[GaryDoug]

I have been pondering this for about a year now. I always wondered what use that panel has for the boat. It gets in the way and hides the view of the rear of the engine. I asked a friend, who is a mechanical engineer, if he saw any structural use for it. He said no, and his thought was that it was just there to hide the wires, hoses, and cable behind the engine. So, last week I cut it out with a reciprocating saw. I kept telling myself I could always put it back with some steel plates to fasten it. I can tell you that there is much more access to the rear half of the engine now. The remaining panels seem just as solid as before. I spent two days cleaning out 19 years of dust and some corrosion, and it looks much better now.
I did not have a good photo of it before I removed it, so the first photo has the panel just taped in place. Any opinions?

[GaryDoug]

This has worked out fine so far but a few weeks ago, I came to an unfortunate epiphany. I think the "cover" was to keep rain from coming in over the rear part of the engine where the distributor and coil are located. The rain could come in at the back edge of the "sundeck/engine cover" and was directed away from the rear of the engine, at least that's what I assume. In order to fix that, I installed a simple rain "gutter" made from some pc cable organizer track material. I just cut it to length and cut off the curled under part, and screwed it to the edge of the remaining fiberglass. Cost=about $16
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