Conference vicki::boats

    I have a 1988 200 HORIZON with the built in swim platform and I
    have stress cracks at the edges also. They are small and I have
    had them since last year. They get NO bigger and no new ones have
    started. I believe that this is normal for fiberglass, espescially
    when it is formed like it is. The platform receives a lot of stress
    from normal use, and somthing has to give somewhere. The same sort
    of thing use to happen with Corvettes just from normal stress of
    road bumps
    I would like to know what your dealer find out about it though.
    

    This may not be related, but who is the dealer?
    
    I know for a fact that a swim platform deals with alot of stress;
    my teak paltform on my '87 190 horizon pulled the lag screws out
    of the transom within weeks of buying the boat. There's probably
    just enough strength engineered into the integrated swim platform
    design to take any load that can be put on there, but not enough
    strength to completely eliminate the stress cracks altogether...
    
    
    Mike

    see also note 163.* there are several replys regarding stress cracks.

re .2:

Screws do not hold well in fiberglass laminate. Anything subjected to more 
than a small load should be through bolted with an adequate backing plate. 
Using screws to mount a swim platform strikes me as cheap, low quality 
contruction.

    
    re: Screws in glass...
    
    	I have to admit I was amazed when I saw the dealer mount
    Mike B's swim platform using the "lag it into the transom"
    method. Seems to hold well enough as proven by all the manufacturers
    that do it....
    
    Rick Whos_platform_is_bolted_on_and_has_to_remove_the_gas_tank_to_take
    								_it_off
    

    The screws into my transom were 1-1/4" by 1/4" lag screws. That
    should be enough to hold the platform to the transom considering
    that there were 16 screws used: 2 screws at each of 4 upper and
    lower mounting plates. I know my dad-in-law's (exact same boat/model
    as mine) has never had a problem. I suspect that the improper size
    drill was used by the dealer's "mechanic" who mounted tha platform,
    or that said "mechanic" "WIGGLED" the drill to make the screw go
    in easier, when looking at what may have happened to my platform.
    
    It would be silly to think that there was no laminated wood in a
    transom, in which to put screws for a swim deck. My transom is around
    2-1/2" thick. 
    
    I did replace my upper lag screws (where ALL the stress is longitudinal
    to the screws) with stainless steel 5/16 machine bolts, with ample
    washers, which completely penetrate the transom, and also sport
    self-locking nuts. 
    
    Of course, the dealer "never had seen those screws pull out before"...
    
    Yea, right. 
    
    The dealer mounts the platforms after receiving the boats from the
    manufacturer...
    
    Mike

    Master Craft does it too, I think they all do.  Yep, mine came out
    after a while too.
    
    Rob.......who has bolts all the way through now also.
    

    The problem is that you get what you pay for. It only takes 10 to 15
    minutes to mount a platform with screws, where as if you have to thru
    bolt it will take two guys a half hour to do it. Besides the extra cost
    of bolts,nuts & washers vs screws. As far as stress cracks go, I'd have
    to see them or a good photo. Gelcoat allways will crack at stress
    points. Its the nature of the material. It just does not bend. If the
    glass itself is cracking? The problem was ether to much resin or the
    wrong mix of resin or someone tried to cut corners by not using glass
    cloth in the corners of their hull. They can make a cheaper boat that
    way. I won't get into name brands.
    
    If the small cracks really bother you? Wait 2 years for most of the
    cracks to show up, then touch them up with gel coat & buff them out.
    The harder you use the boat ie: pounding big waves, high Horse power
    ect.. the more cracks that will develop.
    
                                       Walt
                                

re .8:

>>> Gelcoat allways will crack at stress points. Its the nature of 
>>> the material. 

The gelcoat will crack only if the underlying structure flexes enough. A 
sufficiently strong, stiff hull, deck, transom, etc, will not have stress 
cracks in the gelcoat.

    Ok. I forgot to add the"flex" qualifier. If you read between the lines
    you can see that I said that gel coat does not bend, it breaks.
    
    I wish someone would design a kevlar core, ABS skin, polyethelyne
    coated one piece vacume molded hull in 30 plus foot range. It would be
    light and would bounce off rocks.
    
    No maintaince

    The lines you are seeing may not be cracks from stress as much as
    the fiberglass and resins reacting to the sun and elements. The
    hood on my car is fiberglass from the factory, it is by no means
    under any stress other than the heating and cooling of the elements.
    The hood has a good 2 square feet of crazing cracks. 
    
    ~jeff 

    My last boat, was made in 1974, (you might say big deal) and of
    course i had the "gelcoat cracks" here and there. I had no idea
    why. I called the factory only to find out that the """"gelcoat
    shrinks faster than the glass/resin. If the cracks your looking
    at are ____not___ in the resin/glass area below the gelcoat
    you only have a cosmetic problem. However-- 
    
    i'll stop here.  On the business of screws, vs. thru bolting
    there ain't nothing to talk about. If you don't have thru
    bolting you **********just got screwed************
    
    JIM.
    
    
    
    

    
    	I have a 1988 FourWinns 205 Sundowner, I bought new in May of
    '88. I have enjoyed the boat now for 2 summers, I have 142 hours
    on the 175 hp engine.
    
    	I checked the area that was described and found no stress or
    hairline cracks. There is a ski tow ring mounted just above the
    swim platform. On the back side of the tow ring is a 5"x5" 
    block to reinforce the area, that is it. The rest of the upright
    portion of the swim platform is fiberglass. It maybe with heavy
    tow loads using the tow ring (skiing, tow another boat) could cause
    the wall to flex enough to cause stress cracks.
    
    	I use the transom tie-down rings for skiing, it is a much stronger
    area. As menition before all fiberglass will display some sort of
    stress cracks in time. You can get a gelcoat repair kit from the
    dealer or manufacture. The cracks can be filled, but no guarantees
    they won't come back.
    
    	I have enjoyed my boat and have had no problems with it so far.
    The dealer I bought it from was Melvin Villege Marina on Lake Winni.
    I found the dealer (Tom Young) a very good, honest person to do
    business with.
    
    	Just my .02 worth, Best of luck...
    
    	Mike

    I DO'NT THINK MY 1989 205 HAS THE 5x5 BLOCK TO REINFORCE THE
    SKI TOW RING.  THE REASON I SAY THIS IS THE TOW RING CAME LOOSE
    THIS SUMMER AND WHEN I WENT TO TIGHTEN IT I FELT FIBERGLASS BEHIND
    IT, NOT WOOD.  COULD IT BE THEY FORGOT TO PUT THE WOOD BLOCK BEHIND
    THE TOW RING?  

    
    	The 5X5 block is fiberglassed in place, it is on mine.
    	Do a visual inspection next time when you get a chance.
    	
    
    	Mike

    I HAVE A 1990 21FT MAXUM LDRIVE AND HAVE NOTICE ON THE BOTTOM OF THE
    HULL VERY FINE HAIR TYPE LINES DOES ANYONE OUT THERE HAVE A MAXUM WITH
    THIS PROBLEM??
    I TOOK IT TO THE DEALER WHOM I GOT IT FROM AND HE SAID THAT IT WAS
    NORMAL FOR A NEW BOAT TO FLEX LIKE THAT AND CRACK A BIT HE SAID
    THAT MY 5 YEAR HULL WARRENTY MY NOT COVER GEL CRACKS 
    BUT I THINK THAT 5 YEARS DOWN THE ROAD IT WILL BE A LOT WORST AND LOSS
    A LOT OF IT VALUE.
    
             WHAT SHOULD I DO

    I can't believe your new boat warranty doesn't cover gel coat cracks.
    When I bought my new boat, I developed a couple cracks in the gel
    coat around the cockpit combing where it curved. The boat was about
    6 months old. I took it back to the dealer and he fixed it free
    under warranty.
    
    I would call the manufacturer.
    

    IT SEEMS THAT MY WARRANTY DOES NOT COVER GEL COAT CRACKS
    I LOOKED IT UP THE OTHER NIGHT IN MY BOOKLET
    IT SAID CRACKS BLISTERS AND CHIPS ON THE GEL COAT ARE NOT
    COVERED
    BUT HOW CAN YOU TELL IF IT IS JUST GOING TO CRACK ON THE GEL 
    COAT AND WILL NOT START TO CRACK THE FIBEGLAS ALSO
    

    where are they?????????????????
    
    JIm....

    I tend to disagree with Steve Saslow.  In my observation, very few
    boats cover gel coat, explicitly, in their warranty.  What kind of boat
    do you have?
    
    I have a Campion (B.C. brand for you Easterners) and I had some stress
    cracks in the gel coat after about a year.  I have an excellent
    mechanic (a real ace with Mercs) and he looked it over.  We looked in
    the warranty and gel coat was not covered under the 5 year hull warranty.
    
    He said he was willing to go to bat for me against Campion since anyone
    could see this should not have happened.  I sat there while he called 
    Campion.  The rep from Campion didn't argue in the least.  He
    acknowledged that the stress cracks should not have happened and
    suggested that the gel coat was probably applied too thinly in the
    corners of the deck (where the cracks appeared).  He said to bring the
    boat to Bellingham and he would send a tech from B.C. down to repair it
    immediately.  They sent the tech down and the boat was completely
    repaired.  The tech checked for structural damage and concluded that
    there was none (which I agree with).
    
    What happened here is that the warranty didn't cover the problem. 
    However, I believe that the company has a good reputation currently
    and, therefore, was willing to back their product.  As a result of
    their efforts (and the fact that I love the product) I would buy
    another boat from Campion.
    
    I blieve that a Maxum is really a Bayliner (yes? no?) and it will be
    interesting to see if the boat is backed or not.  Even if gel cracks
    are not covered in the warranty, I would contact the factory and point
    out any dissatisfaction you have.  
    
    Then again they may claim the boat hit something considering the
    location of the cracks.....
    
    /brett    

	The first day we took out my '90 Ski Nautique it was noticed
by my eagle eyed footin' buddies that there were stress cracks on the
port gunnel.  This was December 6th. at Quinnsiggy, we were only able
to get a little beyond the Rte 9 bridge due to 1/4 inch thick  "hard
water".   I called the factory the next day, they asked if I had
talked to the dealer, I said I wanted to deal with them directly, they
said they would call the dealer - it started to sound like I was
headed for a run-around.  I dropped into the dealer the next day since
I happened to be in Spitbrook, he had heard all about it and wanted to
see the boat.  I dropped it off a day or two later, he agreed with my
eefb's (see above)  "This $%#@$% shouldn't happen, but we can't fix it
here, I'll call Correct Craft and get them to do the right thing." I
made it very clear that I didn't want it going to the local body shop
and if the factory proposed that then I wanted a new boat, I think
there were ~5 hours on it then, a couple of which were pre-delivery
check-out hours.  The factory wanted it back to Florida, they didn't
really believe me when I asked for a "loaner" to cover the time it
would be gone {mid December on}.  I kept in contact with their
customer service folks, it was fixed in a couple of weeks - some time
early January.  They called me to ask if I would like them to put the
cassette stereo (list price ~$650, though it doesn't cost them that)
in while it was down there  - -  "for your trouble".   "SURE !, go
right ahead, when can I have it back ?"  There was never a hint that I
might have misused or mistreated the boat, no suggestion that I should
pay any portion of the repair cost or freight, nice people who just
wanted to make the customer happy - it pays off. 

	I had to wait until March 15th to get it back, due to truck
schedules and the New England distributer in Rochester who wanted to
clean it up after its 2,000 mile journey -  we gumballed March 16th.,
right ? 

	Reg


PS	"On the waters of the world since 1925"   

	I think they'll probably be around another 65 years.

re .6

foot-note:	They didn't just gloss it over, they took the 
whole top deck of the boat off at the rub rail, replaced it and put 
the boat back on the manufacturing line.  It came back with a
different swim platform, fuel tank cover boards and rear seat.
I got the 4 speaker Kenwood marine radio/cassette player for my  
"trouble", nice speakers.

	R

    YOUR RIGHT GEL COATS ARE NOT ALLWAYS COVERED BUTTT
    I CALLED THE DEALER AND HE GOT IN TOUCH WITH THE MANUFACTUR 
    AND THEY SEEM TO BE WILLING TO REPAIR THE BOAT I HAVE TO TAKE IT IN
    FOR AN ESTIMATE AND THEN THEY SAID THEY WILL TELL ME HOW THEY WILL
    FIX THE PROBLEM ATLEAST THEY SEEM COMMITTED TO FIXING THE BOAT SO LETS
    SEE WHAT HAPPENS 
    
                     THANKS

    I do not have a 4 Winns, but does anyone know if stress cracks cause
    damage to the hull by allowing water through the gelcoat.  I have
    stress cracks on the transom of my 17' Larson.  One crack is at a 
    corner and feels as though there is no support under it.  I plan to 
    put the boat in the water for the summer but have some reservations
    due to these stress cracks in the gelcoat.  Any information is
    appreciated.
    

    Just to let you know the stress cracks are an industry wide problem and
    have been for the last 4 yrs..I sent my 2100 Renken back to the factory
    for a complete replacing of the surface gelcoat last fall and already
    the new improved version by dupont is cracking.I was told by 2 to 3
    different dealers that they all have having a problem with newer
    gelcoats as to why no one seems to have an ans.But the so called stress
    cracks are usaly just surface related and do not indicate any structual
    problems with the boat.But you should have it checked by an expert at
    your boats dealer.

    Supra do not have problems w/ stress cracks and they are the only
    manuf. that gaurantees against blistering as well.