Laying a new cabin sole (cont)

The most obvious method to replace the sole would be to purchase replacement teak and holly plywood and cover the existing sole. This would be done by carefully cutting and panels to fit over the existing sole. This method would make an attractive repair. The material is available in several different dimensions. If I were to match the existing sole, I would have to insure that the teak and holly strips were the same width. Since there are few square angles in the boat, it would be very difficult to cut the plywood to fit precisely. The wood venire would be just as thin as the current sole. This means that if the sole were damaged in the future, I'd have the same difficulty making a repair as I'm currently faced with. Teak and holly plywood is also expensive. I considered several alternatives to teak, including hardwood flooring, laminated flooring and teak parquet. Hardwood flooring is available in numerous woods and finishes. The boards are typically ¾" to 1" thick. I am reluctant to lose headroom in the boat so I eliminated hardwood flooring as a possibility. Laminates are very attractive and inexpensive. Some have problems with moisture, but some newer products are designed for wet areas such as bathrooms. They typically have custom locking joints milled in their edges. They are easy to install as long as the floor is large and square, but are very difficult to cut and fit into tight quarters. They are also very slippery. Parquet has its roots in nautical tradition but is not commonly found in sailboats. The material comes in prepared square tiles that are easy to cut and install. They are usually made from simulated teak or teak substitute woods, but can be purchased in real teak wood. This would make a good looking sole and would be easy and cost effective to install. Since I planned to only replace half of the cabin sole, I decided to stick with something that would match the existing sole. I would purchase teak and holly boards and mill them to ¼" thick strips that are the same width as the existing sole. These would be glued over the plywood sole. Teak can be purchased as finished boards from suppliers such as West Marine and Defender. This is a very expensive way to purchase wood. It is not normally stocked at lumber yards however. There are wood specialty stores that cater to cabinet-makers and hobbyists that carry exotic woods. I found a local hardwood supplier that has both teak and holly in stock. Wood is normally sold in rough-cut boards. This is normally sold in quarter inch measurements. 4/4 would be four-quarter-inch thick (one inch), and 8/4 stock would be eight-quarter-inch thick (two inch). Hardwood is graded by quality. High grade wood can be very expensive and difficult to find. Too many flaws can make the material difficult to work. I don't mind some minor flaws in wood since it gives the work some character. In my opinion, if the material is flawless, it looks like a laminated composite. My distributor had teak in stock as rough-cut boards of various widths and lengths either 4/4 or 8/4. Boards were typically between 6 and 9 inches wide and about 7 feet long. All were a very good grade of wood with some minor flaws. Teak was sold at $13.50/board-foot. I calculated that I would need 20 board-feet of teak to resurface the aft half of the sole. I purchased four pieces of 4/4 teak. NOTE: Today's price (6/29/08) is $19/bd-ft. Holly is more difficult to find and more expensive that I expected. Since I needed so little of the material, I decided to purchase enough to complete the whole sole rather than just the aft half. This would insure that I could complete the entire job at a later date without hunting for holly. The yard had a very limited selection, most of which had numerous knots and cracks. I calculated that I would need about 5 board-feet to complete the entire cabin. The distributor had one piece of high grade holly that he offered for $35/board-foot, but I chose to purchase the less expensive grade and work around the wood flaws. I estimated that I would lose about half of the holly stock because of flaws, so I bought 10 board-feet. Grade-C holly was sold for $15/board-foot.