HOWto keep decking level

[FishnMachine]

Howdy,

I have a 14 ft shallow-v.  I am adding a deck, but am having troubles on leveling it.  Should I place the level accross the supports along the bottom, or should the level be placed on top of the gunwale?  Once I have the boat level, keeping the deck framing is easy.  How have other people leveled their boats before putting a deck in?  Thanks in advance for any help.

[surfer]

My back deck is out of level.  It slopes to the back of the boat.  It doesn't really affect anything.  

If you want it level be sure to float the boat before making any level marks.  

[fishbear]

I leveled my boat and trailer, then just used my 4 ft. level to keep everything square and even.

[backpain...]

I measured from the tops of the existing benches, gunalls, and transom. I figured that the manufacturers standards for level were good enough for me. Turned out pretty good, I have never noticed anything out of level.

[rokibass]

I used the water/scum line that was on the side of the boat for reference. Also seeing I made my deck out of alum. diamond plate I didn't add much weight so it came out perfect.

Rokibass

[FishnMachine]

Thanks for all of the replies.  Unfortunately, the factory benches were already gone when I got the boat.  What I ended up doing was eyeballing level from when I floated it.  I am keeping all the bracing going off this level line.  It is somewhat a shot in the dark, but we will see what happens.  The nice thing about using wood is if it is not acceptable when finished, I can just replace the legs with shorter or longer ones as needed.

[d.hark]

The only real way to get it level is to put it in the water and fill the boat up with water to the height you want the floor and mark it with permanent marker. This will gaurantee the boat is sitting right in the water and the floor is level with how it sits. The scum or water line on the outside is another pretty accurate way of telling how the boat sits level in the water and you can then transfer those marks inside and build your floor off that, but thats still guestimating becasue of the slopes of the hull.