2003 Ski Nautique 196 - Black & White

[NautiqueJeff]

Picked up this little 2003 196 today in Alabama. Looking forward to getting started on this one. It is going to be beautiful when it is complete. I love a black boat!

This one will need a full wet sand / buff / wax, new graphics, new pinstripes, new upholstery, probably a gateway replacement gauge set, etc. I'll try to get it in the water for a test run this week, but it might have to wait until I get back from Maine next week.

[NautiqueJeff]

This is one of the strangest registration number mistakes I have ever seen on any of my project boats. This ranks right up there with the guy who had actually had decals made of his HULL ID (CTCxxxxxxx) and plastered those on as his registration numbers.

This one is a mirror-image of the registration numbers (And this isn't a camera trick. This is really how they are on the boat!). The numbers are supposed to be AL-4638-ME.

[SilentSeven]

Love me a Ski Nautique 196! That one is gonna look great. Can't quite tell what the hull accent color is......

Sent from my Pixel 7 using Tapatalk

[NautiqueJeff]

It is Black Onyx hull, Silver Cloud deck, Black Onyx third stripe (where the SKI graphic is), Black Onyx primary stripe (where the Nautique graphic is), and Silver Cloud secondary stripe. The platform is Silver Cloud.

Wish the top deck and the platform were Black Onyx. Then I might have to keep this one. Maybe it is good that they are not.

[Scooter G]

Anxious to follow, looks like it has good bones with just a minor case of dyslexia, lol.

[NautiqueJeff]

Well, upon inspection today I found a very bad thing on this boat.

The gelcoat from the water line down is all completely filled with osmosis damage.

For those of you not familiar with this, this is where the gelcoat on a boat that is left in the water for long periods of time will absorb water into the gelcoat and blisters will form. This one has it so bad that most of the blisters had actually ruptured already, and there are small cracks all over the gelcoat that sat in the water.

I hit it with a pressure washer today, and noticed pieces of gelcoat flying off the boat! That's how bad it is.

The entire bottom of the hull will need to be taken down to bare fiberglass and resprayed. I may go as high as the white stripe, or possibly as far as the rubrail so that all of the black gel will be new. We'll see. I need to get some quotes on this, but it is not going to be a cheap fix!

Well, I guess I am glad that I am the one who ended up with this boat. At least I will fix it. Others may have parted it out at this point.

[SilentSeven]

Interesting. Is this a problem with the initial assembly or factory materials selection? I don't recall hearing about as an issue for yachts that are perpetually in left in water.

[Scooter G]

Interesting, that's pretty messed up. I don't know that I have ever seen this before, or paid attention.
SilentSeven brought up an interesting point.

Looks like this one is going to be a 16 page thread...

[NautiqueJeff]

I have been lucky to never have dealt with this either. I have definitely heard of it. I have seen a blister or two over the years, but nothing near this. The ones I have seen didn't even really need to be addressed. I wonder how long this boat sat in the water, and where. I got it in Alabama, but there are decals on the trailer from Florida.

Most boats that sit in the water for long periods of time have bottom paint. That's why you don't hear about this on the bigger boats. That's the whole point of bottom paint -- to keep osmosis from happening and to prevent marine growth. I wouldn't touch a Nautique that had bottom paint though. I'd rather deal with this problem than removing bottom paint on a Nautique.

[Rednucleus]

I think you need to add a "very sad" button next to "like" - poor boat.

[MN Ryan]

Gosh, I wonder how long a boat has to sit in the water for that to happen? Now, I will fret every time l leave mine in the water!

[SilentSeven]

I was curious about this so I did a little webseach....found this.

https://fabdock.com/uncategorized/os...coat-blisters/

The TL;DR as I read the article is that damage can occur with any boat but assembly and product matter. Here's a couple of interesting article snips.

....trailer boats are another peculiar situation. Manufacturers of smaller fiberglass boats assume that their boats will generally only be used for one day at a time and then housed back on the trailer. So any water that has infiltrated through the gelcoat layer will exit the same way it got in while it is sitting high and dry on its trailer. Therefore, they may not pay as much attention to the quality of their gelcoats as long as it looks shiny while sitting in the showroom.

and

... how do I solve this problem and make sure my boat doesn’t get osmosis or gelcoat blisters? A well made boat from a reputable boat builder is the first step. In over ten years, with hundreds of clean-skin boats living in FAB Docks, we have never had an issue. But that is no reason to be complacent. Even good boat builders can have bad days. Even Mercedes, Ferrari and Rolls Royce have warranty periods to cover any mistakes they make while producing their cars. And making a car is lot more exact, precise and repetitive than making a boat.

[Scooter G]

Fab Dock out of Australia, someone had to lay awake at night to come up with that product. Good article SilentSeven, good find.

[NautiqueJeff]

Moved this boat to the "junker trailer" today so that the gelcoat work won't mess up a nicer trailer. Here's the hovering shot.

[bionaraq]

I was all ready to tell you I would take a crack at the polishing/cleaning, but even I have my limits on what I'm willing to tackle. Good luck on the osmosis. I know a buddy with one of the high end Supra's mentioned that all of them get the osmosis cracking easily and that guys have reported it from one season in the water. (I mentioned leaving the boat on the water for a week during our holiday vacation and he asked if it was safe for the gelcoat to do that.)

You can keep your black boats though. My Yamaha's Black lower stripe was a ROYAL pain. once the sun fade had hit the one side, seemingly no amount of cutting/buffing would fully remove the "haze" and it drove me absolutely batty everytime I walked up to it. My wife thought I was crazy and told me I was seeing things. All black just sounds like a bad burn waiting to happen on a passenger on a full summer day!. Though, if i remember correctly there are a few rare full color nautiques. One all green, one all yellow?, and two all black hull/deck everything boats.