Winter Projects

Nancy · Post by **Nancy** » Fri Nov 09, 2012 11:48 pm

Michael,

I don't think your boat ever resided in Canada, but it was owned by a Canadian couple immediately before us. The wife freshened the interior Cetol right before we bought it, and it certainly holds up well in the cabin.

As for the swim platform, I took it down to bare wood in the fall of 2005. The wood was so uneven that I had to take a belt sander to it. I'm no wood expert, but I'm not sure that it's teak. It might be mahogany. I have a photo of it after sanding - not sure if it would be helpful to you, but I can send it you want. I never put gloss on it, just regular Cetol. I put an additional coat on every year, but it probably could have been prepped better where chipped. We didn't find it particularly slippery.

Nancy

Big D · Post by **Big D** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 8:31 am

We can probably tell from a close up picture of the grain even now if it's teak or not. Nancy, when you say uneven, did it seem like the grain was higher and there were valleys in between? If so, this is classic teak after several uses of two part teak cleaner. If it's OEM of that vintage, I would think it's teak. When you get into my vintage, they used a combination of teak and mahogany throughout the boat including mahogany for exterior items.

Nancy · Post by **Nancy** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 7:19 pm

Big D, I don't know if the grain was raised so much as the whole thing was just, well, lumpy. A palm sander was useless. I didn't get it completely smooth as I didn't want it to be slippery.

Hart · Post by **Hart** » Sat Nov 10, 2012 7:42 pm

I really like the look of the Cetol Natural Teak - looks close to an oil finish.

I think that, after looking at so many photos and reading so much on the Cetol finishes, I'm going to proceed on my original plan for my platform and cockpit sole.

The swim platform has a coat or two of Cetol Marine on it. I'm going to give it a light chemical stripping, I'm going to sand it just a bit, clean with a decent two-part system or something comparable, and I'm going to oil it with boiled linseed cut with mineral spirits.

For the cockpit sole, all it needs is a two-part clean/bleach and then the oil application. If I need a couple coats of oil, fine.

I don't mind the prospect of cleaning/oiling my swim platform and cockpit sole every season. That's a type of work 1) I can do, and 2) actually enjoy. If I don't like the results at the end of next season, I'll re-consider the finish of those two members

Thanks for the input/photos.