Weathered Toe Rail

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From: Wayan2 (Original Message) Sent: 16/03/2008 22:46
I have a Tophat Mk 3 with seriously weathered gunwhales. Before I replace the current timber type I wondered if anyone had any other ideas for something that will stand the elements a bit better.

Thanks,

Wayan 2



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From: TomT_007 Sent: 20/03/2008 18:48
To all who love their Top Hats,

I was surprised there was no response to Wayan 2. I to have a seriously weathered gunwhale. What is more urgent is it has now broken, and I am left with doing a patch up job or replacing it completely.

There must be someon out there who has replaced the gunwhale on a Top Hat. I couldn't be that hard.

If you have received a solution Wayan 2, I would appreciate your advice.

Tom Transfield
Alley Oop at lovely Parsley Bay.

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From: Storm_Petrel_ Sent: 20/03/2008 19:35
Hi Tom,

The gunwhales on my MkII were very weathered and they have had a couple of damaged sections relpaced with similar beech. I just sanded them back and varnished them. Evan though they are a bit rough they came up resonably well. I will however have to replace them in long term and would be interested to hear what others have done.

I spoke to another tophat owner last year who had replaced his completely with beech as per the originals but I do know how much it cost him (he has since sold his boat).

Cheers,
Mark

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Sent: 23/03/2008 00:15
This message has been deleted by the author.

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From: mmts1 Sent: 23/03/2008 15:15
Hi Tom,

I have recently been through the dilemma about what to do with the toe rail/gunwales. My tophat is a Mk1 and its teak toe rail was looking very ordinary and sections had broken off. A patch up job really wasn't the go, As we all know time is money, and the time spent by a shipwright removing sections scarfing and replacing can quickly add up. I also looked at replacing the teak with an alloy toe rail.I t was about $250 per 6m length (this doesn't include a genoa track) fastenings for this was about $50 and labour to fix it to boat would have been about $560.00

After a little deliberation I went for a total teak toe rail replacement, it looks much nicer and it worked out a little cheaper. the teak was purchased from SWI in Mona Vale, all up cost for material was 16.4 mts of Burmese teak $455.10 + a set up fee for profiling the teak of $90 + GST. Labour costs well that worked out at about $65/hr say for a full day to replace both sides, I assisted in a small capacity with this work mainly supplying an extra set of hands, a bit of drilling screwing, bolting and plugging. The end result after only two coats of varnish looks pretty good. My boats up at Parsley bay if you want to check it out "Mari Anne" The work was done at "Brooklyn Marina" shipwright was Greg Lowe.

I'll attach a photo if I can work out how to do it

[Sombrero]

Sombrero has had a few minor scraps while racing. I replaced damaged toe rail sections scarfed in and shaped in situ. To overcome the colour difference between old and new timber I coated the full rails with several coats of Bondcell jarrah stain varnish. The overall finish is very good. It looks like new. Quick and painless!

'SOMBRERO' H1421
John Streader.

[auriga]

I just last week took care of such a problem

The original timber toe rails were heavily rotted and looked very bad, i stripped these off and replaced with a rubber gunwale. The rubber sat quite well over the hull/deck joint and finishes off the whole thing quite nice.

Will post a photo after i next go out. Rubber cost about $250 plus bolts etc for a further $180.

cheers
dan