One Response to “MacGregor 26 rub rail”

• Andy Cryer says:

  01/12/2009 at 12:42 am

  Hi there, I am not sure what sort of rub rail is on the MacGregor but with smaller boats like the Wayfarer they usually come with a rubber strip in a D profile which is screwed to the gunwhale of the boat. As this becomes damaged it starts to look tatty and more importantly exposes screw heads which can start to cause damage to other craft or simply fenders etc. With Wayfarers, I simply remove the rubber strip and replace it with a wooden strip of something like Maranti (Meranti) not sure how its spelt? I use sikaflex to adhere the strip onto the gunwhale and stainless steel screws at around 6 inch intervals countersunk into the wood to cover the heads and then just round off the corners for good measure. This provides a much better finish than the original rubbing strake and means that if it does get damaged you can simply scarf in a new section rather than replace the whole thing.
  Make sure you use sikaflex though! Any other non marine mastic simply wont do the job. Usually if I have to remove these rubbing strakes at any time, the bottom surface of the wooden strip will actually come away before the sikaflex comes off the boat.

  hope this helps.