Experienced boat owners know that your boat only looks as good
as the quality of its wood. But sometimes maintaining that wood’s quality can
be tricky. Wood, after all, comes from organic material. Properly sealing and
restoring wood will require a little more than the occasional wiping with a
damp cloth. But boat interior wood restoration doesn’t have to be rocket
science, either. Here are a few of our favorite tips to help make the process
easier.
Ongoing Wood
Maintenance
In boating as in life, “an ounce of prevention is worth a
pound of cure.” If your interior wood already
looks good, that’s great. But its appearance may hide a few things going on
behind the scenes, which is why it’s important to pay attention to your wood as
part of ongoing boating maintenance. Here are a few tips to keep in mind:
- Keep your
wood sealed. Use our End Grain
Sealer Kit to prevent the kind of
rotting you’ll read about more in the next section. This sealer will lock out a
number of issues that can lead to dry rot, and it can help your wood maintain
its original strength and luster. That’s key to maintaining both the appearance
and performance of your boat wood. - Keep your
wood clean. Unsealed wood with regular exposure to the marine environment
is going to be highly susceptible to a number
of problems. To keep things simple, employ a versatile Boat Cleaner to make
cleaning and drying your wood part of the regular boat cleaning process without
having to pick up an extra bottle.
These two habits alone will do a lot to keep your wood
sealed and protected. But our focus here is on wood restoration.
Restoring “Tired” Or
Dry-Rotted Wood
What happens if it’s already too late for you to maintain
the habits you found above? If you need to go with a “pound of cure,” you might
still have some options for your interior wood restoration. Here
are a few of our favorite tips:
- Tackle
dry rot with our Git-Rot Kit.
Dry rot can be one of the most vexing challenges for new boat owners,
especially if you’ve never encountered it before. Our Git-Rot Kit uses the
natural capillary action of the wood to deeply infuse itself into the core and
rebuild the strength of the original wood. - Use Fix Repair Putty for
small leaks and holes. Although this putty is versatile enough for use with
fiberglass, metal, and glass, its performance with wood is our focus here. Fix
Repair Putty, once cured, will bond to wood and can even be sanded down with
the rest of the wood. This makes it an ideal tool for fixing leaks.
Want more ways to restore your boat interior? Then visit all
the products here at BoatLIFE
to find the cleaners, repairers, and restorers you need to get your boat
performing like new.
