Transom cap (bang plate) replacement

[Summertop511]

waiting for warmer weather and perfect time to pull the bang plate. Never thought it would have been this bad. 2005 seafarer with 420 hours. I’ll post pic of also my dads 07 with 200 hours. Crazy. Wide open for water to go in.

 

[Summertop511]

Pop’s boat

 

[seasick]

And I thought scraping and painting my front iron fence and railings was a challenge!


Your's looks pretty nasty.
That's an interesting approach to making clearance by shifting the motor back a bit. I wonder if you will have enough room with the motor in place to do the repairs.
Keep those pics coming.

 

[Doc Stressor]

Mine was like that also after 11 years, but the Greenwood transom appeared to be dry. But the boat was dry stacked the whole time and not exposed to rain.

I will never understand why Grady stuck with that dumb*ss design for so long.

 

[dainlaroche]

Doing mine too on my '93 Escape 209. Luckily I have a chain hoist in my garage and pulling the engine off from it's lift point is pretty easy. I left all the hoses and wires attached and have about 18" of work space with the motor hanging in the air. Looks like Grady used a hard type of epoxy filler to fill the gap under the cap between the liner and hull, which I saw was not sealed well once I removed the cap. I set the depth on a battery powered circular saw and cut out the epoxy filler between the top of the transom and the heavy aluminum angle embedded under the end of the liner. It exposed all the wood at the top of the transom and happily it's sound and dry. I am upgrading the 1/16" thick aluminum cap to 1/8" using a larger 2" x 2" aluminum angle and am going to seal the gaps and the aluminum angle with substantial amounts of 5200. I thought about glassing the seam but my hull liner and hull are off by about 1/4" (fore-aft) and I think it will be hard to get a nice smooth seam and make it look clean. Seems that the 1/4" underlap between liner and hull existed from the factory since the same gap was there once I pulled the brass drain tube and that gap was filled with that same hard filler. Pretty confident my larger aluminum angle and 5200 approach will last a long while. Also putting in all new stainless through hulls, scuppers and hoses. When I get to the point of finishing it all I'll post some pics.

 

[Summertop511]

Moved a little further today with nice weather. Put west system in the gaps and screw holes. Made a template to put 1/4” starboard under the motor mounting brackets. Don’t want to tighten the motor down onto new bang plate. After west system cure. Move onto 5200 everything. Let that cure. Then new bang plate and caulk the edges with the expensive Grady white color caulk from Grady.

 

[dainlaroche]

I had the same thought about a plate spacer between the engine and transom to prevent crunching the bang plate when tightening down the motor mount bolts. Have others done this?

 

[Summertop511]

I got the idea from trapper’s write up.

 

[Fishtales]

what a horrible design. that is such bs for the jing they get for the boat.

 

[Doc Stressor]

I had the same thought about a plate spacer between the engine and transom to prevent crunching the bang plate when tightening down the motor mount bolts. Have others done this.

This might be the best $330 I ever spent. It gets the motor away from the bang plate:

Bob's Machine Shop Manual Jack Plate

It also lets you easily set up the engine hight just right.

 

[Fishtales]

I had the same thought about a plate spacer between the engine and transom to prevent crunching the bang plate when tightening down the motor mount bolts. Have others done this.

This might be the best $330 I ever spent. It gets the motor away from the bang plate:

Bob's Machine Shop Manual Jack Plate

It also lets you easily set up the engine hight just right.

I'd like to see a pic of that if you can....

 

[Doc Stressor]

My boat is in quarantine right now. So am I. But I'll look and see if I have a picture somewhere.

 

[dainlaroche]

I had the same thought about a plate spacer between the engine and transom to prevent crunching the bang plate when tightening down the motor mount bolts. Have others done this.

This might be the best $330 I ever spent. It gets the motor away from the bang plate:

Bob's Machine Shop Manual Jack Plate

It also lets you easily set up the engine hight just right.

That’s cool. I like the idea but I’ve already got a kicker and want to keep transom weight down (and my costs). Probably going to make some sort of spacer.

 

[Summertop511]

Got the 5200 on today after the west system had went in yesterday and filled larger gaps.

 

[seasick]

Does anyone know where the term 'bang plate' came from? I always thought it was called a transom cap or something similar.

 

[Doc Stressor]

Here are a couple of pictures of my Honda with the jack plate installed. They don't show very much but you can see that the plate doesn't take up much space. I improved the fuel economy at least 10% by adjusting the engine hight correctly. You need to use a jack underneath the skeg in order to take some weight off so that you can easily turn the adjustment bolt with a wrench.

 

[Doc Stressor]

Here's another picture.



I took a grinder and removed maybe 1/8 inch off of the top inside of the jack plate so that it does not come into contact with the bang plate. With aluminum, that was very easy to do.

 

[Fishtales]

Does the jack plate come in contact with the bang plate or is it just under. Hard to tell from the pic.

 

[Summertop511]

Got it all finished. Starboard 1/4” is perfect amount to keep motor from crushing the new thicker vinyl plate. I know I gotta put the second locking nuts on the mounting bolts.

 

[Punch53]

Big improvement!