Wooden name plates

Hey everyone--I'm looking to get some wooden name plates to put up on the sides of my Monk 36' by the sidelights. Anyone know where to go for something like that? Thanks!

The guy who did my transom name change also made my side plates. So check with a local yard for the name of the transom painter and see what he can do.

I just refinished mine.The letters are routered into the wood, painted bright yellow, which looks good against the teak. A good woodworker might be what you need. You could do the letters in gold leaf(Menzies might), mine are gloss oil paint. I varnish(Cetol) the whole board, letters and all.

Have you thought about a no maintenance solution such as Starboard name plates. Boatoutfitters.com will make them out of layered Starboard and you will never have to refinish them.

BruceK said:

I just refinished mine.The letters are routered into the wood, painted bright yellow, which looks good against the teak. A good woodworker might be what you need. You could do the letters in gold leaf(Menzies might), mine are gloss oil paint. I varnish(Cetol) the whole board, letters and all.

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Bruce:

Mine look bright yellow too. They are gloss white paint on teak, then several coats of varnish over that, resulting in the yellowing.

koliver said:

Bruce:

Mine look bright yellow too. They are gloss white paint on teak, then several coats of varnish over that, resulting in the yellowing.

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Interesting Keith. I use yellow paint, but the varnish likely accentuates it.
I liked Comodave`s idea of something that won`t need refinishing, but my boards, in a sad state when we bought near 10 years ago,are original to the boat. I think I have an obligation to preserve and maintain.

Contact Buckwoodcraft. They have a good reputation. They made a custom shower grate for Hobo that came out better than expected.

Custom Engraved Name Boards -- Teak & King Starboard Color Core

You can do them yourself in a weekend if your handy.

I redid mine in gold leaf and show how on our blog, "grandbankschoices." Burrow down to find it.

Wooden Dock Sign

I made this out of cherry with Tung oil.
It hung from our Dock Box from April thru Nov.
I filled the voids with epoxy mixed with blue pigment, let cure and sand, then finish.
The board had a blemish that came out initially.
I am going to look into King Color Core

Greg

I've done it 3 different ways and they each have their own charm:
1) Traditional hand chiseled. Actually, this was done by a professional before I acquired the boat. The letters were painted in and the teak nameboard was oiled. Looked very nice and was probably pretty pricey.
2) Laser etched lettering. I took my wood nameboard to an engraver who had a laser engraving machine and they burned the letter in. I then painted with white paint and covered with several coats of varnish. Looked fine, but the lettering wasn't smooth so the paint didn't fill nicely. This was my least favorite choice, but you can pick any font that's in the computer to use.
3) Painted on. I laid on 2 coats of varnish on my nameboard and then had my wife paint with white One Shot sign paint. After that I laid on 6 more coats of varnish and it made the lettering look yellow. This was a great solution and my favorite overall of the three methods. With this, you are limited to the skill of the painter but everything is smooth and easy to refinish with another coat of varnish annually.

If you want a side by side photo of the methods, I can take a picture of them. Just let me know.

Larry M said:

Contact Buckwoodcraft. They have a good reputation.

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X 2. Excellent quality.

Wood is nice, but many of us try to reduce maintenance rather than increase it.

So I went with black starboard, spring priced, nexoensive white vinyl lettering by BoatUS. That is on clear plexiglass and screwed on for easy replacement every 3 years or so when the vinyl curls from the heat of the black starboard. Black letters might have lasted longer on a white background.

I wish I could find a closeup of the ones I made many years ago - they are clearly visible on my avatar Pic. The local chandlery carried teak of varying sizes and thicknesses. Was fairly simple to make a suitable size with an "L" wing to mount a nav light. I had vinyl letters made and just varnished the whole thing. Worked fine for over 20-years. Didn't require much talent or effort to make and probably cost $30 or so.

During the refurb of Scot Free in 2014, I decided I wanted varnished name boards.

What I did was went to a lumber yard (Houston Hardwoods) and selected some nice stock Honduras mahogany. I then cut the plank to the size I wanted for the transom name board, two side name boards, and a board to place an image of the the ‘ships mascot’. I call him Hamish.

I then drew out how I would like the boards to look and brought them to an old fashioned wood sign maker. He took my designs and put them on an overhead projector then drew out in pencil and routed out the boards.

Hamish is a copy of a Scotch decanter that I had found in an antique store about 20 years ago. He lives on board. I took pictures and using the same overhead projector technique, traced him out on a board.

The results were pretty good. I used yellow paint for lettering and the letters stood out well. I had thought about gold leaf but rejected because of perceived cost.

The boards held up well with just occasional varnish touch ups but after four years in the southern sun I redid them this year. This time I used gold craft paint but the lettering didn’t show well from a distance. I solved that by outlining in black.

Originally they had five coats of Epifanes. This time I did ten. I also varnished the backs of the boards whereas originally they only had one seal coat.



Original pencil drawing on boards



Hamish decanter



Attached to transom



Start of refinishing



Side boards

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Transom board

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Hamish sitting on his whiskey barrel.

Ok. I don’t know what happened to the photographs there. Last two are not from my boat and not from my photo gallery, they are not mine. They seem to be inserted in place of three photos I had posted of the refinished boards.



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McGillicuddy said:

Ok. I don’t know what happened to the photographs there. Last two are not from my boat and not from my photo gallery, they are not mine. They seem to be inserted in place of three photos I had posted of the refinished boards.

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Ok. I reposted the three pics of refinished boards and two are (again) replaced with two pics from unknown source. Any mod care to find out what is happening here?

White starboard with navy blue shaded letters from BoatUS

Picture of trailboard I made from off-shelf teak and vinyl letters. Varnished over the entire thing. Has held up fine over 20-years

mvweebles said:

Picture of trailboard I made from off-shelf teak and vinyl letters. Varnished over the entire thing. Has held up fine over 20-years

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Oops - here's the picture

menzies said:

The guy who did my transom name change also made my side plates. So check with a local yard for the name of the transom painter and see what he can do.

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Go to website for Paul White woodcarving; he does very good work.

No matter what you choose, just make sure that your transom lettering is clearly visible to overtaking vessels. My policy now is: if I can’t read your boat name, I can’t contact you on the radio and if I can’t call on the radio, I can’t arrange for a slow pass. In that case I just give the appropriate whistles and go on by at 10mph.

sbu22 said:

X 2. Excellent quality.

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X3. He did a great job on our name boards and hail. We got teak boards with carved letters and did the gold leaf ourselves. He uses a CNC or similar to carve them but fusses with letter spacing on the computer so they look hand carved. You can tell when they are machine done as each letter occupies the same amount of horizontal space and is the same distance apart. He places them individually so it looks appropriate.

Gold leaf is a learned skill. Getting it applied in deeply carved letters was a pain for us but ended well.

Woodland Hills said:

No matter what you choose, just make sure that your transom lettering is clearly visible to overtaking vessels. My policy now is: if I can’t read your boat name, I can’t contact you on the radio and if I can’t call on the radio, I can’t arrange for a slow pass. In that case I just give the appropriate whistles and go on by at 10mph.

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That's nice, but the rules for marking a documented recreational vessel do not require the name and hailing port to be on the transom.


Richard

They also require 4" letters but I find that many I see, me included, are short of that a bit. I have not heard of CG/LE pulling out a tape measure to check. I am entertaining a dinghy davit and if I did I would move them to the sides as suggested above.

Took the “1 and Done” approach with Stainless Steel cut out . . .

JimW said:

Took the “1 and Done” approach with Stainless Steel cut out . . . View attachment 98971

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Very nice. Whodunit?

JimW said:

Took the “1 and Done” approach with Stainless Steel cut out . . . View attachment 98971

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wow, thats really cool

Britannia said:

That's nice, but the rules for marking a documented recreational vessel do not require the name and hailing port to be on the transom.


Richard

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Correct....The law also prohibits negligent operation .

For those that don't believe it....

From the NVDC....

"The name and hailing port of a recreational vessel must be marked together on some clearly visible exterior part of the hull. The vessel name of a commercial vessel must also be marked on the port and starboard bow and the vessel name and the hailing port must also be marked on the stern. All markings may be made by any means and materials that result in durable markings and must be at least four inches in height, made in clearly legible letters of the Latin alphabet or Arabic or Roman numerals. The "hailing port" must include both a place and a State, Territory, or possession of in the United States. The state may be abbreviated."

46 U.S.C. § 2302(a) provides that a person operating a vessel in a negligent manner or interfering with the safe operation of a vessel, so as to endanger the life, limb, or property of a person is liable to the U.S. Government for a civil penalty.

rgano said:

Very nice. Whodunit?

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I friend who has a print shop, he sourced the vendor, he used laser cutter to cut out the letters from a 1/4” stainless plate, then cut to shape, offset mounted on Teak. Sure there are other sources with same equipment to do the same job. If you cannot find one I can provide more information. BTW . . . Nameplate lettering meets the 4” requirement, also have lettering (not stainless) on the bow and stern (with Port of Call) as required.

Standing by -
JimW