Deck cracks in cockpit area

[Mikestpaul]

Hi Guys
I own a 1995 Catalina 30 MKIII and recently found several cracks on the floor of the cockpit. Pictures are included for you to look at.
I have several questions:
1. Any idea of the cause for these cracks?
2. Do they look structural or cosmetic?
3. If you've had a similar problem, what did you do to correct?
I spoke with a guy at Catalina yesterday and he was very helpful. He indicated there are sometimes "air pockets" between the fiberglass and wood subfloor that can crack over time when pressure is applied (like walking on it.) He suggested drilling a small hole through the glass, use an l-shaped wire to determine if such a pocket exists and then drill into the wood to determine if it's wet. If the pocket exists, he suggested injecting epoxy into the cavity.
Any and all thoughts are most appreciated.
Love the boat but this problem has me spooked!
Thanks.
Mike

 

[Ted]

You forgot to post the photos.

 

[Mikestpaul]

Thanks. I inserted the pix.

 

[Stu Jackson]

Start with Captain Tolley's Creeping Crack Cure, available at WM and most other chandleries, maybe here, too.

 

[Joe]

The most important thing to find out is if the wood is damaged beneath. The easiest way is to simply drill a bunch of small holes around the cracks to determine the extent of wood damage. Your decision will then be to either inject penetrating epoxy into all the holes....or do a full re-core of the cockpit floor... which means fiberglass work. Either way, the non skid will not be easy to duplicate. So you should plan of replacing the cockpit non skid completely. There are a number of products.... one or two that look similar to the diamond pattern that Catalina molds in to their decks. Here's a link to get started Non Skid

On my boat, I had zillions of spider cracks in the non skid. I resurfaced the entire boat's non skid with Kiwi Grip(which rolls on)... It looks fantastic... Since you have a much smaller, rectangular area... something like tread master would be easy and economical fix. I've heard a lot of good things about the "faux teak" products also.

 

[Ward H]

How long have you had the boat? Did you have a survey on purchase? Do you know anyone who may loan you a survey meter? Even if you had a survey a few years ago and it didn't show high moisture in the cockpit floor, contact the surveyor and ask him to check it now. With the pedestal and pedestal guard, which someone is always grabbing, you may have water intrusion softening the encapsulated wood.
Surveyor should also be able to determine if there are any voids, which is what Catalina was saying.