Super Jet 2015 SJ Refresh

[freshfit]

Hello!

A little background on me and the boat. I live on the west coast of Wisconsin so I ride when I can, a lot in the summer months but also have a 5/7mm wetsuit that keeps me warm even in freezing water temps. I bought the SJ new in August of 2015, since then I have kept it mostly stock, breaking ice last spring i broke my pump shoe and intake grate so I installed a Worx pump shoe and a Worx 228 intake grate. Over the past three+ years the ski has seen a lot of use and it was starting to show especially on the pole which was developing a crack from the top about half way down on each side. I have a riding buddy that has a SXR with about as many bolt ons you can do however I never really felt the need to go after more power until he installed his b pipe; people aren't joking when they say what a difference that makes... So I ordered one. And a pole. And footholds+new turf/padding. In this thread I'll be documenting the install and clean up of the Superjet.

Parts acquired:
RRP cast handlepole black/black
Factory Bpipe
Hydroturf padding (9mm, 18mm, 26mm)
Hydroturf black molded diamond turf
Throttle trigger
R.E.V. footholds

On to the pics! (ignore the mess I moved into this house in October after remodeling the interior, haven't worked on the porch or garage yet. - SJ is priority this spring while the Ol' Miss warms up)

REV footholds, Super happy with these. The install is more tedious than some others on the market but so far loving the fit/space gain.



More to come!

 

[freshfit]

Sunday was the first day of work in the garage. I'm not going to claim to be great at fiber-glassing but I've done a few projects in the past so I wasn't totally in the dark about it. Here's the foot holds going in.

Old turf off, controls off and cleaned up:



First cut after some trimming of the REVs and minor defoaming:



I Started with the easier side... I had read a couple places where people run into the exhaust on the right side. I cant see how you could install these footholds without hitting it on a stock RN:



That didn't deter me though:



The footholds required a little more modification to make the fit better. I ended up setting them into the gunwalls a bit and cut them to make them wider as you can see in the following pictures:



After I was happy with the fit I first put a couple stainless rivets where i could and then glassed them in. Here you can see towards the front of the foothold its about 3/4 of an inch wider tapered to around the middle of the hold. It seems to fit my feet pretty well, look at all that GLORIOUS tray room:



The right side ended up being far more custom. I think it turned out better as well. There are 3-5 layers depending on the stress the area will see:



View from the back:



Top down:



Can't wait to pad and turf it. The goal is to get it up and running by the end of the month. Wisconsin may have different plans. Here's the view from my window at the moment, for reference it was 81 on Monday:



My garage is not heated. Its supposed to warm up a little this weekend so hopefully I'm not at a stand still, can always get the carbs ready for the Bpipe.

 

[bird]

May 1st, are you going to be READY?!

 

[mikidymac]

For future you should remove all the gelcoat down to the bare glass when trying to bond new to old glass. You will not get a good bond to gelcoat even roughing it up.

 

[bird]

For future you should remove all the gelcoat down to the bare glass when trying to bond new to old glass. You will not get a good bond to gelcoat even roughing it up.

Can you sand down to the fiberglass if it's SMC?

 

[mikidymac]

The top deck isn't SMC it is just resin and glass.

But yes, even SMC you need to get all the paint and/or gelcoat off for a good bond.

The top is gelcoat over resin and glass.

The hood and bottom are paint over SMC.