New Sprayhood - Wathermax 80 or Sunbrella?

[wizard]

I would never even concider polycotton, the cotton content will give you problems with rotting, colour fastness, shrinkage and mildew.
PVC goes stiff with U.V degradation.
Sunbrella is an Arylic canvas and it's worth noting that their stated max wash temp is 30 and not 40 degrees. The fibres will contract with heat at 40 degrees and shrink. Bear this in mind if washing.
Another problem with older canvas is when it's never cleaned, dirt becomes ingrained over the years and stiffens the fabric making it less flexiable. I'd also recommend taking the canvas off the frames every year and cleaning the frames, the canvas can "stick" to the frames when dirty and then the canvas is tight when trying to stretch down at the sides.
Acrylic canvas including Sunbrella should be fitted tight and will then stretch in a few days to a user friendly fit.
If it's taken off for a while it recoils, contracts and will be tight again the first time it's put back on
Most will know we are not the cheapest, but anyone with our work will have adjustable end plugs on the frames in most cases (occasionally there is a valid reason why they are not used). These are expensive fittings and the end lug can be wound in or out, hence lengthening or shortening the framework and hence you can adjust the tension in the canvas if a slacker fit is required.
The end lugs can also be wound completely out and changed for different lengths which can be brought, they come in 3 sizes each with around 20mm of adjustment.
Hope this all helps.

John
www.tecsew.com

Have you had any luck in sourcing the stainless steel zips yet?

 

[jaybee63]

Have you had any luck in sourcing the stainless steel zips yet?

YKK are insistent that they can't produce the block and starting pin from Stainless. They reckon that stainless is too hard a material to be stamped and formed as a mass produced process.
They started development of a Stainless slider, but this was stopped and they can't say when of if they will resume work on this.
I spent a lot of time with a U.S company and they said it could be done and I had samples. They would only be available in black and the cost was around 4 times that of a standard zip and this was based on our entire zipping order being transferred to them and for the new Stainless zips, I.e we would have to be using these as standard and not as an option.

Import costs would have added to the total as well and we would not be able to put black zips into a white, beige or lighter colour cover.
Just to give an idea of cost increment, we were talking nearly £600 extra on a Bimini conversion.

 

[wizard]

Ah well, it was just a thought. You certainly get full marks for trying!

Back to the drawing board as they say.

 

[jaybee63]

YKK even brought someone over from Japan to discuss the issue but to no avail. We have put so much pressure on them and have talked to other manufacturers about producing a top quality zip for marine use, you would think there would be a massive market with wet suits and the like.
Plastic starting blocks and pins are not strong enough. They are okay with a zip which isn't undone very often, perhaps pocket zips, but with panels which are constantly zipped in and out the block breaks and the whole zip then has to be replaced and this can easily happen in the first few months.
Most people will have had a favourite jacket where the starting block has failed and the zip is then useless.