Practical Boat Owner – June 2019

Can teak veneer inlaid with maple ever match original sole boards of

teak-faced ply with holly strips? Roger Hughes shows it can be done

P

art of the remodelling of the

chart table area on my 45ft

(13.7m) schooner involved

making a new section of

floorboarding – or to use its proper

nautical term, the cabin sole.

After the heavy chart table and

moulding had been chopped out I

discovered the floor beneath was just

rough plywood, unlike the remainder of

the boat, which was beautiful teak-faced

ply inlaid with holly strips.

I naturally wanted any new floor to

match the boat’s existing sole.

I scoured the web and other sources to

find teak plywood with whitewood strips to

match the floor pattern, but I was unable

to locate the exact pattern anywhere. I

thought that using a different pattern

would look like a botch job.

The area was not large (1.37m x 0.91m)

requiring just over half a standard 8ft x 4ft

sheet of 19mm teak-faced ply. A full sheet

would have cost in excess of $400 with

delivery costs and still have no white strips

• an expensive section of floor, with nearly
  half left over and nothing to use it for.
  So I decided to try to copy the exact
  pattern using a different approach.
  I bought the finest quality 8ft x 4ft sheet
  of 19mm smooth faced plywood I could
  find in our local hardware store. It cost $47
  and they cut it to my rough size free of
  charge. I made an exact template using
  sheets of cardboard, then trimmed the
  plywood in my garage.
  I also decided to incorporate a lifting
  hatch in the new sole, to give direct
  access to the three seacocks and a
  battery beneath.
  I first painted all the edges and
  underside of the plywood with two coats
  of Interlux Primekote two-part epoxy
  primer, to seal the timber.
  I then ordered an 8ft x 4ft sheet of teak

I trimmed the edges using my handheld

router with a^1 ⁄ 2 in straight cutter, then

edged the hatch with^1 ⁄ 4 in wide teak. Then

I fitted a brass lifting handle to match the

rest of the hatches. The veneered board

looked superb, but the job was only half

done...

Fitting the strips

I somehow had to make thirteen^3 ⁄ 8 in wide

strips and set them into the teak veneered

plywood. However, I couldn’t find any

actual holly timber anywhere locally, or

even on the internet. The nearest match I

could find was^1 ⁄ 8 in thick maple in 4ft

(1.24m) long sheets.

I set up my bench saw with a new

60-tooth 10in carbide tipped blade which

cuts thin timber very cleanly. Using the

table saw and its guide I carefully cut

thirteen strips out of the sheet, each

exactly^3 ⁄ 8 in wide.

The next process was to machine

grooves in the teak board to take the

strips. For this I used my handheld router,

fitted with a^3 ⁄ 8 in plunge cutter which I set

to produce a^1 ⁄ 8 in deep cut. I taped the

end of my vacuum hose to the router to

suck shavings out from the tool and

prevent them building up in the groove.

I placed the router level with the centre

of where I wanted the first groove, then

tightly clamped a stout straight timber

board to the floorboard to act as a guide.

It was then just a matter of slowly

pushing the router along the guide, which

The new section of inlaid floor (far left of picture) is a near perfect match for the rest

veneer. Good quality veneer is not cheap

and my sheet cost $157 including

shipping. This was 'quarter sawn' meaning

the grain is pretty straight along the 8ft

length with no swirls or knots in the

pattern. It was not paper backed like most

veneers, but Okoume wood backed and

very suitable for flooring and flat sections,

like bulkheads. I was advised to let the

sheet acclimatize for 24 hours before

trying to glue it to the plywood, to

minimize any shrinkage or expansion

once it was glued to the plywood.

The easiest method to glue veneer to a

largish stiff substrate like plywood is to first

copy the outline of the ply on the

underside of the veneer with a felt tip pen.

With the veneer placed flat on a level

floor, contact adhesive is then spread over

the area within and just over the outline

drawn on the panel. Then adhesive is

similarly applied to the plywood.

I used Weldwood contact cement and

poured it out of the tin, then spread it

using a serrated trowel.

When the glue is nearly ready to bond,

instead of trying to locate the large wobbly

sheet of veneer accurately on top of the

plywood it is easier to carefully lower the

plywood on top of the veneer, to the

guidelines already drawn. The teak can

then be trimmed to remove it from the

whole sheet, turned over and smoothed

using a wide blade plasterer’s trowel. This

squeezes all the air out and minimises the

chance of future bubbling of the veneer.

Inlaid veneering

PRACTICAL

(^3) ⁄ 4 in ply £36
Teak veneer £120
Maple boards £30
Brass lifting handle £16
Contact adhesive £10.50
Liquid Nails foam glue £3
TOTAL £215.50
I didn’t need to buy Rmax foam
insulation or Cetol wood varnish as
I already had some in my garage.
Costs (approximate)