Pipe and Foam

The project has been stalled for a few weeks and finally was able to get back to it on Sunday. My buddy, Adam, came up to help me - and it was very much needed and appreciated.

Part of the overall planning of rebuilding this floor is to add the ability for power and sound to be run from the front the boat. To do this, we needed to snake cables to the front "cleanly". Tom had a good suggestion of running 3/4" of PVC pipe through the stingers and up to the front where we could bring the cabling up through the floor and have it all concealed.

To cut the holes in the aluminum stringers, we had to use a 1 inch drill bit. Granted, a 1 inch hole doesn't seem large until you have to buy a $30 drill bit to punch the hole. Take a look below: 

 

 Punching a hole in each stringer was more challenging than we had antisipated. As the bit would get itself stuck halfway through and we would have to use a metal file to finish opening each hole that was created. Next time, we will use a 1 inch hole saw - lesson learned! Below you can see how we cut and mounted the pipe. 

Finally, after 3 trips to Lowe's, a quick lunch, and 4 hours later. We had the pipe in place. It's always the tasks that seem the easiest that end up becoming the hardest.

Next, we moved on to the foam. This has been a MUCH debated subject in the world of boat restoration. We could use sheets of foam and cut them to fit or use a chemical based foam to "pour".  I bounced back and forth for about a month as to which was the right answer. Finally, a colleague of mine mentioned the idea of using "spray foam". Thus, you apply it no different than spray painting, or more accurately, like spreading Cheese Whiz out of a can.

 Using this type of material worked out the best because we didn't have to cut foam and then figure out how to adhere it to the floor and keep it from making that wrenching squeaking sound every time the foam would shift in the boat. It also saved us from having to mount the floor first in the case of chemical foam.

I was still a little apprehensive of using the foam so I decided to buy one can to see how far it would go. It filled 9 Solo Cups and took one large piece of cured foam and soaked it in a bucket for a few days to see how it reacted to the water. Happy to report that it still floated as well as the first day I placed it in the water and I was sold!

Rather than do the math of how many cubic feet per ounce I would need - I just grabbed a case of 24 cans and figured we can take back what we don't use and buy more if we need to.

As you can  see from the picture below, the first 24 cans made a large dent in the amount needed.

We went back and bought another 24 cans (for those wondering, it's $2.98/can so about $80 a case) and used about 8 more cans to finish the floor. I will need more foam for the "above ground" panels near the transom in a few weeks so I will keep the extra for now. Overall $160 isn't a bad price for foam after calculating how much sheet foam we might have used or containers of chemical foam. It came out close to the same.

This week, I will fill in the nooks and crannies and then use a saw to cut out the pieces that are above the floor line. Happy to say there will be much more foam in it now than there ever was installed at the factory. 

That's it for now. Next big step will be buying and the wood for the floor and epoxy sealing the wood. Not sure when I will get to that, but you can be sure more pictures will be up once that process begins.