Just to follow up for those of you kind enough to share thoughts or for others who read the thread, here are the results.
After reading the web pages about "limitations of moisture meters," I went ahead and purchased a
budget moisture meter. I bought
this one, based on the review of a
boat surveyor who said he had some decent use out of it. I was aware that it would not be perfectly accurate, but that it would give me a relative idea of one area vs another.
For a basis of comparison, I used it on a bone dry bulkhead, but one that was in chilly air. (About 5 degrees Celsius inside the
boat after a cold night.) The meter said 13% at all places on the bulkheads. I then checked the entire
deck (about 12 degrees Celsius since the air outside was warmer), and everything rated as 3-4%, with one area in shadow reading 6%. When I cycled through all the modes, the highest reading I could get was 12% (and that was with the meter set to an unrealistic 'masonry' mode).
This, coupled with the fact that I can't find any soft spots, makes me cautiously optimistic.
On the other hand, I'm also more aware of my ignorance. It turns out that a lot of the areas at the edge of the
deck that I was worried about don't have coring at all: they're solid
fiberglass. It seems that the signs of
work around the holes where stanchions etc were removed were actually just the PO plugging the holes with something (butyl tape, I think) to seal them against the rain during transport to the warehouse
storage.
The 'two different sounds' I mentioned in terms of a percussion test turned out to be areas with: a) one layer of fibreglass; b) two layers, where the
hull and deck overlapped at the joint. So, 'solid' and 'solider'.
Thanks for the
advice, all!
Linear Mode
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