522vx wood rot and wet foam

[palletguy]

I recently bought a 522vx that has been neglected. There was water in the starboard front storage and the fiberglass floor was cracked. I cut away a bit of fiberglass and found the plywood and foam to be wet. Any advice on how to repair? I was planning to cut away and replace the plywood and re fiberglass. Should I be concerned about this?

[Bassin Bob71]

I'd be surprised if a 2000 boat has wood in it. I thought Ranger stopped using wood in the '88/'89 time frame.

[Amistad Tackle]

My 1999 492VS has plywood core floors encapsulated by upper and lower layers of glass. Yes, I would repair it. Your floor in that area will eventually rot out (it will never dry) and get soft. Any competent glass shop can fix it or do it yourself. I do not think the foam Ranger uses will soak up water but I may be wrong. The plywood certainly will. If it is like mine you can cut the upper layer of glass and remove the wet plywood leaving the lower glass layer intact. You can then replace the plywood, epoxy it in, and then glass or epoxy the upper layer back in using fiberglass cloth at the seams. I used West System epoxy for everything as it is much stronger than fiberglass resin. I used an oscillating multi-tool to cut the upper layer off and various tools to pull out the wet plywood.

WS-User-Manual-2020.pdf (westsystem.com)

Fiberglass-Manual-2015.pdf (westsystem.com) Replacing damaged cores is on page 29.

[mactlman]

Ranger used wood up into 2004-05 yrs i have read. Surprisingly to me.

[1ranger487vs]

In decks. Not the transom. Not sure on the stringers

[mactlman]

In decks. Not the transom. Not sure on the stringers

no on transom and stringers just decks from what I remember reading

[Rudeman]

I'd be surprised if a 2000 boat has wood in it. I thought Ranger stopped using wood in the '88/'89 time frame.

My 361V had wood encased in 'glass on the deck and lids. The transoms on all boats from 1988 on are all fiberglass, but some wood was still used for other parts of the boat.

[Tim W]

Im not sure on the exact years but mactlman is probably right. Triton in 96 was the first boat to not use any wood.

[mactlman]

Im not sure on the exact years but mactlman is probably right. Triton in 96 was the first boat to not use any wood.

99 on the stratos boats basscat maybe before triton early 90's---not sure why ranger was behind the curve