scedistofisher said:
I'm still decking away on my 89 duracraft. Slowly but surely. Anyway last night I thought I finally completed the front desk frame work. I inserted the seat and pin into the receiver yo give it a test run. After climbing up and having a seat I quickly realized that I was too close to the elevated factory installed/ welded deck. With that being said, it will make my foot controller for my trolling motor very difficult and uncomfortable to operate. So, my question is....... should I cut the deck out inside of the rails? My concern in doing that is compromising the structural integrity of the bow. Here's what it looks like :
Assuming the question is should you cut the factory installed forward cap, the answer is no, you shouldn't cut that out.
The shape of jon boats/aluminum bass boats is inherently poor at resisting torsional forces. The basic square, open top channel is very strong in some dimensions, but is also prone to twisting down the length. Alternatively, a full box structure is significantly stronger in the torsional department. Obviously, it isn't practical in most boat layouts to fully box the top of the structure, nor is it really needed - it just requires enough to alleviate twisting.
In some cases, this is done with bench seats, but in boats that needed a more open layout, the same result was achieved by making larger, stiffer gunwale caps, and boxing them together at the bow and transom. In other words, the only thing you have resisting twisting in that boat is that bow cap, and the transom corner caps.
You will be gaining back some strength with your bow deck, especially once you sheet it, given how it is tied to the sides of the hull, but I'd still opt for leaving the bow cap, and making the necessary deck changes to make the seat base functional.
