Transom Cleaned

We were able to get the transom prepared for the repack.  We ground out all of the fiberglass, and used wood chisels to remove all of the plywood from the transom.  We were also able to cut out all of the stringers that we plan to remove.  The next step will be to ground down the channels that the old stringers were in and then sand them in preparation for the new stringers and glasswork.
The plan is to have the gas tank tested, for peace of mind, prior to restringing the boat, just in case the tank is a bust and we have to get something else.  After that, we will hopefully begin restringing the boat and get ready to lay 2/3 of the floor, leaving the back unfinished until we get the bracket mounted and figure out exactly what we are going to do in the back of the boat.
Here is a pic of the transom with all of the wood removed, ready to be sanded, cleaned, and repacked. You are looking at the fiberglass that came out of the mold in 1973.

and here is a shot of most of the flooring, stringers, glass, cables, and other things that we have demo'd out of the boat so far.  I am really ready to stop cutting on this one.

Stringer Removal

The project has taken two turns for the worst, when considering the timeline expectations and desire to float this boat and put fish in it.
July 4th weekend the bro started cutting away at the transom (engine pad) in an effort to "feather" away the glass and old wood. The thought was that we could cut out about 6-10" of the old wood, grind down the glass and then plug the hole, and continue on. Wrong answer, the wood got more rotten the further he got from the i/o hole, so the decision then was to cut the entire pad out and replace it. You can see from the pic where the rot is and that we have delayed taking that out.

We had to cut the stringers, plan was to cut them about 6-10" back in order to fit the new plug in. Long story short, the more we cut the longer the project got. The stringers were completely rotten and we now in the process of removing them and working our way back to the transom piece of the project.
Some of the stringers were nothing more than powder, held in place by the glass skin. Not a big deal, just a little more time, the bird will be stronger after we are done.