TOPIC: Question for Jim - Century Decks

Hey Jim - I'm working on two Century boats now; 1955 Resorter and a 1948 Sea Maid. Resorter I'm refininshing the decks and repairing the dash. I have all the decks off the Sea Maid as the boards all were either cupped or cracked. A few questions. It appears the wood is the same, mahogany about 3/8" thick; is that correct? The decks are the typical blonde and mahogany. I believe the blonde is bleached mahogany; is that correct? And lastly, the mahogany stained wood has no striping, whereas the blonde wood has striping. There's a a beautiful Sea Maid on the Century site you can see. I'm not aware of any suppliers of 3/8" mahogany or mahogany planks with the striping grooves precut. So my belief is I'm going to be buying thick, planing it to thickness, and then for the blonde wood, running it through the table saw and using the blade's kurf to make new striping grooves. Thoughts on this appreciated.

Brian

If it is me you are asking Brian I am 99.9% sure the yellow or gold you are speaking of is a stain not a bleached out wood.

example: sandusky Chris Craft blonde stain Sandusky Cordova stain, used for the king planks (Blonde center planks) on 1950's Chris Craft boats. True color will show after 4 coats of varnish.
There are other stains out there as well you may want to consult some of the folks over at the Century Boat Owners org...
www.centuryboatclub.com/

Your deck thickness sounds about right. You can buy the decking anyway you like these days from a number of wood vendors. Instead of placing a batten between sections of strips of decking try to put a sub deck in there and seal it up with epoxy. Then build the new deck over it.
I was working on a 53 Correct Craft utility that was turned into a Garwood (look alike) Racer. When they did the deck they used plywood as battens for the seams. Once the boat began to work while running and loosening up the deck leaked causing lots of issues from molding (black and white mold) to serious water penetration. What started as a leak at the covering board on the forward deck rotted a hole in the planking where she flared at the bow but because the Correct Craft was carvel over diagonal planking the water followed the path of the diagonal planking and wiped out a good section of her chine log.


Supplies:
www.classicboathardware.com/restorationsupplies.htm

Jim - I didn't ask the question correctly. I know I've got to stain the wood, but do I need to bleach the mahogany first?

being that I have personally never used this color stain I would put this technical question to the folks at Sandusky. Anytime I have stained wood I simply stain it however this application could be different. We used to bleach teak on the tuna boats for 2 reasons. It made the harder (didn't want to dig into that fancy wood with the leader and line) and decreased the overall maintenance. The teak would then have a hard gray appearance. To make it bright again we would clean it w/oxalic acid (teak cleaner) and re-oil it.

I would ask the stain manufacturer for proper prep on this one I do apologize for not directly answering your question. Now that I am curious I will do some research later this evening.
Jim

This hull #48173 and has the dark through the entire torpedo, so must be a later 48 according to the website. Thanks for the assist. Off to the Washington Navy Yard today. Back late Wed night.

Got the Sea Maid's interior cleaned this weekend. Scraped 63 years of mung, grease, and oil off every surface. Looks nice!

Brian,
Got Don Dannenbergs book, great reference. Acoording to him, he bleaches the Mahogany and then stains it blonds with a mix he uses. I'm at work right now so I don't have the book with me but I can post what he uses once I get home. I haven't started on mine yet but I do have the bow decking dilema. According to the book he uses 7+" wide planking and cuts the grooves with the table saw. Puts battens between the planks. He also uses 3M 5200 for everything, including filling the grooves, than painting them white after the 5200 dries, using a pinstripping wheel.

The guy I bought the boat from gave me 1 1/2"ish wide planking to use on the bow and stern but I don't think that is correct from what I'm seeing in the book. Haven't checked with Century folks yet and I want it to be period correct. I guess I could do the 1/8" plywood then these planks but pretty narrow and not alot to fasten with. I guess using the 5200 would help some of that but don't think it's right and doubt AOMC folks would like it. But that also means I'm going to have to buy more Mahogany.

Sorry I know this was to Jim but thought I throw that 2 cents in there from the book.

Bob

Brian,
Looked up what Don put in the book and he uses 8 parts "natural" grain filler and one part "Golden Oak" for the blond sections. Hope that helps.

Bob

all good info. this is a message forum the more the merrier. we may all learn something. I just did.
thank you
Jim