Stress cracks around outdrive on 23 footer

[VKRUE]

Hi everyone:

I have a couple questions concerning a boat that one of the guys that I work with has recently bought.

He has purchased a 23' Rinker... Captiva 232.

I believe that it has a big inboard engine... it's a merc at any rate.

There are stress cracks around the lower side of the outdrive / lower unit spreading around and outward from the outdrive unit itself. One of the cracks has passed under the transom and extended about 3" toward the bow (in that general direction).

Would you buy a boat with these cracks around the out drive ???
Are they as serious as I think they are ???

The guy that bought the boat doesn't think anything of them at all... "Every boat has stress cracks, every boat... no biggie. The salesman wouldn't have sold me a boat that wasn't right" Mind you, this guy admitedly knows nothing at all about boats... a lot about race cars... but, nothing about boats.

Before selling the boat, the salesman took this guy and a friend of his out on the lake in this boat... without life preservers... and took the boat up to full speed (55 mph) and just to prove that it could not be capsized (at full speed) he turned the boat around... a hard turn to port... as fast as he could.

I am guesing that this kind of driving / sailing (whatever) is possibly what caused these stress cracks in the first place.

Your thoughts.................... ???

[marshmat]

(1) The salesman is an irresponsible hooligan.
(2) The stress cracks could be superficial; then again they could be an indication of ongoing failure of the hull laminate. There's no way to tell without a thorough, detailed inspection.
If the boat's going to have a beefy sterndrive and big motor, it had damn well better have a sturdy and well-braced transom that can take that kind of loading. I certainly would be giving it a very, very thorough survey before buying, if I were to consider it at all.
Of course it won't capsize in a tight turn. It's a heavy, very-deep-V monohull. It'll bank inboard like crazy. If you screw up even a little bit doing a reckless hairpin turn like that, it'll spin out and smash in the hullside on the adjacent rocky shoal long before it capsizes!

[PAR]

Vic, I think the Captiva has a 350 (around 230 HP) mated to an Alpha drive.

Rinkers aren't the best built things going.

My questions would surround if they are truly stress cracks or go through the gel coat and into the laminate.

Stress cracks could indicate age, hard use, etc. Cracks in the laminate would suggest it's been backed into something or been hit by something.

Open up the cracks and look to find the mat. If the mat has color, they're probably just stress cracks and a reasonably easy repair. If the mat is pounded, white or clearly has fractures and delamination, you know you'll have to grind back to good material and make a repair. Get inside the engine box with a flashlight and look around the gimbal housing mounting plate, checking for cracks. If they roughly indicate where the cracks appear on the outside, it's probably taken a healthy shot on the drive and the area should be considered suspect.

[Ike]

I agree with Marshmat and Par. What the boats needs is a thorough condition survey with probing and testing in the area of the stress cracks. If they are just gel coat crazing, then it's only cosmetic. If they extend through the laminate the the boat needs major repair work.

The salesman is an irresponsible idiot and I would refuse to even deal with him. Personally, I would run, not walk, away from this one as fast as I could.

I spent two years of my life dealing with a whole model line of boats that had this problem and they were totally unseaworthy. We nearly had to take the manufacturer to court to get them to fix the boats, and some were so bad they had to replace them.

[VKRUE]

Thank you everybody, for your quick replies.

I'm going to try to convince this fella to at least have the boat inspected by someone who knows boats... and is not just trying to make a quick buck !

Your answers were just as I anticipated...
Possibly cosmetic but, should be inspected at any rate.

Again, thanks guys.

[Poida]

VCRUE
Nave some faith in humanity, salesmen don't lie.

Tell yer mate to buy the bloody boat.

The worst that can happen is the back end could fall off, and by the sounds of it, it probably will.

But heck that's the chance you take in life.

That's what coastal rescue is for to balance out the boat salesmen.

It is my pleasure to give you some responsible advice.

Poida