Rubber Gunnel Replacement

Sailm8 · Nov 16, 2010

Try here:
http://www.tacomarine.com/cat--Rub-Rail--rubrail.html

google "rubrail"

Joe · Nov 17, 2010

Here you go....

http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wc...playLevel1&N=710+2011389&omniTag=Category:Rub Rail

Old Skool Neil · Nov 17, 2010

The original factory rubrail was manufactured by Kirkhill Rubber in Brea, CA. I have no idea if it's still available from them as the market dried up by the late 70's and Kirkhill went the way of aerospace and other markets. The Taco reference is a good one, their product #V11-0232 is the closest to the profile we used.

You didn't ask but I'll throw it out there anyway, the way we installed the rubrail was to start at the bow at the midpoint of the rubber, snap it on by hand along both sides leaving maybe a foot hanging off the stern. As I recall, we trimmed a little notch at the bow to accommodate the stem fitting. We would tie ropes to the tails and their other ends to a forklift, the forks raised to the height of the hull/deck joint. Then we would back up the forklift, stretching the rubber so it extended past the stern maybe 3 - 4 feet.With wood blocks for protection, we'd double clamp the rubber a foot forward of the stern, trim it to length and through bolt the end cap. Sheet metal screws with washers were driven on the underside of the rubber, spaced approx. 5 feet apart. Last was the bow casting.

Old Skool Neil · Nov 17, 2010

ukrsindicat said:
Wow! Fork lift? I thought I could have replaced it by hand...

Hmm, i dont think I can get the forklift on the floating dock.

Understood. As we weren't building them on floating docks it wasn't an issue for us.

The stretch really smoothed the rail out, no sags or lumps. Any means of stretching will do, perhaps a come-along attached to a cleat on the slip across the gangway from you. Or 2 come-alongs to 2 cleats. The trick is to pull on each tail simultaneously. Warm weather helps too.

Winkfish · Nov 17, 2010

ukrsindicat said:
From above link, it looks that rub rail is a two piece application. One riggid vinyl insert goes on the hull/deck seem and then other Soft Durometer rub rail goes over it. Am I right?

You're basically right, but your plastic insert and rubber covering may be slightly different. I couldn't tell from your pics what yours is like. You may want to take a small section apart to see how it goes on for your boat.

On my Whaler, the plastic insert attached to the seam has a wide groove facing outward. The rubber bit that goes on top is like a "C" with lips on the ends that curve out. The plastic insert is attached to the seem with screws, then you pinch the "C" together to get the lips into the grooves of the plastic insert. Once you get it in one place, you use a rubber mallet to gently tap the rest of the rubber in. I just used my hand to stretch it out as I went along.

Old Skool Neil · Nov 17, 2010

The Newport 30 did not use the rigid insert, only the softer rubber.

Come-alongs are cable winches ($20 per) but if you're going to use the engine to do the stretch you won't need them, sounds scary to me though.

Maybe you could set an anchor far out in the channel and pull against that?

P.S. Your boat is beautiful!

Wanted to acknowledge your compliment, thank you.

Joe · Nov 17, 2010

Or you can use your mainsheet tackle.... if that's not powerful enough.. run the tail to your primary winch.

Jalepeno · Nov 18, 2010

Looks like you have the outward flange type of joint.
My post on the CAL forum should be relevent to your application:

"I've been doing a lot of upgrades on my CAL 25 mkII. One of the nagging issues since I purchased her three years ago has been the condition of the rub rails. Most production power and sailboats use a "shoe box" style of hull/deck joint that used a basically flat rub rail to cover the joint. This type of rub rail is relatively cheap and easy to find. Some boats use an “external flange” style of joint and it is extremely difficult and expensive to find a rub rail to fit. Sailboats such as CAL, Santana, Newport and I believe Crown along with some others use the external flange type of hull/deck. The factory CAL joint uses pop rivets about every 4 inches (100mm for those that are not bilingual) to hold the joint together during manufacturing. The back inside of the joint is then filled with fibreglass and glassed over with multiple layers of glass cloth about 8 inches wide. This makes for a very strong and water proof joint. Essentially the hull and deck become one structure.

The CAL 20 and the classic flat top CAL 25 use a one-piece “C” shaped snap-on rub rail to cover the joint. My CAL 25 mkII and all of the larger CAL’s that I looked at use a two-piece design. The main part was a horizontal "H" shaped plastic strip about 1.75" square that fit over the flange and was held on with glue and screws. The second piece was a semi circular plastic cover cap that inserted into grooves on the outside of the “H”. My hull/deck joint is fine but the 31-year old rub rail was in a very sad state.

I searched the Internet, sent many emails and made many phone calls winter and finally found a solution that did not cost “an arm and a leg”. Actually it cost about ½ of a boat unit. Steve Seal at Seal’s Spars & Rigging supplied a 60 ft long piece of CAL 20 rubber “C” shaped rub rail. I pulled off the old ones, cleaned up the joint and installed the new ones by myself while at the dock in the Nanaimo boat basin one long hot day (it was a 6 beer job) last summer. You need to plan the project and do it on a hot day.

Here is the contact information for the rub rail supplier:

Seal's Spars & Rigging
1327 Sherman Street
Alameda, CA 94501
510-521-7730
http://www.sealsspars.com/gunnelcatalog.html "

Rubber Gunnel Replacement

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