Dinghy rubbing strakes

[ghostlymoron]

My GRP dinghy/tender has become quite damaged on the underside by dragging over rocks etc. I am going to repair the damage using gelcoat filler and add some wooden strips to the bottom which will take the wear and can easily be replaced. What wood should I use.

 

[Twister_Ken]

I'm no wood expert, but I'd say almost anything that you can get cheaply, and that's up to the job. Reason is that the rubbing strips will be sacrificial, so you're going to have to replace them every few years anyway, whether they are cheap deal, or expensive iroko. Frankly, I'd be looking in builders skips, and the skip at your yard!

I'm ready to be corrected by someone more into wood than me!

 

[ShipsWoofy]

[ QUOTE ]
What wood should I use.

[/ QUOTE ]

mild steel.

Seriously, this is the most common method, run three strips of flat metal, on the keel and on each side of the bottom, usually on the raised bilge bumps (I have no idea what these might be called).

I get the feeling, with wood, you may get a season before it is hanging down and catching stuff in the shallows. With metal, when you are tired and just want to go home, you can tow the dinghy up the slip behind the car.

 

[VicS]

[ QUOTE ]
Seriously, this is the most common method, run three strips of flat metal,

[/ QUOTE ] But I would put wood strips on first then the metal on that.

What wood? Well in the absence of metal strips the hardest and most durable I could find. If capped with metal soft wood might do provided it is treated against rot, otherwise a rot resistant wood.

What metal? Mild steel will rust. Galvanised will lose its galvanising if dragged over hard surfaces very much and then rust. Brass, too expensive (and attractive)

 

[jleaworthy]

I use galvanised water bar (sometimes called weather bar) from builders' merchant epoxied straight to hull. Avoids drilling through hull and into buoyancy chambers. I was warned on this forum that it wouldn't work but they are still there after two seasons.

 

[colvic987]

you can get brass or ali keel band for dinghies, try looking for them from a chandlers that specialises in dinghy spares..

http://shop.pinbax.com/index.asp?selecti...%20per%20metre)