J/30 Class Association Forums J/30 Forum The Boat, Sails and Equipment Replace Fiberglass floor or repair?

Looking for some j30.org wisdom here. The fiberglass cabin sole on HiJinx has some delamination at the base of the companionway.

Would like to repair and wondering about approach, pull off part of the fiberglass floor and repair; or, pull out the whole floor and replace with something new (Teak & Holly perhaps)?

Any experiences here?

it is my understanding that the teak&holly sole is glued to the fibreglass pan? There are delaminated areas in hull#79 in approximately the same area that I have not felt a need to be concerned about, at some point I am planning to drill small holes in the delaminated areas, inject epoxy, put weight on it and be done. anything more than that would be too much work.

You can buy sheets of laminated teak and holly from Jamestown Distributors or other places. It looks almost like a sheet of thin plywood. A friend of mine redid his J37 floor. It isn't cheap but it looks fantastic. I redid the head section of my J30 with some of his leftover material. It's hard to tell from the much thicker teak and holly main salon.

Bob Rude

Bob - you raise a good question. I assumed that the J's with the wooden floors were solid wood and not lam'd on to the fiberglass pan.

Corey - The optional teak & holly sole was done with solid wood and looks beautiful. Similar to what Bob experienced on Mmmm, for Rhapsody the teak & holly on the step by the mast became waterlogged and split. I ended up removing it from there and just cleaned up the surface and put a mild non-skid paint that matched the cream colored gelcoat. The main cabin sole still looks great. Three years ago it was stripped and 8 coats of Epifanes applied with a matte finish.

Not all boats have the teak & holly sole, as it was an option.

Screwed and plugged and then maybe a bit of adhesive? .... BUT prior owners have a tendancy to sand off old finish and wood to make like new ... wearing down through the plugs to the screws heads ... ugly. for those thinking of refinishing ... varnish remover!

But I would explore: Plastic teak and holly

I'm thinking a lot of new boats are going sort of this way to save weight. Matt would be my choice.

BUT what do the non wood floor models do for the bilge cover?

Still puzzled. If anyone has the original wooden floor, is there still a fiberglass pan underneath it?

The answer is yes - the wood is put on top of the finished fiberglass floor. Below the fiberglass in the area is vermiculite which is probably waterlogged and the reason that you see delamination as it freezes and expands.

Here is an interesting writeup from Rich Miller who rebuilt hull #294

Many thanks to all for the guidance on this. Likely will fix delam with epoxy as opposed to repairing and then resurfacing with anything else.