Teak alternative for cabin top "eyebrow" strips

[robwm]

Need some advice on alternative wood to use for replacing the "eyebrow" strips above the portholes on the cabin top on my CD22. The strip on the port side buckled and split at one of the retaining screws and is beyond repair. The other one has also started to split. So, I am faced with needing to replace them.

Problem is that to have new strips fabricated I can only find single boards that are 1"x8"x10ft and are being quoted at $350 plus. That's rather pricey ... Looking for advice on alternative woods that could be used in this application. Any suggestions??? Thanks in advance,
Robert W-M
CD22
Lake Travis, Texas

[Steve Laume]

You can buy Mahogany decking from a decent lumber yard. The stuff comes in 5/4 X 6 as well as some other sizes, if you order it. I have found it to be very straight gained and in lengths up to 18'. Ipe and some others are all great teak substitutes. The mahogany is a bit more coarse grained than teak but has great rot resistant qualities.

I am currently making up some new and stronger handrails for my cabin top. I have also made a few other items for Raven and it is very hard to tell it from teak. Most teak is not only very expensive but also from fast growing plantation trees of lower quality.

[Paul D.]

Other teak replacements that you may try to price out are Eucalyptus, iroko and Bubinga. Eucalyptus probably being the most sustainable. At least you wouldn't need much and could scarf together shorter pieces. Good luck.

[VaCD25]

Try Sapele. About $8 a board/ft I bought enough to replace all the wood on my CD25 and then some...was about $400
So far I've only replace the rub rail. I was able to buy mine in 9" x 10ft and 14ft lengths

[John Stone]

I removed the eyebrow strips from my boat and filled in the holes. To me it looks better but more importantly I eliminated 28 holes through the cabin top. All of them leaked. They served no useful purpose other to to visually make the cabin top look lower.

I have never thought of mahogany as particularly rot resistant. It great wood for sure and I have milled close to a thousand board feet. Love it. Easy to work and it holds paint and varnish well. Looks gorgeous varnished. Should be varnished if used on the exterior if you want it to last. I have built counter tops and desk tops from sapele. It's good wood but not normally left bare so should probably be varnished or painted.

Iroko is a pretty good substitute for teak rot resistant wise though not as strong as good teak. My boom gallows is iroko and I have left it bare for 7 years. It's doing OK.

Steve L is correct that plantation teak is a poor substitute for Burmese teak. Burmese teak is the only kind I use and you can find it though it's expensive. I purchase it as shorts from Impulse Trading wood company in Newport NC. https://www.impulsetrading.com/ a single plank of Burmese teak probably only 6" wide by 10' long 4/4 would do what you want and leave you some left over to cut wood plugs. That's 5 board feet. At $30 a BF it's only $150. You can scarf the strips together at 12:1 to make any length you want. It's how I built all the cap rails in the boat. I cut up the original coamings and scarfed them together to make the cap rails for the bulwarks. (2) 36' long strips all scarfed tother from 7' long strips.

Were it me and I was determined to have that eyebrow line then I'd consider painting the line to eliminate the holes. Of course almost any wood will work if you protect it. There are other exotic woods as mentioned, like bubinga, but I have no experience with them.

[tartansailor]

I'll second Sapele.
The grain varies considerably, so pick and choose to suit your preference.

[Brimag]

I added a vinyl stripe where you have your teak eyebrows .Cape Dory cost cutting on Seniors. I matched with my cove stripe. Not as nice as wood but it works for me !

[Ken Textor]

If you want info on teak substitutes or any other wood, check out: https://www.wood-database.com/
This site has every imaginable engineering and aesthetic characteristic of any lumber available on world markets. No opinions, just facts. I recently used red balau as a teak substitute and had good results. Used it in both boats and as decking on the back porch. Good luck,

Ken

[ghockaday]

Stripes matching the boot stripe

[Brimag]

My stripes are eyebrow and cove stripe . It's also the same color of the boot top.

[sgbernd]

I did the replacement with teak 16 odd years ago and have a couple comments which may be helpful.

1) The original eyebrows were half round. The mill which made my replacements made them square because they had trouble sourcing the round. After installing and varnishing them, I found water from dew or rain tends to pool in the upper edge which lifts the varnish. Were I to do it over, I'd have insisted they be round or switched to some wood which could be sourced as half round.

2) The screws securing the eyebrows are very short. The new screw holes were countersunk a bit more deeply than the original, probably to give the bungs more depth, with the result that some of the screws poked holes in the liner. They didn't go thru the liner but made spider cracks visible from inside. I didn't realise the liner was so close to the outer surface. Take the time to measure how much clearance your boat has between the liner and the exterior.

Steve