Repair, Tools & Materials

Many years ago, one of our editors had an old wooden boat with lovely wooden handrails just inside the companionway that his sailing partner decided could use new varnish. The original coat, which was peeling around the base and worn where hands had gripped it, was sanded smooth and meticulously coated with varnish. Subsequent coats were applied according to the process that had served well for years-varnish, scuff, wipe, varnish, scuff, wipe . . . repeat.

We recently launched a new evaluation of marine adhesives and sealants. There is no single caulk that works in all of these cases, so its impossible to declare a single Best Choice adhesive, but we decided to at least put some numbers on paper to guide you in your choices.

You've made an offer on a used boat and have retained a marine surveyor to examine the vessel prior to completing the transaction. One...

You can’t maintain a boat without ordering a few marine supplies, so Practical Sailor readers offered (mostly) high praise and appreciation for our guide...

Are Marelon through-hulls a good modern replacement for bronze or a failure waiting to happen? Common refrains are: “Okay above the waterline if you...

Online juggernaut Amazon, big-box behemoth Walmart, and West Marine—with more than 250 stores nationwide—are the biggest sellers of marine supplies in North America. But...

Are the tapered plug seacocks on your boat difficult or impossible to close? If you tighten the adjustment nut enough for them to stop weeping all over the inside of your boat, does it take two hands and a hammer to operate them? If so, it's time for an overhaul. Even if they worked well last season, a little care while the boat is hauled can save you a lot of grief in the future. As part of your boat's routine maintenance, tapered plug seacocks should be disassembled, cleaned, lubri­cated, and reassembled on a regular basis.

Simple ferrous-metal oxidation is a process in which iron, oxygen, and water chemically react, and it can cause rust to seemingly weld fasteners together. This unyielding grip often turns disassembly into much more of an ordeal, but with a few, regularly available products and a good set of wrenches, the big battle becomes a minor squabble.

Owning and using a boat is all about maintenance. While maintenance is not fun—it can be filthy and arduous—it must be done if you...

In the old Star Trek TV series Captain Kirk would press a button on a machine called a replicator and request banana cream pie,...