Weighed it
The give-away on these is weight. Dry hull should be around 320 lb; this one is well over.
Water in the foam, then. Wrote down the weight so I can measure progress by it later.
13 Sport · restoration
Boston Whaler 13 — transom and foam
by Example Logs
· boatbuildlog.com
An example log of the job every old Whaler eventually needs. Shows a restoration where the boat is structurally sound but waterlogged.
This is an example log, not a real project.
It exists to show what a useful build log looks like — dated entries, tagged to a step,
with hours recorded and mistakes written down. The technique in it is illustrative;
don’t follow it as instruction, and check anything structural against your
designer’s drawings. Its hours are excluded from the site’s median figures.
4
Entries
31
Hours
98
Days elapsed
4
Photos
Jan 2026
Started
Teardown
6.5 h
Console and rails off
Everything unbolted and labelled. Photographs of every fastener pattern before removal.
Transom
12 h
Transom out
Cut the inner skin, dug out the old core. Wet, black, and exactly as bad as expected.
The one everybody dreads, and it deserves the reputation. Take the full weekend.
Drying the foam
Drilled a grid of drain holes and left it in the sun for six weeks, weighing it fortnightly.
Still to do: new core bonded in, reglass, then fairing and paint.
