Best Ceiling Upholstery Material

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theredboat1

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Nov 6, 2011
2
nightwind 35 jacksonville
Fellow Boaters,

The interior of my 1982 boat is looking really, really tired. It has a white vinyl headliner that hangs in some parts of the boat. I want to remove this and put up something that I can easily take down to do maintenance on all the through-deck bolt fittings. Any suggestion on the best materials out there? I'm a pilot and thought about using aircraft cabin panels, but my buddy said they get brittle and chip easily.

My worst case option is to remove all the headliner material and just leave the glass exposed (not pretty, but functional). In this case I would have to remove all the glue. Any idea the best way to remove 30 year old glue?

Thoughts?
 
31seahorse

31seahorse

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Aug 2, 2005
1,155
Pearson 33-2 & Typhoon 18 Seneca Lake
Hello theredboat1,

We removed and reinstalled a headliner in an Irwin 31 many years ago. It was installed as wide strips from side to side across the cabin on battons on the overhead. It was stapled to those battons and then cover strips of wood were screwed in place over the seams. Removing and reinstalling was tedious as we pulled and then replaced the 10 K staples. Stretching the liner was reasonably easy.

Just brainstorming here since I don't know your boat's construction.......(1) Epoxy battons to the cabin top and stretch new vinyl material into place. With shorter battons outline the areas where there are throughbolts so you only need to remove small rectangular pieces when it is time to rebed the bolts. (2) Install thin, narrow strips of wood (or vinyl or plastic or starboard) onto any material that your vinyl is now attached to. (3) Paint the overhead after the existing vinyl is removed. Add some wooden strips to accent/break up the top.

Posting pictures of your project and progress would be interesting. Pics of my project are long gone.

Respectfully, Phil
 
toddco

toddco

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Jun 17, 2011
96
ODay 20 driveway
31seahorse said:
Hello theredboat1,

We removed and reinstalled a headliner in an Irwin 31 many years ago. It was installed as wide strips from side to side across the cabin on battons on the overhead. It was stapled to those battons and then cover strips of wood were screwed in place over the seams. Removing and reinstalling was tedious as we pulled and then replaced the 10 K staples. Stretching the liner was reasonably easy.
Click to expand
Hello ThereD,
In the mid 80's my first real job was making conversion vans. The process Phil mentioned was pretty close to the way we would put headliners in vans back then. We used sheets of masonite for the panels. There is a way to do a seamless headliner by sewing folds in the headliner cloth. The headliner would be one piece. You would then staple the fold to batten strips. This can get tough as the battens need to fall on the strips attached to the cabin top. As you stretch the headliner in, you cover over the screws that attach the battens. The other problem is finishing the running edges and the end of the last section. In the vans, sidewalls would overlap the edges. Good luck and post pictures!

Todd
 
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