non-slip decks

[stephan shugart]

Any information, materials or techniques for adding a non slip deck surface to one-off male mold cored deck surface. Since the deck is cored can't lay done pattern and then laminate. Have to finish one side then flip the deck to laminate the other. Is putting sand or grit in the final laminate coat my only option.

[Lew Morris]

Stephan,

I posted a similar question about anti-skid materials (see Boat Design Forums/ Construction/Materials/AntiSkid) and found Gibco Flex-Mold. Gibso manufactures vinyl sheet that has a texture calendared (embossed) into it.

This "transfer sheet" can be cut to shape with scissors and is used with Awl-Grip, or Gelcoat, or epoxies to "mold" the texture onto any surface. They make "right reading" (my term) textures for repair use, and "reverse reading" (my term) textures for use in pattern/mold making operations where you want the texture to be correct in the molded part.

Call these guys up and ask for their sample swatch kit... it's free. You will find that they make textures used on most of the boats being manufactured today... and a ton more. There are several hundred swatches in the kit.

Gibco Flex-Mold
Phone: (817) 236-5021
Fax: (817) 236-5020
Email: gibco@swbell.net

[pjwalsh]

I have had good results using the plastic nonskid grit sold by paint manufacturers applied using an el-cheapo gravity feed cup gun.

You may need to do some experiments to find the right size tip and quantity of grit to blend with the paint depending on the materials you are using. You can adjust the roughness of the nonskid by making slower or faster passes with the spray gun, or by adjusting the pressure, or by changing the tip size. Definitely do some practice runs first.

I copped this technique from a really talented tool finisher at North End Marine - it is how they create the texture for molded in nonskid surfaces.

Look at TEK-DEK for U.K. on the web.

[War Whoop]

Gibco has a great system they have shipped it to me half way around the world before BUT the best “non skid” I have used over the years is Awl grip Grip Tex fine it sprays thru a standard spray gun and you can be real creative with the taping...

Personally I like and use a lot of the decorative nonskid finishes! On one project I placed samples of every known material on the floor then wetted it. There were 4 Boat Captains present and tried the various Materials and the Grip-Tex won. The simplest of them all was the best actual non skid... BTW the Military likes it too.