650Guy wrote:
My 94 wrap around back seat is pretty much mulch. I'm thinking of just putting a temporary layer under and then come winter, completely rebuild the seat. Never done that before, but figure, how hard can it be! ha!
GTBecker wrote:
Four Winns must have made some progress if your '96 seat back is wood. The '99 258 seat back and the wraparound vertical portion of the starboard wing is a heavy molded assembly, impervious to water, with foam glued to it. I have photos on this machine somewhere...
GT I was basing my '96 off of a '94 that I had seen. I have not taken my seat apart to know if it is wood or a pre-molded back. I came up with the idea of building the way I stated by looking at how Four Winns had done it on the '94 and how I would have done it.
ric wrote:
Cap'n Morgan wrote:
I would think starboard would be a better material than even marine grade plywood for making a seat. A certain builder I am familiar with uses starboard if it is not a molded in seat.
When the guy redid my bow seats he was shocked it wasn't starboard for being a four winns and not a bayliner. You would think by the year 2000 people would be smart about using wood and not using it.
Here the key word is bow seats. Most likely they were smaller than the large rear seat. Take a look at GTBecker's second picture. Look at the outside corner and then at the right side corner. This is where the seat attaches to large thick aluminum angle pieces, if his '99 is like my '96. These are really the only points of support for the plywood. Starboard is a great idea but it needs
full support at 16" to 18" intervals and also depends on the thickness for the support. As for any gluing most people don't have access to a welder. If you know someone that does flooring on the commercial side of the house and does hospitals they might be able to help you out with their welder. That’s just a thought on that don’t really know if a floor welder would or would not work. Now to use it for the seat back, as GTBecker stated he has a molded back that is a possibility. You would need to make the same type of mold you would need for bending ¼” ply for bending it and holding it until it cools. A heat gun is not expensive to buy, don’t use the wife’s blow dryer it’s not the same (that’s for those who have never used a heat gun).
GTBecker wrote:
neutron wrote:
... I will seal it with an epoxy resin...
The seat, particularly the wing, will flex. Would an epoxy coating comply, or crack?
Epoxy is not flexible. It would crack, especially if you have the epoxy bar top idea. On this thought process I’d use a urethane but only a coat or two. The amount of flex in the seat would not be enough to crack the urethane, I would think. A marine varnish would be better. Maybe the marine varnish is a much better idea than my original fiberglass idea. I think I would lean towards that over the glass. See what happens when people start kicking ideas around.
An ex-employee of mine, when I was in business with the cabinet shop, took a piece of marine ply I had in the shop to redo the seats in his bass boat seats. Just the other day he asked me if I had any of that ply anymore. Told him no that I didn’t was all out. I told him back then that the marine only meant the glue and not the wood that it would still rot. He’s found that out now. He’s going to coat with urethane now.
Four Winns might have wised up with the molded backs but for the way the seats attach to the boat with the limited amount of support provided we are stuck with the ply. Just need to extend its life out further.
Since we are on this subject, what is everyone using for the covers? My seat so far seems to be hanging in there but my stitching is giving out and it’s coming apart at the seams. Can we get covers from Four Winns? I don’t want to have to have everything recovered.
Eric
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