Bimini top tips please

[[2574]]

We're just in the process of instructing a bimini to be made for our boat. The plan is for an arrangement such that it can be used whilst sailing and covers almost (about a foot gap between front of bimini and back of sprayhood) all of the cockpit. We're having silver material to reflect the heat and building in side and back net screens to shade from the afternoon evening sun. On a collapsible framework. The whole thing seems to cost about £1,500 so if anybody has a top tip I'm all ears!

Planned cruising ground is UK then Baltic then Atlantic France & Spain and finally Med.

rob

 

[wanderlust]

I got a frame made by a local s/s fabicator for £200. We bought the Sunbrella fabric and my wife made the cover. Ours is 10ft x 5ft. Go for a dark colour as they are less prone to failure in tropical sun. Dont know why but they are. We sailed across Atlantic and back with ours and it is still in good condition.

 

[adrianb]

Depends if you want "budget" or a nice tidy proper job - If you want THE BEST then I can give a superb SS fabricator, and the top cover guy near Hamble, nay, in the world !



Adrian


oh and I'm allowed to put this in so there ! www.cleanandshiny.co.uk

Authorised and approved !

Thanks Keith

 

[MoodySabre]

I've just bought an umbrella from Ikea that clamps on the pushpit - £5.99 but it's not marine grade /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[vyv_cox]

Don't have the framework too collapsible. You will need to keep the bimini up in all conditions, it's hot and sunny even when the wind blows. You will certainly need your side curtains, ours zip on and are used often. It's an obvious point but the main problem with a home-designed bimini can be that you cannot rotate the winch handles.

Consider making it robust enough, perhaps with an arch, for fitting solar panels and your GPS, Navtex and emergency VHF aerials, plus maybe anchor light.

 

[Bajansailor]

Copied below is a photo of a fibreglass bimini I built for our Challenger 35. The mainsheet is just forward of the goalpost supporting the forward end - the goalpost also has a gallows for the main boom to rest in.
It has three main purposes - keep the sun off, support the solar panel, and collect rainwater when required.
I also have bolt on canvas side panels for when the sun is low and still strong. These panels are port, stbd and aft, and can be rolled up and secured.
The aft end is supported on a S/S tube fitted horizontally between the two backstays.
This bimini has put up with 8 years of harsh tropical sunshine with no worries - the only maintenance it has had has been a coat of 2 pack acrylic paint on a couple of occasions since it was built - and that was really just for cosmetic purposes.

I am guessing that the total cost of the GRP materials was less than GBP 40, although I think the canvas side panels were probably about GBP 80 (from a local sailmaker).

(The garden light in the flag pole socket on the cross beam supporting the aft end has its own little solar panel, and was a useful anchor light - until it disintegrated because it did not have an affinity for salt water.....)

 

[alandee]

Hi. We had one made last year by a company in Gosport. It cost us £1650 and it LOOKS fantastic. However the problems are: The frame which started to rust six weeks after fitting collapsed mid channel when the screws holding it onto the boat pulled out and the whole thing collapsed. When left up in the rain it collects water and drips through. The stitching rotted where the retaining straps are sewn onto the bimini half way through the season. When the bimini was fitted to the boat in the first place the two monkeys doing the work were wearing Doc Martin boots and did untold damage to the coach roof and teak deck. When I refused to pay untill everything was put right I was threatened with a court order to pay and was told that the damage to the boat was because they were having trouble getting staff! My advice to you would be to talk to as many other boat owners as you can and look at the work they had done. Avoid Gosport.

 

[graham42]

alandee.

ive had similar problems with the company operating out of woolverston marina, ipswich.
the bimini is 13ft x 6ft and is single stitched and without tension straps.
company also made a stac-pac and repaired mains`l. wouldnt use them again. they operate out of the blue baker premises.

they used similar excuses too.