How much caulking will I need?

[djs]

I am budgeting for a recaulking job on the teak deck. I have a good estimate of the length of seams and am interested in real world experience of how many feet / metres I would get from a 300ml tube of caulk.
The seams are mostly 5 or 6mm. Until I remove the existing caulk I'm unsure on the depth.

I'm planning on using SIS 440.

I've already allowed for a decent pair of knee pads!

Thanks
Dave

 

[pvb]

I have a good estimate of the length of seams and am interested in real world experience of how many feet / metres I would get from a 300ml tube of caulk.
The seams are mostly 5 or 6mm.

I'd work on around 8-10 metres per cartridge.

 

[nimbusgb]

Buy caulk in 'sausages' rather than solid tubes. It comes in a bigger, more economic size but does need a syringe type gun.

 

[martinaskey]

Dave

The unhelpful answer would be 'always more than you originally thought ' !

I did the same job last winter and did a rough calculation of seam volume but ended up ordering more caulking.

Although caulk is expensive my advice would be to allow for substantially overfilled the seams and then cutting back to avoid gaps.
As Nimbusgb says, buy it in 600ml sausages - you can get a 600ml gun from places like Machinemart and overall it is cost effective.
Robbins have a guide on their website that is useful but I agree with pvb on metres / 300ml (roughly).
I used the Robbins numbers and ordered 11 x 600ml but eventually had to order another 4 sausages to finish the job - approx 18m/600ml

Martin

 

[Tranona]

Relatively easy to work out. 5*5mm is 25ml per metre plus the amount that you have above the seam to make sure you fill it completely. Two methods of doing it. First is to overfill by min 2mm, let cure then clean off with a sharp chisel and sand. Second, which is the way I found better, is to mask either side, fill then smooth with a spatula, removing the masking tape almost immediately (potentially messy!).

So the 30ml per m is a minimum and more likely between 35 and 40 or up to 15m per 600 sausage. As already suggested don't bother with cartridges except for small jobs. Having just finished the job I found that masking up and filling a whole 600 sausage is a reasonable amount for a single session.

I used SABA from Marineware in Southampton. Very competitive price if you but 12 sausages at a time.

 

[antaris]

Slightly off topic, but Lidl occasionally stock an amazing tube/sausage gun - very very economic...