Do battens to stick to the interior have to be plywood?

[steve yates]

Probably a dumb question, but I'm no diy'er.

I got some strips of wood 3mm thick from b&q to glue to the hull inside bethfran, for the purpose of screwing pine cladding to it, after sticking closed cell foam to the ground between the battens as insulation. The battens seemed flexible in their long length, but when cut to 15cms they don't really bend anywhere near enough to follow the hull curve, which is quite slight.

Am I using the wrong kind of wood? Can't even remember what it was exactly, but definitely not ply.

Thanks.

 

[LadyInBed]

3mm thick seems a bit thin to screw into, 6mm would be ok.
A way to achieve this would be to run your 3mm battens the put a 3mm pad where you want to screw.
For the short lengths, just use 6mm pads.

 

[chrishscorp]

If it is out of the mouldings rack at B & Q its probably Ramin which is a hardwood, very flexible untill in short lengths. Ply may well be better but even then you may need to cuts in the back of the ply in order to get it to flex enough depends how much the hull curves.

 

[steve yates]

3mm thick seems a bit thin to screw into, 6mm would be ok.
A way to achieve this would be to run your 3mm battens the put a 3mm pad where you want to screw.
For the short lengths, just use 6mm pads.

I was quite happy for the screws to go through to the grp for a couple of mm

 

[prv]

I wouldn't expect ply to be significantly bendier than solid. If anything it might be the other way round.

I reckon you either need to stick to long battens, or switch to short pads which don't cover enough hull to need a bend. Your 6" lengths are neither one thing nor the other.

If you can't bend the stuff to fit the hull even in long lengths, you could try steaming it. Some types of wood get soft enough to tie knots in, while hot.

Pete

 

[Daydream believer]

Possibly you could try some thin plastic & cut that into strips. Use something like plastic angle section, or a length of square section downpipe & slit it. It becomes quite flexible then & may not split when a screw goes into it. Need to get the right glue to stick it though.(sticks like ??) Have a look in the rack for something at B & Q.
The other option is thin strips of aluminium. That is expensive if you want more than a couple of lengths.
Finally you could make your own fibreglass strips in situ, provided it does not melt the foam behind- (paint it with 2-3 coats PVA first). Just put some strips a 3-4 of layers thick, wherever you want them & then screw through those.
If you are worried about the foam melting, cover it with polythene fixed with lots & lots of drawing pins. Cast the fibreglass strips. Let them go off. Remove them, remove the polythene, then stick the ribs that you cast in place with sticks like adhesive.
I have not tried Duct tape, but instead of polythene you might find 3 inch wide duct tape might be better than polythene as it will sit tighter to the foam base.It will be wide enough for 2 inch fibreglass tape strips

 

[Neeves]

Another alternative is use even thinner strips of wood, I've used (re-cycled) the slats from wooden venetian blinds, and lay them up, one on top of the other. being thin they will bend, more easily, and if you adhere using epoxy - they will be quite robust.

Another method, a variant on Daydreams suggestion, is lay up your own fibre glass sheeting onto something that will peel, polythene sheeting is cheap. Cut the width you want and then epoxy these strips together to the, approximate, shape you want to achieve. If this is going to be too heavy - find some thin foam (as used in boat building), again bend roughly to shape and glass both sides - then cut into the strips you need.

If you want to bend accurately to the shape you need then use packing tape and lay up onto tape (more difficult onto vertical surfaces).

Jonathan

 

[Poignard]

Why do you have to use such short lengths (15cm)?

 

[stevie69p]

Mads (of Sail Life on youtube) is using foam board cut into strips for battens to attach things to the hull of the Warrior 35 he is rebuilding. May be an alternative to wood?

 

[Graham376]

Bendy plywood is available in various thicknesses - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Flexible-B...ywords=flexible+plywood&qid=1575803382&sr=8-1

 

[steve yates]

Why do you have to use such short lengths (15cm)?

Because Im an idiot and mix up cms and inches! Apologies all, it was 15 inches. I spent 2 hours before posting hanging wall prints in the studio and all the measurements and calcs were in cm's, so I had a brain fart and wrote 15cms instead of 15 inches.

 

[Daydream believer]

You need metricating :encouragement:

 

[LadyInBed]

Because Im an idiot and mix up cms and inches! Apologies all, it was 15 inches. I spent 2 hours before posting hanging wall prints in the studio and all the measurements and calcs were in cm's, so I had a brain fart and wrote 15cms instead of 15 inches.

Does that make the battens 3 inches thick? No wonder you are having trouble bending them

 

[steve yates]

no I got that bit right! Tho above I even quoted the wrong reply, from nerves instead of poignard. Fixed that now but some days I shouldn't be allowed out.
Anyway, thank you all for the suggestions.