Dinghy Rub Rail Repair

[Cinnamon Girl]

We have a 9' Nissan RIB, about 1992 vintage, but in very good shape. This summer, we noticed that a section of rub rail about 6" long is beginning to separate a bit. Anyone know how to fix that properly?

[cabo_sailor]

Without seeing it, I would suspect your best option would be to get a tube of either PVC or Hypalon glue (as appropriate), little bit of medium grit sand paper and a bit of acetone.

Lightly sand the inside of the rubrail and the hull where the rail attaches. If you are a neat freak, you can even apply masking tape to the hull to contain the glue. Wipe down both with acetone. Follow glue directions. Find something to use as weights for good contact between rail and hull then walk away until glue sets.


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[skipmac]

Hi Cinnamon Girl (like the handle by the way. one of my favorite Neal Young songs).

I have the same problem with my Avon. Did a little research and I was told that the problem was because the dinghy is Hypalon but the rub rail PVC or some other material. So the glue used to bond the two dissimilar materials together eventually failed.

There are a couple of solutions from what I've learned depending on whether your dink is PVC or Hypalon.

In my case, the best, permanent is to buy a new rub rail made of Hypalon like my dinghy, clean off ALL the old glue and residue, buy the proper Hypalon glue (which is another question as there seems to be several options, each with fans saying that one is the best ) and attach the new rail. Of course being the best option it almost goes without saying it's the most expensive as in several hundred, even if I do it myself.

Plan B, which for my old but serviceable dinghy, is to buy a glue that works reasonably well with PVC or Hypalon, reglue the old rub rail and get another 4-5-6 years or so out of it.