hi, 

i have looked at your pictures.

as to the bow, it's pretty straight-forward, sand it back to the wood/straightening it out, use epoxy wood flour to build up any area you need, reglass (feathering it into the rest of hull) and re-varnish/repaint.

i have done this same repair after an accident with a boat and broke off about two inches of the bow.  so i just reglued it on with epoxy and faired it in/reglassed.   my hull was painted so after i was done, the repair was not detectable.

you do appear to have some water damage.  it's important that if you have a gouge that goes into the epoxy/wood, that you dry it out, re-epoxy to ensure waterproof and then varnish or paint over it.

easy to change to a painted hull is also an option.

h

   In the process of sanding down the deck. I imagine I shouldn't expect to be able to fully remove any water damaged spots? Ie, I can't sand them out without sanding into the next layer of plywood? So if I varnish it'll show through but getting down to it and sealing with epoxy will make it waterproof and resilient for further adventures.

Very much appreciate the advice!

   Also, it appears to be a slightly modified Chesapeake 18? Measured and it's 17'10" long.

I totally agree with hspira's advice, except that I would paint the entire boat.  That will eliminate the all the consmetic concerns.

   A little update, I've got most of the deck sanded down to wood. No glass was laid over the deck, but I've read this was SOP years ago. Most of the blemishes have been reduced or removed, so I'll likely leave the deck varnished and paint the hull.

Any tricks or tips when it comes to sanding tight areas like the combing? I want to make sure my epoxy sticks down nicely.

sounds like great progress.  glad to hear you are satisfied with the results.

i would recommend that you glass the deck as part of putting it back together.  it does not interfere with eventually varnishing the deck as it will turn clear.  but it does protect the deck much better than epoxy alone.  as you mentioned, it was SOP a long time ago not to glass the deck.  but when i have refinished my older boats i made the upgrade.

on tips for tight sanding areas, i usually make some custom sanding blocks out of scrap pine that fit into the areas that i am trying to get at.   that certainly helps.  i also just pace myself and mark off a small section to focus on and complete just understand i will do one section a session and space it out over a couple days.  lots of times, for that kind of sanding, your hand just starts to ache due the the grip and pressure your are applying as you can't bring in a power sander or other tool that does the work for you.

also keeping your sandpaper fresh and using the right grit to get the work done is helpful. i am much better than i used to be of starting with a courser sandpaper to get the intial work done (e.g., carve out a bump) and then going to finer paper to clean it up.

hope that helps

  Deck is nearly ready for glass. Seems like it makes sense for me to glass it and go ahead and finish out the epoxy on the deck prior to flipping it and prepping the bottom for new varnish. Any thoughts on getting the deck glass and epoxy down prior to flipping and sanding the varnish on the hull? Thanks so much for all the advice so far!

   I realize that it's quite late for me to weigh-in here, but I quite like the "sinister" bend in your bow! If it doesn't affect performance, I'd be inclined to leave it. Great talking point!

I agree glassing, fairing, and painting are good recommendations -- though you would not necessarily have to paint the entire hull. I can imagine a slashed paint job near the bow that looks appropriately piratical and threatening.

   Well I've already taken care of the bow, ended up just lopping it off and sanding a nice curve up and back into the deck. Ended up looking nice.

When I bought the bought, I was told it was a Chesapeak 17 (but this was not from the original builder/owner.) When I measured, it turned out to be almost 18' (17'10") so I figured it was a Chesapeak 18. After more measurements (in particular the cockpit placement and beam) it seems I don't have a Chesapeak at all, but a West River 180. Took me a while to figure it out because those models were discontinued ~18 years ago! So it's seen some time. The deck is looking great, cleared down to the wood with many of the blemishes coming out (and only  adding one new one!). I'll fiberglass it this week, so it should be stronger than ever and back in the water in September.

Good choice.  Who wants a sharp, pointy bow like that, anyway?  You could poke yourself in the eye walking around the car tying it down.  Worse than a BB gun, your mother would say.  <;-)

Seriously, I wish you all joy of getting her cute little nose pointed out to some nice destination on the water.

.....Michael

   Actually, that doesn't look like a WR 18, those were multichine hulls, i.e. there were 4 panels per side of the hull (8 total). That really looks like a Chesapeake of some sort. I've built both boats. If it's got a hard chine hull, two panels per side, it's a Chessy.

George K

   Really interesting, George! I believed it was a WR 18 due to the cockpit placing, I didn't take a look at the WR hulls. 2 panels per side on this boat.

Were there any early Chesapeak designs that had a different cockpit placement? She measures 17'10" from bow to stern (prior to cutting off a little bit of the bow) and about 7' from the stern to the back of the cockpit.

   my guess is it is a Cape Charles which is a Chris Kulczycki design and a pre-cursor to CLC....it was 18 feet and pretty similar to a chesapeake.

here's a link to a picture:  https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?p=chris+kulczycki+kayak+designs+cape+charles&fr=mcafee&imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fplansforu.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2016%2F04%2FCape-Charles-Sea-Kayak.jpg#id=-1&iurl=https%3A%2F%2Fplansforu.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2016%2F04%2FCape-Charles-Sea-Kayak.jpg&action=click