It is is fair condition, it needs new carpet and , honestly i would like to paint it w some fresh clear coat, can i do this stuff at home? i am confident on the carpet, clueless as to boat painting . all i know is it is WAY different when auto paint LOL
this boat will never see public waterways BTW only on my place so i just wana fancy it up for my needs

it is a t 154 bass boat

Awlgrip would probably be the easiest to use

is that sprayed on or rolled??

Is it Glastron or GlasPly?

Glas Ply went to poly stringers in 78.

Watch out for wood stringers or transoms on old boats.

it is a glasstron (or says so on the title) its made of fiberglass.

I can't find a t 154 Glastron in the Blue Book of Boats. The close numbers indicate they are 15 foot boats not 17.5 as shown in your post title. The comment on checking transom condition and floors and stringers is a good one. If the boat is not sound, you probably don't want to put money into it. I sprayed some clear coat on a fiberglass boat many years ago and it worked out well. If it is not for show, you might be satisfied with brushing or rolling.

quote:

Originally posted by golddot:
it is a glasstron (or says so on the title) its made of fiberglass.

OK sorry. I know more about Glas Ply, which are great boats. Just be sure you look at the stringers and transom to be sure they are not made of wood. If they are, check the condition. Old wood stringers and transoms are often the kiss of death.

One thought - wet sand then buff a spot. You may be surprised how well it cleans up.

Heed FishOn's advice. Many boats of that era were covered in fiberglass, but the core structure was wood. Easier to repair early on if there are spots needing it than later. Once you have the carpet up and see the decking, I expect it will need help.

Once you pull that up is when the real reveal begins!

i thought about the wetsand and buff, but it literally has the glitter coming off in my hands, like ALL the clearcoat is gone, its werid, my buddy says its structurally sound and has a very good strong motor (johnson 85HP)

quote:

Originally posted by FishOn:

quote:

Originally posted by golddot:
it is a glasstron (or says so on the title) its made of fiberglass.

OK sorry. I know more about Glas Ply, which are great boats. Just be sure you look at the stringers and transom to be sure they are not made of wood. If they are, check the condition. Old wood stringers and transoms are often the kiss of death.

Treatment outside the hull should be no problem.

Potential major trouble with wood parts inside the boat. BTDT, not fun. Ended up scrapping the boat.

Water collects under the floor boards and if the supports are wood, they tend to rot.

The stringers are what gives the boat its strength along its length. Picture ceiling joists attached to the inside of the bottom of the hull. They're what keeps the boat from breaking in half when it hits a wave hard.

The transom is the flat part across the back of the boat. It has to be very strong because the motor is bolted to the transom. The motor is both very heavy and pushes the boat by pushing on the transom.

In a fiberglass boat, the stringers are almost always COVERED in fiberglass, but something else is attached to the inside of the hull to give the shape, and then fiberglassed over. In older boats, the stringers are often wood. In modern boats they are usually (but not always) some kind of synthetic foam.

The synthetic foam isn't very strong, so that type of stringer is glassed over very heavily and a lot of the strength comes from the fiberglass.

Wood, on the other hand, actually IS very strong, so in a boat with wood stringers, the wood is usually responsible for most of the strength and the fiberglass is mostly there to protect the wood.

The same is true of transoms. A well built 18 foot boat might have a transom made out of 2 or 3 layers of 3/4" marine plywood, or alternatively a 2"+ thick piece of very dense foam (the foam has to be very dense so that the motor being bolted through the transom can't crush it).

Lots of older boats also have glassed-over plywood decks.

If the boat is built properly, you can build a great boat that will last pretty much forever using either method. There are beautiful offshore fishing boats in the Carolinas that have the entire hull made out of strips of plywood (usually two or more layers with the strips running different directions) glued down to a wood frame and then lightly glassed over that were built in the 50's and 60's and are still in great shape. (This process is called cold-molding, and the old Carolinas cold-molded offshore boats are works of art.)

But with fiberglass boats that have wood in them, you have to be careful. Foam doesn't rot. Wood will, if it gets wet and stays that way. As long as the fiberglass sheath around the wood is intact, you're golden. If it gets a hole in it, you can get in to trouble.

In some of the old fiberglass boats with rotten wood, this problem is caused by a material failure in the fiberglass. Most of the time, it's because someone came back and drilled holes in things to attach something or run wires or whatever and didn't seal the holes properly.

When a marine surveyor checks a boat, they'll often drill a few tiny holes in different places and stick a moisture probe in to check the wood, and then seal the holes back up. Sometimes you can tell if there's a bad problem because places with really rotten wood can feel soft or hollow.

It IS possible to replace the rotten wood in stringers and transoms, but it is a LOT of work.

quote:

Originally posted by golddot:
is that sprayed on or rolled??

Awlgrip is a heavy duty urethane paint that a lot of people use on boat decks and stuff above the waterline. You can add nonslip stuff to it for decks. It can be sprayed, rolled, or brushed.

The hull itself on a fiberglass boat is usually finished in gelcoat.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gelcoat

You can put hull paint over gelcoat or you can add more gelcoat to it. Gelcoat is pretty nasty stuff. It's more durable than hull paint.

quote:

Originally posted by golddot:
all i know is it is WAY different when auto paint LOL

I think you'd be surprised. As someone mentioned, many boats are coated with gelcoat, but many are also painted. Imron is a popular paint used for that purpose.

quote:

1977 Glasstron

Ha!
My Dad had one when we were kids....
I did a lot of skiing and a decent amount of fishing on that boat.

In 1977 Glastron changed the name to T-156, which made more sense then calling it a V ... as it was a tri-hull.

Make sure you get Marine carpet and not outdoor carpet. The Marine carpet had a rubber backing.

41

Here's a fun look at a Glastron. I have a 74 CV-16 in the same color with a 115 horse Johnson. I believe the one Bond is driving is a 15 footer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upQ-MXF_ZgI

quote:

Originally posted by Georgeair:
Heed FishOn's advice. Many boats of that era were covered in fiberglass, but the core structure was wood. Easier to repair early on if there are spots needing it than later. Once you have the carpet up and see the decking, I expect it will need help.

Once you pull that up is when the real reveal begins!

Exactly! I love old Glas Plys. You just need to know what to look for.....

1978 is when Glas Ply switched to Poly stringers. And then, you still need to inspect the transoms. Ask me how I know.

I have owned a few of them...

Do not let this scare you off. They are great boats! I love old Glas Ply and Olympic hulls

Post '78 Glas-Ply and subsequent Olympic boats should be considered. Contact me for details, and I do not have a boat to sell...

As a guy who has owned two "project boats" (and currently still has one of them), they are nothing but a hole in the water into which you throw money - assuming they even get to the water!

Do follow the advice above about the stringers and transom. Be certain to get marine carpet, regular indoor/outdoor won't hold up to marine abuse.

Go over the wiring very well, and anything that needs replaced should be soldered/heat shrinked, not butt spliced.

Also, are you sure on the model number and length? The only 154 I can find is an HP 154, and it was 15', not 17'.

In any event, you'll likely end up having some fiberglass repairs to do. It really isn't difficult (I ventured into this last fall myself). There are some really good youtube videos out there. Just take your time, and make sure you have the right tools & materials for the job.

quote:

Originally posted by exx1976:
Go over the wiring very well, and anything that needs replaced should be soldered/heat shrinked, not butt spliced.

I'm going to have to disagree with you here. ABYC, the American Boat and Yacht Council, which publishes standards for how boats are built, how systems are installed, etc., recommends always using crimped connections. So does pretty much every boat maintenance guy I've talked to and every book on boat maintenance I've read.

ABYC discourages but allows the use of soldered connections as long as solder is not the only mechanical connection. In practice, this means if you want to solder it, ABYC standards require that you use a crimp connector and then solder the wires to the crimp connector. ABYC standards also require that the area where the wire goes from plain wire to soldered wire be supported on both sides - in practice, this means a wire clamp screwed into the boat within a couple inches on either side of the joint.

The reason for this is that soldered joints can be brittle and are subject to fatigue damage, as is the transition between flexible unsoldered wire and stiff soldered wire. The severe vibration experienced by boats can make the connection or the wire fail over time. A partial failure can increase resistance enough to start an electrical fire.

For the same reason, ABYC completely prohibits solid core wire. Wire nuts are completely prohibited, too.

Before you complain about crumped connections pulling free, ABYC has standards for crimped connections, too, which you pretty much have to use proper ratcheting crimpers and good quality connectors to meet. For 14ga wire I think the connection is required to take more than 30 pounds of force to pull apart.

If corrosion is the concern with crimped connectors, dab the wires with dielectric grease before put the connector on and then spray the whole thing with CorrosionX afterwards.

Also, this doesn't have anything to do with ABYC, but if you're going to use heat shrink on a boat, use adhesive lined heat shrink and apply it with a heat gun. Anything else is asking for trouble.