With great weather in Alden during the April 18-19 weekend, I was able to begin the tear-down of the ’87 Manitou pontoon boat. I had received all the new parts by this point, so it was time to begin ripping it apart.
One chore that I needed to get done was the sealing of the new plywood decking. I chose CPES, an epoxy resin sealer used by many boat builders. It’s not cheap, but it has an excellent reputation. I used an old cottage cheese container to mix the 2 parts, then applied it per the instructions. The sides of the decking were also soaked with sealer, so I’m confident that this deck will last for decades.
Once the plywood decking was sealed, I focused on the tear-down. Everything had to come off the boat. The rails and side molding came off first. Even though most fasteners were stainless steel, they were a challenge to remove. Much work was done underneath the boat, where little spiders often fell on my face and in my hair. Enzo kept himself busy chasing the ducks and geese away.
After roughly 6 hours of work, everything was removed from the deck and the first of 4 deck sheets was removed. Next weekend I plan to remove the remaining 3 sheets, then focus on cleaning the aluminum pontoons before the new deck is installed.
