Old Princess Teak Deck Removal

[Dino]

A friend of mine has an old Princess 414 with very poor teak decks. They are rotten and lifting and causing leaks. They appear to be some sort of teak veneer on plywood. He priced the replacement with synthetic teak but it was big money and he would have to prepare it for the fitter.
So he is looking at a DIY removal of the old teak and replacing the decks with a few layers of glass mat followed by a good deck paint or similar covering.
Has anyone taken on a job like this themselves?

 

[petem]

It's worth looking at KiwiGrip, @MapisM has done a similar upgrade / downgrade !

 

[Dino]

Yes Kiwi Grip has been mentioned as a good deck finish.
Would thickened epoxy be a suitable filler for the screw holes?
was then thinking 4-6 layers of fibreglass matt.

 

[kashurst]

taking the old teak off should be straight forward. The deck underneath is gel coated fibreglass on a P414.
Worth getting an electric chisel to speed things up a bit. Once it is all off and cleaned back hopefully any leaks will be caused by old screw holes. Easy enough to countersink and fill if small. If the damage is more than that, epoxy filler or worst case maybe some fibre-glassing.

I would see what the deck looks like when its all prepped and cleaned before deciding on a finish. Awlgrip and others do a range of suitable paints that would provide good looking and hard wearing solution for not too much money and you just mask the edges and paint it on.

 

[Divemaster1]

No electric tools = Hard work and bruises pending ... New Aft Decking (hard work)

 

[Hurricane]

Yes, like Pete says, I remember that MapisM has used that KiwiGrip which I believe is applied like paint.
Maybe MapisM will come along and explain better.

You must have seen my recent thread on DIY Synthetic Teak
DIY Synthetic Teak
I used the Trakmark range of synthetic teak which is much cheaper than other similar systems.

But advice in removal.
The old teak is probably stuck to a base mat made from glass mesh.
We found that the best way to remove the old was to remove any screws that you can see in the old teak.
Then ease the old up at an edge using a chisel.
Then when you have enough up, drive hardwood wedges between the old teak's base mat.
From there is is then just hard work.

We tried using a router to cut grooves and make it easier but that didn't really work for us.
That KiwiGrip will produce a much easier deck to keep clean but I prefer it looking like new.
Wood teak doesn't do it for me but synthetic teal seems to be easier to keep clean and should last longer.

 

[MapisM]

Yes Kiwi Grip has been mentioned as a good deck finish.
Would thickened epoxy be a suitable filler for the screw holes?
was then thinking 4-6 layers of fibreglass matt.

The answer to your question is definitely yes.
But I see no need to cover the decks, after removing the teak, with ANY matt layers. I mean, the deck of GRP boats are designed to be self-sufficient in terms of structural strength, without the need to have a concurrent layer of teak glued on top.
In fact, in most boats, teak is available as an option, and obviously the deck has to be strong enough without any additional layers.
So, you only need to recreate a smooth surface for the application of KiwiGrip (or any other non-skid paint of your choice).
And this is true regardless of whether in your boat teak was an option or was standard, because in the latter alternative more than likely the deck came out of the mould with no diamonds anti-skid surface, but also in the former case, any pre-existing antiskid surface embedded in the gelcoat was probably routed out before applying teak. And even if it weren't, it would be impossible to recover the original GRP+gelcoat finish anyway.
In any case, additional matt layers would only make the job harder, aside from adding some useless weight.

I never made a full fledged thread on all the 3 categories of works involved, i.e. old teak removal, surface preparation, and KiwiGrip application.
But the job was debated in a few threads (see links below), where I also posted some pics of the results, if you would like to have a look.
I can't guarantee to be able to answer anymore specific questions you might have, but feel free to try!

Refitting job #1
Eventually, the real deal
Kiwi grip deck paint - anyone used it?

 

[Dino]

Great info guys, thanks