I will be curious to see how that bedliner holds up. Especially if the boat is kept in a slip where it will be submerged 100% of the time.
When I repowered my old Sailfish, I had took the chance to address some issues with the bracket as well. There were several spots where the Gil-coat as they call it had lost it's bond to the underlying aluminum. Admittedly, I cut some corners, but I was still happy with the end result. Here's what I did...
I had every intention of taking the bracket entirely off the boat and having it sand blasted, but after fighting with it and it not budging even a little bit, I had to change plans. With the motors off, I ground all the Gil-coat off of the top of the bracket, the engine mounting surface and little down past the water line. This got all the areas where the coating had broken free. There were a few very small areas of corrosion, so I filled those with the gray MarineTex and sanded them flush.
Then I had the top, sides, and access plate primed and sprayed with matching Awlgrip. I can't say whether or not the aluminum was etched prior to being shot.
Next I taped off the painted areas and treated the bare aluminum with West System's aluminum etching kit.
The etched aluminum was then coated with several layers of Interprotect 2000E (it was alrady on the rest of the hull and bracket too).
Washers under the mounting bolts were replaced w/ 1/4" aluminum plate painted to match the gelcoat.
Got new sleeves for the top engine mounting holes from Gil. Motors went on and were rigged.
Bottom paint was touched up.
Grady Bracket.jpeg
