There are lots of reasons for redecking a boat. Maybe the old surface is beginning to look a bit tatty or it’s suffered some damage. Perhaps you want to cover a glassfibre deck to make the boat look smarter. Whichever it is, you should pause before you pick up the phone and ask your boatyard to recommend a teak fitter.
Most of the world’s available teak is now plantation grown. Not necessarily a bad thing, it has nevertheless opened up teak forestry to new regions with different climates. Some say that the result is an inferior wood quality from trees that grow quicker and less uniformly. Shorter planks with erratic grain clearly make it harder to fit a teak deck, for instance, and one experienced fitter I spoke to said the rate of rejected planks and remedial work was pushing the price up dramatically.
A real teak deck now costs from around £840/sqm fitted, making even small boat decks a big investment. Fortunately, there are lots of alternatives to teak, from cork to PVC and even EVA foam. They all have their advantages and drawbacks – read on for the low-down.
Still the most common teak alternative, synthetic PVC panels have been an option for decades. The material is designed to mimic the grain and colour of real teak as closely as possible, but being made of plastic, it doesn’t weather or wear. It requires no more than a sponge down or a spray wash to clean and you can even sand out stubborn rust or burn marks.
It usually comes in long rolls that are ready designed to resemble two caulked planks. For custom fits, the supplier welds strips of this together to build up a deck panel, which can be edged with another PVC strip to resemble a margin board. CNC routing can create almost any pattern, logo or word you desire in the panelling. Some manufacturers also supply the rolls for simple DIY installations, in which case you glue the strips together and stick them down.
Manufacturers have developed a whole palette of different shades, ranging from brand-new wood to vintage teak, and you can select caulking in either white, black or grey/silver. There are an increasing number of non-natural colours available, too, including carbon, off-white and titanium. These are more about giving your boat a certain look and feel than replacing the teak.
Originally, PVC decking weighed about 6kg/sqm and it was notorious for absorbing the sun’s heat. Just as with denser teak wood, the decking could be uncomfortable to walk on barefoot in the heat of a Mediterranean day. Flexiteek has since developed a second-generation product containing microbead fillers that reduce the weight and density by one third. Unsurprisingly, the fillers also cut the warming potential of the decking too.
Other brands, such as Permateek and TekDek make a virtue of the fact they use no fillers at all and only virgin PVC. The jury is still out on which product is better, but with numerous examples of both types of PVC decking still in faithful service, it might just be a question of whether you plan to sail in hot climates, and whose colours you prefer.
Available in 14 different colours with three caulking options, Permateek was recently launched in a new High Grain (HG) variant, which is said to be a step up in resemblance to real wood. Made in Ringwood, Hampshire, the product comes in ready-made panels of straight-planked ‘wood’ for easy DIY fitting, or you can get custom decking made up according to a template. Permateek will sell you a patterning kit to template and fit the deck yourself, or send in its own team for a fee. Prices range from around £200-550/sqm depending on the complexity of the panel.
Specced on new boats from the likes of X-Yachts, Grand Soleil and Hanse, Flexiteek can be easily retrofitted too. It comes in 11 base colours and can also be CNC milled to put a logo, pattern or name into your decking surface. However, it is not available for amateur fitting – this is strictly pros only! Sister brand Isiteek (easy teak) is dedicated to simpler DIY jobs using a roll of PVC ‘planking’ which can be cut and joined to form panels. Flexiteek costs from £342 to £462/sqm and the deck for a 40-footer would be in the region of £8,000.
Manufactured in the UK, TekDek calls itself the “original” PVC decking material and distances itself from others in the market by using no fillers. TekDek suggests this results in a more stable product, but it is also heavier and absorbs more heat. It comes in four natural tones, and a grey called ‘London blue’, with a choice of caulking colours. Prices range from £264/sqm for sheets to £696/sqm for ring decks on sailing boats.
Launched just over a year ago and also made in the UK, Evo Decking aims to provide the most realistic synthetic teak on the market. It comes in six natural shades, plus charcoal and titanium with the usual three colours of caulk. DIY is not an option here – Evo Decking is only available for professional fitting and costs from £600/sqm fitted.
Andrew Adams used Evo Decking to replace damaged teak on his boat’s bathing platform. The detailing was so good that the synthetic product perfectly matched the existing teak in the cockpit, saving him an estimated £6,000 of replacement costs. “I’ve had other synthetic decks on other boats, and they always look good, but this is the first product in the market that really looks like wood,” he says. “You literally can’t compare the two! It’s the way that the colours are blended into the product. It practically looks like it has knots in it! There are swirls that mimic a natural wood.”
Three years ago, Mark Turnnidge bought a well-used Hallberg Rassy 36 and set about returning her to mint condition. “We’d had a 312 before that, but decided we wanted slightly bigger,” he says. “This one came up, but it wasn’t in the greatest of condition when we got her – lacquer work below was faded and the deck was fairly well shot, and the engine was tired.”
The old teak deck was leaking badly, so he wanted to lay a waterproof synthetic deck instead. Doing the rounds at the Southampton Boat Show, he was instantly impressed with the Evo Decking stand. “It was head and shoulders above what others were doing – it has that ability to look and feel like real wood.”
Elite Teak were quoted in the region of £20,000 to remove the old deck, build and fit the new. But a significant element of the job was filling and fairing the glassfibre substrate. “Stripping the old deck off took six to seven days with two guys going at it – it was glued and screwed with over 2,000 screws,” he says. “Then fairing took two weeks, because they had to let the epoxy cure between coats. Templating was very, very quick. Deck manufacture was done in a day and a half, and fitting was just a few days. Some of the detail work took a bit longer.”
The cockpit coamings were done in a plain teak band and Turnnidge had the toe rail capped with a 60x10mm PVC profile. Using more Evo Decking profile and a stainless steel core, he engineered grab handles on the coach roof himself which looked so good that Elite Teak is adding them to its range. “I’m very happy with the results, and it’s just lifted the boat,” he adds. “She looks that incremental bit better again.”
You see the odd boat alongside that has cork decking, and it is growing in popularity here. Compressed cork has almost all the benefits of PVC, plus some advantages of its own. It is flexible, easy to cut and fit, lightweight, naturally cool and insulating, anti-slip, hardwearing and waterproof. What’s more, it is entirely sustainable in its pure form – indeed some argue it is carbon negative!
Set against all this is the fact that it doesn’t closely resemble teak. Although different tints approaching solid wood can be achieved, the texture is always the piecemeal, dappled effect familiar from your favourite bottle of plonk. “Cork looks like cork!” says Tye Conway of Elite Teak. “There’s no question about that. On the other hand, it can be CNC-machined, so you don’t have to stick to traditional lines.”
The other catch is that it can cost 10-20 per cent more than PVC, although still cheaper than teak. Like teak, cork will slowly weather over time, unless you treat it with a protective coat of polyurethane sealant every five years.
It is very flexible to install. DIY kits allow you to lay the cork in 6-9mm thick strips, just as you would with real wood, then apply caulking. Suppliers can also make up sheets for you to cut to size, or do a full templating and custom build. As you can’t screw deck fittings directly to elastic cork, you may need to use inserts instead from a stiffer material such as Delrin.
One of the longest established cork decking brands, Marine Deck 2000 is distributed in the UK by Eco Marine Deck of Plymouth. The material is actually manufactured by a Dutch company which has been at it for more than 40 years. It is formed under 400t of pressure from pellets of Portuguese cork that are synthetically bound and then cut into sheets and strips. Eco Marine will supply it in planks from £420/sqm, sheets or as a fully custom-made deck from £660/sqm, ready for professional installation.
Produced by Germany’s Multicork Solutions since 2003, Oceancork has found its way onto the decks of superyachts and daysailers alike. It comes in two variants: pure cork and rubber cork, both available in large panels. Multicork recommends an 8mm thickness for the best balance between longevity and weight, but says that thinner cork can be useful around contours. In addition, it will supply strips or panels made up with caulk lines, as well as a full custom deck service. You can fit these panels yourself or engage a shipwright.
Elite has 30 years of experience laying decks of all sorts, including its own cork product. Costs from £600/sqm installed, but it depends very much on what has to be removed first and how much fairing is required.
Based in France, Seacork is sold mainly locally and in the US. However, it has loads of experience building decks for smaller sailing boats and tenders. Note that it supplies the product in various thicknesses to your specifications, so the service is better suited to DIY fitters.
This is an Italian supplier of cork decking, which would again work for the DIY fitter, or someone with a willing shipyard on side. It has experience of building decks for larger sailing yachts
It is rarer to find foam decks on sailing boats, but they do exist – especially in the racing world. It is easy to machine and fit, giving a supremely comfortable padded finish that lends itself really well to high-pressure competitive sailing with lots of people sitting on the rail. Even away from the race course, foam decking can turn the cockpit coaming or locker lids into a pleasant perch. From TP52s to J Boats, Wayfarers to tenders, foam is a cheap and quick-fit option.
Manufactured under licence in the UK, Seadek comes in an unrivalled range of textures, colours and patterns. The joy of EVA foam is quite how flexible it is as a material, facilitating finishes that are impossible in wood, cork and PVC. But while one of the possible textures has a grain-like effect to it, nobody would ever claim that ‘brushed mocha’ foam got close to looking like teak. It comes in a solid sheet, 2in and 4in strips, diamonds, fractals and hexagons.
As a deck covering, foam is not just springy, it is also waterproof, easy to adhere, anti-slip and helps to insulate for both heat and sound. Some have questioned its durability and for those there is a heavy-duty version called Seadek HD. This is designed for commercial and military use, and was the decking of choice for the TP52 Gladiator belonging to Tony Langley as well as the new Gunboat 80 Highland Fling XVIII. It has a durable outer shell which can be applied in single ply 5mm sheets, or laminated with any classic Seadek finish underneath. Either way, Seadek will make up panels to your measurements with a 3M peel-and-stick adhesive backing for simple installation.
Standard machined Seadek costs from £182/sqm, with one fitter quoting around £250/sqm all-in for templating and fitting. Seadek HD costs around £190/sqm all-in, although prices go down if a deck plan for your boat already exists.
Made in Britain despite the name, Wässerdek is 6mm-thick covering made of two-ply EVA foam. You can choose from seven colours for each ply, such that when the top layer is routed out for caulk lines, the colour underneath is revealed. It is available in three patterns – plain sheets, planking effect or honeycomb lattice, and there is the option of cutting a logo, design or name into it too.
Wässerdek will send you a templating kit to measure out the different panels you need, then make them up to fit yourself (or get the yard to do the job). Again, stick and peel adhesive makes it is easy to install. Or you can get it templated, cut and fitted by Wässerdek for £300/sqm.
The closest alternative to teak planking is a composite called Eco Teak – made by binding sawdust into stable planks along with a bit of pigment. It is made by Euro Design and available in three standard colours: weathered, brown teak and yellow teak, but custom options are also available. The product can be laid in just the same way as real teak (which the company also supplies), but it will also make up custom panels that are pre-caulked and adhesive backed for simple sticking down. The result is cheaper than real teak and cooler to walk on. And because it uses a by-product of the furniture trade, Eco Teak is said to be sustainable.
Treated softwood is another possible deck material. Welsh-based Lignia is sadly no more, but the non-toxic pickling process behind the Accoya brand can turn fast-growing pine into durable hardwood with incredible longevity. It is widely used for cladding buildings and in outdoor decking, and has recently been used to redeck SS Great Britain in Bristol. It is being evaluated by US superyacht builder Westport, and supplies are readily available from timber merchants. Attempts to introduce it to the marine market have not been successful to date – perhaps because of Accoya’s ‘surface checking’ or fine cracks. These don’t affect its performance, just its looks.
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