Bought a 1970 shallow V Richline off Craigslist this weekend

for $450, with trailer.

Our ten year old is crazy for fishing and has been dying to get out on the water rather than fish from shore. We saw this boat on craigslist.com and brought it home Friday.

It's really rather a wreck, but we're hoping that even though it doesn't look great it's sea worthy enough to get us out there.

Before taking it out on the water, Len and I rewired the boat lights yesterday.

Today I rewired the trailer lights, used a metal brush attachement on the drill to brush down the inside and other wise cleaned it up the best I could. The inside of this boat is a disaster and I am wondering if it is going to have leaks?

We purchased some outdoor carpet for the purpose of placing "covers" on the seats to prevent hot seats in the heat of summer. Then I thought that I would like to carpet the floor as well, not only to cover up the nasty tar or whatever they have all over the floor, but to make it nicer to walk on. After reading around on this site, I thought maybe I could put in a sub floor and carpet that. That would be a lot easier than trying to carpet over the ribs on the floor, and would make maneuvering around the V bottomed boat easier. Len says he doesn't want to do this because it will make him "sit higher in the boat". Maybe he's afraid of being "top heavy"? I don't know. I think a 2 x 2 covered with a 5/8' of plywood won't make that big of a difference in height compared to the positive difference it will make moving around the boat.

I have a few questions about this first:

Should we use some kind of sealer on the inside or outside of our boat to ensure there are no leaks? I wouldn't want to install a subflooring and then find out that it's filling up with water under the sub floor. If you recommend a sealant, what kind and where can it be purchased?

Is there not concern from the users on this site who are installing the sub floors or decking, that water will accumulate under there?

Any ideas on what the "black stuff" is on the inside surface of our boat? Could it really be tar? Can I remove it? The wire brush on the drill isn't making much progress. Should I remove it? How?

We're not looking for a fancy all over modification like some of the users on this site. We don't have the tools or skills to do that sort of work. I just want to make this little boat as useful as I can for our family to do some fishing.

I've posted several photos of our boat in our album, but I am unsure of how to post those pictures here.

https://www.tinboats.net/forum/images/thumbnails.php?album=188&page=1

Thanks in advance for any ideas you may have.

Carol

:WELCOME:

Fill your boat with a couple of inches of water. This should show you most of the leaks.

I'm sure someone on here could help you with your floor. Just decking the floor isn't going to change the stability very much.

Welcome Aboard! Tried to see your boat pics but get a message that the album needs a password.

Putting pics in is easy.
On the Post Reply Screen, hit Browse under "Upload Attachment" (first box under the area where you type), pick out your picture from your computer and then hit "add file". It will ask if you want it "inline", hit yes & it will automatically add it to your post.
Pretty easy!

Oops! I had the album set so that only we could view it. I've updated it now to make it public.

The black stuff looks to me like some sort of clue residue or something of the sort. If it were mine, I would fill it up with some water with the garden hose and see if it has any leaks. If it is sea worthy, I would go ahead and pus a deck in it. If you put any kind of flooring down you wouldn't have to worry about cleaning that stuff up as it would be totally covered anyway.