Replace old SeaDek

My deck, which has SeaDek on it now, badly needs to be redone. I tried to peel up the old SeaDek, but that seems to be pretty much impossible. Some of it comes up but then it tears. So now I have patches where some of the fiberglass deck is exposed. I thought about just putting down new over the old torn material, but the SeaDek people say that it will not stick on top of the old material.

Any suggestions? I am not wedded to using SeaDek again, but am not sure just what else might be available.

Thanks,
John

We painted our decks with Kiwigrip. We love it. Easy to maintain if you wax it with Woody Wax. Just spray on Woody Wax scrub it with a brush and let it sit for 30 minutes then hose off excess. I had to repair a section of the deck and the Kiwigrip was very tough to sand off. I finally went with my belt sander with 40 grit paper. Good news is that after repairing the fiberglass the Kiwigrip blends in very well and the repairs don’t show. The Kiwigrip covers minor cracks and defects also.

I never have (never had, actually) heard of Kiwigrip. But read about it just now, and it looks interesting. Thanks. I have some questions for the manufacturer about it, but of course will direct those to them

John

There are videos on Utube showing application. It is really pretty easy and cleanup is easy since it is latex paint. Just don’t leave the tape on too long and let the paint dry or you won’t get the tape off, just peel the tape as you go.

John
Take a look at Bacchus website - Projects section.
I did our aft / side decks w/ PlasDeck and absolutely love it.
Looks great - many comment they never saw it on other Mainships and thought it was factory done. I made patterns and dealt w/ the folks at PlasDeck for advice & info to install and it wasn't too difficult.

I ripped out carpet & padding in fwd cabin last season and installed PlasTeak to match what MS installed in the salon.
Worst part was tearing out old and prepping surface. Sharp scrapers, heat gun, acetone and coarse sander helped but I wanted to get down to clean fiberglas and suspect you will need to do the same no matter what you do.
If you are interested in the PlasTeak let me know and I can elaborate and supply some pics - I just haven't taken the time to write it up and add to my Bacchus website.
On PlasTeak advice I added the foam padding under the sheet PlasTeak and LOVE LOVE LOVE the feel - soft under foot - I wish the whole salon had the pad. Hatch wasn't even a problem - I did the template and had them pre-cut both flooring and pad and it fit exceptionally well with very minor fitting at install.

I used KiwiGrip on my sailboat. I highly recommend it. It grips nicely, cleans easily and is super easy to apply.

I think John's problem here is getting the Sea Dek off. I used to own John's boat and installed the Sea Dek about 10 years ago. So here's my .02.


John, your going to have to get the sea dek off completely and the deck underneath reasonably smooth, no matter what you go with as a replacement. No easy way to do it, but it shouldn't be super adhered, I peeled and stuck it using the pre applied adhesive, no epoxy or anything. I think I'd try scraping it, maybe use some heat. After I got as much off as possible, I'd go back and grind the rest off with a high grit sander. That might be a job to consider hiring out, it's going to be fairly labor intensive. The boat had another type of mat/non skid on the decks when I bought it in 2005, it eventually fell apart and I scraped/ground it all off. It was a big job. I was 40 then but I still was pretty beat down at the end of it. It's not skilled labor, just hard on the back. Talk to Brett Shields, he may know somebody that will do it reasonably or possibly the Lynn Brothers.



Aesthetically, I'm sorry to tell you that you're not going to like what is under the Sea Dek. The top skin wasn't leaking when you bought the boat, but it looks really bad. To get a good finish on the decks you would need to fair and sand it. There is a lot of ugly gel coat under the Sea Dek. That's why I decided to put the Sea Dek back on rather than going with a full deck grind/fair/grind/prime/paint. Given the current age and overall condition of the boat, I recommend doing something similar. Heck, the Sea Dek lasted 10 years, that's not so bad. If you recall, it looks really nice and feels nice underfoot when it's done.


I may be wrong, but I think Kiwi Grip wouldn't be great in your situation without a lot of prep. I've heard it's a good product though.



The good news is, that you don't need to worry too much about damaging the gel coat when you grind the Sea Dek off. It already looks rough, and I can tell you from experience that the top skin is super thick on your boat. I repaired/recored a few wet spots in the deck and was always amazed at how heavy they laid on the glass in 1973.


Don's Plasti Teak may work as well.


I hope this helps and I hope that you are feeling better.


Doug

Thanks, Doug. Good advice, and I appreciate it. And I'm going to check out Don's Website also (Bacchus). So lots of good pointers here. And of course the good thing is that there is no rush. So plenty of time to check things out. Thanks, guys.

John

PlasDeck products, Ohio. Google it. Great products for decking.

jwnall said:

...And of course the good thing is that there is no rush. So plenty of time to check things out...

John

Click to expand...

Now that is good news!

Check out PlasDeck ... We did our boat decking and results fantastic. Pricey but great product.