don’t think they are bad. The back is because they added the exhaust and didn’t seal it correctly. If the stringers are bad would wood do you guys use? Stack 2x whatever to make the size and seal it or?

another question kinda same topic , my floor inside has carpet I hate. I was thinking since I’m doing this job I was going to get rid of the carpet and thinking about putting gel coat on floor. Would you add texture to it? If so how would you go about it. I’ve never had to do gel coat before. I have dogs so don’t want carpet and the foam get so dirty, and I can’t find it big enough to do one piece. I will be doing more research about this. Just kinda want some input.


**also for anyone reading this. My plan to do this job is when installing the wood layers, I will be using screws from outside of boat going in to suck the wood to the hull. I’ll be using existing holes like trim tabs screw holes, tow hook holes, exhaust cut out holes. Once transome wood is installed and cured my next step would be to drill out all my holes( exhaust, gimble housing, tow hooks, trim tabs) then I was going to fill the drilled holes with expoy to cure. Once they are cured I’ll Drill through them so holes aren’t just exposed wood. Even tho I’ll be using sealant on outside. I don’t want this to ever happen again.

so again I’ve done reading and looked into this job. This form is really for some fine tuning. I don’t want this job to be I shoulda deal. I want the best. Everyone has done jobs and found the hard way after spending lot of time and money and coulda did it better. Most of you guys know the internet is good place for info but also bad place to get false info.

thank you guys.

A lot of people get hung up on the wood..... Just make certain you laminate it properly and that it can never get wet and the wood doesn't matter.... If it is going to get wet.. then the wood still doesn't matter. Yes you can use a premium construction adhesive to glue the 2 boards together.

plywood will be fine 2 layers of 3/4 and 1 layer of 1/2 will get you there. Try to find a good lumber yard and get some okoume or similar and just stack them in sandwitched with CSM. try and spread out the load when you clamp in the transom (threaded rod across some 2 x bys) if you cant find any marine wood some good ACX ply from home depot will do. Everyone loves the foam core stuff but usually double the price -not always in the budget. Tab in the final layer of pyl with 1708 twice with good overlap and then 2 more layers over entire transom. Then for stringer you can use the cutoffs from the same plywood and lap-joint them together with csm in-between and 1708 oner top and down through the corners.

I did plan on spreading the load out along each layer when clamping. Not sure if I mentioned it. But that’s good point you brought it up. My transom is flat, has no curve to it. If it does it’s very faint. But I didn’t make this post for just my personal use. It’s for other to read and maybe help fine tune there projects. When I do this I will post some pics in here. Thanks for your input.

Read these threads by Heath Blair. He completly redid a 30' Scarab and a 38' Scarab and he has lots of pictures. Also reach out to Glass Dave. Dave is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to restoring old off shore boats. The threads may give you some insite on how Wellcraft did things.


Back from the Dead; '81 Scarab 38 Resto

79 Scarab 300 resto

Thanks for the reply’s guys. Work has had me super busy. And every chance I get I’ve been working on the boat. So here is what I got.
moror is out, back wall is stripped and the stringers. The stringers were wet as hell and one spot was soft but weren’t to bad. The transome right side was a mess. I put screw driver into it and it all fell apart. The left side was solid. I think who ever is she exhaust, and the transducer didn’t seal it correctly. Anyway rant over

this is my next plan on action.
-some of the back fiber glass has little bit of waves to it from the wire wheel cup brush I used to get all the wood off. It’s not bad but has some spots. So I’m thinking of when I install the wood I was going to use the expoy for the fiberglass along the back wall instead of glue. So when pushed together it will all flatten out as one filling the voids?

-first I gotta make templet and cut the wood. My trans went in my truck so that’s been bigger to do. But later this week I’ll be making templet for the wood and cutting it out.
-my transome was 2 1/4 thick. Fiberglass shell is 1/4 so that leaves me with 2” the inside wasn’t that thick. So I’m thinking going with 3/4 sheet, 3/4 sheet, and then 1/2 sheet like mentioned before. Then fiberglass the inside an go from there.

-expoy first 3/4 sheet to wall let set up.
-glue second sheet to first, let set up
-glue 1/2 sheet to second, let set up.
- then I’ll make the stringers(that’s 3/4 and 1/2 Believe) get them installed
-install wood that goes left to right.
-then fiberglass everything. Looks like along stringers were like 1/4 thick. So I’m gonna do about 4-5 layers?
-then gonna gel coat everything
- all my holes I drill out for exhaust, swim platform I plan on putting expoy in the holes so it’s all sealed then scre into that.

Question for you guys is:
1. What oz fiberglass should I go with? I found bunch of them. Think I seen 17 oz? And it was in grids like ## that should be good right? If I didn’t have anyone to ask that’s what I would be using.

2. what expoy you guys use? I’m going to mesco(marine company) to pick things up. They have everything you can think of. So I wanna get the right stuff.

3. on my floor between the stringers the fiberglass to the floor is thick. I just cut around it all and ground it down and like 60* so when reinstalling stringers and all I can epoxy and fiberglass everything. Can I leave what’s on the ground?(1/4 thick) and just go over it. Tie it all together? I don’t see it being a problem. If not I gotta grind it all out.