TIP TOP TEAK by Captain Chris
08 November 2009 | Inlet Cove Marina, Ponce Inlet, Florida
Sunny, 80's

With the headliner off the list, we were ready to tackle our most ambitious project: refinishing the teak in the cockpit. It is strictly ornamental, unlike teak decking, which can leak into the boat and rot out the deck. Since the cockpit sees heavy use, the teak had seen a lot of wear. Between each teak strip, there is a line of caulk to seal the two strips to each other. In some places, the teak strips had worn to the point where the groove for the caulk was now flush with the top of the teak. Also, the plugs hiding the screws were worn all the way through in some places, showing the screw heads.
We felt if we were to sand the teak smooth, there wouldn't be much left of it, so we decided to go with a more natural look. The first step was a 2-part cleaner-brightener: the part 1 acid eats the worn old soft teak, and part 2 neutralizes the acid and turns the new teak back to a light brown from the weathered gray color. All this is flushed with copious amounts of water to keep from streaking the fiberglass. The second step was getting rid of the old caulk: Linda tackled most of this. It involved slicing the sides of any grooves that still had caulk with a razor knife, and then scraping the caulk out with a "reefing hook". A commercial website wanted $34 for a real one, so we promptly went to the local pawn shop and got a screwdriver for $1. A few minutes with the grinder and voila, a reefing hook! After the caulk is scraped out, the grooves are sanded back to solid wood to remove any traces of caulk residue.
While Linda was getting rid of caulk, Chris was making or deepening the grooves where we needed them. Our grooves were 3/16" wide. Videos on the internet show people using a router to work on the grooves, but of course they're demonstrating on a section of deck on top of a workbench, with lots of room all around. With bench backs and other assorted contours, I would have missed about half the grooves with my 8" diameter router base, so I decided on the Dremel tool with a 2" diameter router attachment. Although Dremel makes a 3/16" router bit, I couldn't find it locally and had to settle for a 7/32" wood carving bit. I aligned the Dremel along a straight edge, taped the straight edge to the deck, and made several shallow cuts until the groove was deep enough. I repeated this anywhere we felt the grooves weren't deep enough, and then finished the ends where the Dremel wouldn't fit with a wood chisel.
Next came the caulking: The experts say no need to tape, just sand off the excess caulk after you're done. As I've mentioned, we had a somewhat rough surface that would absorb the caulk, and then trying to sand it off would eliminate our teak. SO, blue painter's tape went along the edge of every groove before the caulk went into the gun. After everything was taped, the grooves got a final wipe with acetone to make sure they were clean, and the caulk went in. It went sort of like this: squeeze caulk into three or four feet of groove, put down caulk gun, use putty knife to scrape caulk flush with top of teak, scrape excess caulk off knife, look for imperfections and correct, then repeat, repeat, repeat. After waiting a few hours for the caulk to set, I then pulled the tape. Most of it came off pretty cleanly, but there was one section where I must not have pushed down hard enough with the putty knife and the caulk "flashing" pulled off the tape and stayed attached to the caulk in the groove. I had to attack this with the sander after the caulk fully cured in about two days.
The entire project took place over about two weeks. We worked for about 3 days prepping the teak, and then got a rainstorm which got 3 of the 4 sections wet. We caulked the dry section, then covered the other three sections with plastic in case it rained again, and took off for a week for them to dry out. After finishing the sections upon our return to the project, we gave the entire area two days to fully cure and then sealed the teak with Semco teak sealer, the same sealer we have on our handrails and companionway surround. The raw teak got two coats, the handrails got another coat as long as it was open, and that finished our quart. We'll have to recoat about every three months, but the Semco goes on with a foam brush and then gets wiped with a rag, similar to a Danish oil finish for interior woodwork, so it's very quick and doesn't require all the sanding and other fuss that varnish requires.
Yea! Another big project is off the list!
(See "Refit Wrap Ups" in the Photo Gallery side bar for the latest pictures from our activities.)