Storm damanged rub rail

[tagster]

I don't know if that's what it's even supposed to be called, but 's what my neighbor calls it. The rail around the whole boat (which used to be very beautiful bright work - and I wanted to sand down and refinish) took some serious heat during a massive wind storm last winter.

How would you go about dealing with something like this, especially if you want to sand and varnish the rail.

[sailingdog]

Is the damage mainly superficial, or does is it really torn up. If the damage is primarily superficial...just sand it and re-finish as originally planned.

[danjarch]

It looks like your missing a chunck of wood there. You could try a dutch boy. measure about 2to6" past the damged area, both sides. Mark face square to the top. You now determine how much wood needs to come out. find the deepest spot of damage and measure how deep you most cut in to the rub rail to get really close to just past the damage. Mark a line along the top of the rub rail, from the front line to the aft line that you made. Use a chisel or a sharp pull saw to cut the front and aft line to the depth you marked. Now use your chisel and plane to remove the wood between the mark. Now sand and clean the area. Take a new piece of wood and plane it to the right width. cut it to size. If you've done a great job with planing and chiseling, you can epoxy the new wood on. If it was a bit rougher, then use a polyurethane glue. it expands to fill the voids.
P.S. Before you start going to town with your plane, try to remove all the screw in the damged area.

[sailingdog]

If any sections are badly damaged, you might want to remove them and scarf in a new piece. It is easier and will probably look better than doing piece meal repairs.

[danjarch]

Saildog's comment made me think of something. Before you fix the demaged area, you might want to strip the rest of the rub rail. there could be other damaged areas that have been puttied over. After you have it all stripped, you might find that bigger sections should be replaced.

[tagster]

Looks like I'm going to have to get better at wood work :-) I've got a big trip coming up. I guess I'll just leave it and re-calk under it. When I get to my destination I'll strip the whole rail and see what else I find.

There is a lot of other would-be bright work on the boat. I have a feeling that since all the top-side bright work is painted over that the previous owner(s) were looking for lower maintenance. I intend to find out. :-)