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Hey everyone, I am new to boating... I bought an 18.5' 91 stratos 285 ski last summer with a 91 Johnson 150 fast strike (confirmed hi comp cylinder head castings). I got it in the lake near the end of last season, and everything seemed to check out OK, approximately 50MPH on GPS with a ski prop.



I put it away for the winter with a cover that turned out to be not so waterproof... After reading a bunch of threads about wet foam, I decided (regrettably) to put some test holes in under the rear bench seat.

The port side was relatively dry... you could squeeze a few drops out of the foam that was closer to the bottom, but not too bad looking. On the starbord side, there was a significant volume of water underneath the foam... I then lifted the bow and it filled the hole completely (pics below). I removed approximately 5 litres of water last night using a shop vac. All of the wood seems solid and strong. I found one potential leak in that area of the floor where someone sealed a smaller hole with a plastic cap.





I can't have this boat out of commission for a long period of time during the season as I have a water access only cottage, so my plan for this year is:
1. Fill the potential leak with epoxy
2. Install access panels over the two holes I drilled so that I can check periodically to see if it is still taking in water
3. Get a good waterproof cover

I am guessing that in the long term (next winter), I will need to recore the boat to get rid of any wet foam. Can this be done with the cap still on the boat? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

welcome to the site JohnyIROC,
i have never actually cored a boat my self only payed to have it done. but none of the boats i had re-cored needed the deck removed im sure every boat is different but if you have room once you gut it then there is no need to.

there are lots of guys on here with experience in this area.

Thanks! I am not too worried about taking the floor out if I have to... but at the point of removing the cap, I would probably decide to throw in the towel. Just out of curiosity, what is a ballpark price for having someone do the recore work?

I was suprised that the floor in my boat is wood with a skim of resin... I would have thought it would be all glassed in... it is really no wonder that water can get in. Any concerns with running it as is this year? I know I may be missing out on some performance potential, but my main concern is I don't want to do irreparable damage.

if you do the gut job ( Remove all the foam, floor and stringers) . BCB would be around 3-4 k if your whole hull is cored (just a Ball park) ... Hydrostream Canada would be about 8k and you wouldn't see your boat for 3-6 years.

Thanks! When you say recore, does that include new keel beam, stringers, etc? Or just replacing the foam.. I am thinking my structure is still good under the floor, and I just need to replace the foam and seal it back up with a new floor.

I love your boat BTW!

i saw a stratos project..... he cut his floor out and removed all the wet foam, core was fine,, but he got out 273lbs of wet foam...

Was it on screamandfly, or someone local? I haven't seen many stratos ski boats in Canada.

no, but there was one on s&f aswell ,, this one os from ottawa

i think we are talking about two Different things...... someone else explain core please ? Rick?

Cool boat (another SRV clone I believe). Core and what you are seeing are two very different things. You are looking at floatation foam which is not structural but needs to come out if you have any performance aspirations. Core refers to material that is sandwiched between the inner and outer layer of Fibreglass. To get rid of the foam you'll likely just have to pop the floor out and remove it and the 900lbs of water that it is holding. Replacing the core is much more involved.