Quote:
Originally Posted by NoRegrets
Our family had a 1968 MFG 16 foot boat with a 60 HP Johnson. The transom rotted out and "broke" our boat in 1978. They were fiberglass over plywood structures. Water seeped in and saturated the plywood in the transom (caused some rot) and froze in the winter weakening the fiberglass..... We were fortunate to discover the problem before hitting a wave. The same construction was used to make the floor and structural members. The article did not say what happened to this particular vessel. I would guess it was something similar.
We are all fortunate the problem happened during this time of the year and not much later or in the spring time when less people are around or the water temperature becomes numbing!
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This is a very very common issue with MANY boats out there. Some brands you would never ever think would have issues like that and are never checked.
Especially if there have been any changes to the transom such as: custom swim platforms, new hydo-steering, custom trim tab assemby, ext. boxes.... any adjustments not done correctly can cause these issues.
There are very easy ways to check if you have an issue. The best is with a moisture meter. But if you don't have that and you can see your transom through the engine compartment, you can tap the back in a linear pattern with a small tack hammer to listen for voids or strange muffled noises in areas where there shouldn't be. Be sure to look inside the engine compartment for any supports attached to the transom. Obviously these would make different noises when tapped. But a moisture meter is the way to go and not that expensive.