Clecos are your friend! There are some guys on here that know all about that.
It is much more difficult to line up the original holes for the rivets than I had anticipated. Difficult but not impossible with a bit of persistence. I managed to get most of the rivets in the front deck with only the cover to the live well remaining. While I stayed at it all day the progress wasn't as noticeable as yesterdays. I also carpeted the boat floor and rear casting deck although I did not get them in the boat they are still setting on saw horses. Good thing it has been to windy to go fishing or the temptation would be to great and I would not be getting anything done on the smaller boat. I don't need anything to side track me. It is definitely a challenging project but I must admit that I always wanted to improve my boat building skills and this project is accomplishing that goal.
Clecos are your friend! There are some guys on here that know all about that.
Proud Member of Team Geezer!
Don't make it look too pretty, wrangler, or you'll be getting a lot of PMs asking how much you'd charge to fix other guys' boats.
Redge LIKED above post
No worries, some one might ask for help but no one would offer to pay. The foam in the boat floor had started absorbing water so I had to replace it. The foam I removed weighed about 75 pounds
Temperature began dropping and Arthur started talking to me so I had to stop for the day. Managed to get the floor in but have not aligned the holes for the rivets yet.
I did look up clecos to see what they were. They look useful so I observed a YouTube video of their operation. The videos I saw showed them being used when both items being attached were clearly visible. In my case I can only see one hole while having to "feel" for the second unseen rivet hole. If a clecos could be used in my current application it would make my job a lot easier but someone would have to show me how.
I did get all the holes for the rivets aligned today and pushed rivets in the holes to hold the floor in place. I did not compress any of the rivets because the weather has my arthritis acting up and I can't manage the rivet gun. Doing that little bit allowed me to feel like I accomplished something today so I'm good with it.
Redge LIKED above post
Front deck only completely finished. The rest of the boat still a mess.
KCMasterpiece, Bigskyfisherman LIKED above post
That looks sharp Wrangler!
Proud Member of Team Geezer!
Looks professional, wrangler.