carpet VS vinyl

[jwmiller33]

what is your preference for carpet vs vinyl? I am going to put one of the materials on the wood benches in my alum Lund. Here are a couple pics

I would put carpet or vinyl where all the wood benches are.

Is installing one easier than the other? I heard vinyl is easier...

Would all I do is take out the wood benches, wrap it with carpet, either glue or screw the carpet into the wood, and put back on bench?

thanks guys

[BoxMN]

Do vinyl, you won't be sorry! I did vinyl on pontoon and boat about your size. Works great, looks great, wears great, keeps from having soggy carpet work at rotting your wood.

Here are a couple links from my projects, I posted them before, but might help you as well.

Pontoon rehab

16' Alumacraft Classic 16 rehab

Vinyl was Dot Deco brand.

good luck with your project, looks like a fun one! Take lots of pics, I see you have started, it is fun to look back and see the progress

edit - BTW, my neighbor has that same Lund model, and he had a few leaky rivots right near where the last roller carries the transome area. His roller was too far forward and not supporting the transome. So it took a beating just forward of the transome. We had to tighen up the rivots. Easy to do, just need the air hammer rivot tool and a blocker - we used a Stainless steel axle, it was heavy and we could get it in between foam and still have enough beef to back the rivot.

While you are taking floor/seats out, you might as well make sure all rivots are tight. Just put it on jack stands and fill with water (no freezing temps of course, ha!) and look for any tell tale signs. Then jkust go and tighten those rivots. Hopefully it is tight as a drum, but now would be the time to do it, if you are replacing floor or even just the seat boards, as you would have easier access. good luck!

[jwmiller33]

wow nice projects you did! nice work by taking lots of pics.. that is definitly what i am oging to do to, so you can see the before compared to the after...

ok so say i have my 12inch by 54inch piece of wood and i am putting vinyl on it. Do I cut a piece of vinyl just big enough so it wraps around the bench a couple inchs on the other side?

Then do I glue it on? Can I just screw it into the wood and would it be fine?

[BoxMN]

Hey JW, thanks, they were [PoorWordUsage] projects, but the bracing on the alumacraft got to be a PITA due to rivoting by hand, ha! I got a air rivoter for the pontoon, wish I had it for the boat.

You want to make the vinyl larger than the wood by several inches. You want to be able to cut the corners/angle so that it totally covers the area where it will sit on the alum frame "with only one layer" of vinyl, so it will fit nice and flat, not with bunched up areas in corner from overlap. Once you do one corner you will get hang of it.

You will use some outdoor adhesive (menarrrrds or HomDep, etc.) for outdoor carpeting. Then stable the back side after pulling it tight. You will want to use a roller as well to get air bubbles out, and flatten the adhesive nice and smooth. You don't need much, as it really spreads out easily.

Then attach the wood back the same way. I would recommend SS screws, and there is even those little round screw "washers", I think you can see some in our boat pics, but we used brass not SS.... only cause I didn't know there were those washers in SS when we did it. They help hold it down without the screw turning the vinyl/ twisting ti when it gets tight. Gives it a nice finished look as well.

Make sure the wood is fully dry, or use new wood. If you got the ca$h I would use new, but I also did another boat (no pics) where I did just the seats and it worked okay. You can kind of see that wood grain through the vinyl so any bumps will show up. Not horrible, but noticable.

Any questions let me know, we have done rehabs the right way and the wrong way plenty times.

edit - f-u-n is a poorwordusage?.... oh well..., heh.

[jwmiller33]

thanks a lot! if i used carpet, would i use the same procedure?

[Rivernut]

I've had vinyl in my boat for 12 years, and still looks good. Easy to clean, and to keep clean. You"ll be glad you did vinyl. Good lick!

[jwmiller33]

would fleet farm have boat vinyl?

[Neighbor_guy]

I prefer carpet. Mabe I am bit I like the feel of it with bare or stocking feet. I have had Vinyl in the past and found to to be very slippery, especially when wet like in the morning with the dew or in the rain, and in the sun it got HOT . I pulled it and went back to carpet.

There has to be one in every croud right?

[PerchJerker]

For the seats and benches I'd do vinyl, but on the floor of the boat I prefer carpet over vinyl. Good luck, looks like you have a fun project ahead of you.

[DTro]

There's really only one circumstance where I prefer the carpet on the floor, and that is when it's about 30 degrees and you are catching a bunch of fish. All the slime and splashing water from the fish likes to freeze, and boy that vinyl gets slippery.

[Deitz Dittrich]

Vinyl is way easier to clean.. But carpet is quieter and more comfortable.

If you fish with kids, animals, or clutzes, get vinyl.. otherwise go carpet.

[Ray Esboldt]

Them Boxes do nice work, don't they?

I am vinyl man myself. Now that I have it in a boat, I never want carpet again.

[jwmiller33]

im going to fleet farm right now to check our vinyl VS carpet first hand! i will let u guysknow how it goes in about a hr

[opsirc]

I did my lake superior baot last year with carpet and love it. did not like the vinyl, too slippery expectionaly when the waves get a little bigger, hard enough to stand in the boat as it is. bought some nice indoor/out at menards for a good price.

[BoxMN]

FWIW, we use ours for duck hunting, in cold and ice and sand and mud caked boots. Also on pontoon, and I have yet to fell it slippery at all. I have dot deco brand, not sure if that matters.

The best world would be to have vinyl and then have a snap in carpet liner. Easy to shake out, clean up, and could have that soft feeling when you want it.

To answer your question, yep, I would use the same procedure whether vinyl or carpet. You will want to take the wood off and get a good fit with staples on the back, nice and smooth with even corners.

I see you are going to do a deck in front as well, nice idea Make sure to run some 8 or 10 ga. wires up there first, just so you have it there for trolling motor. I use 8 ga. that you get from menaaaards instead of marine stuff, works just as good and tons less expensive. We put it inside the tube, you can see the blue tube in one of my boat pics above. Also leave a single rope/string in it just in case you need/wants to string anothe rwire through it later We always pull an "empty" line through with a new wire, so it is in place for when we need it next time, ha! As there always will be a next time!

edit - oh yeah, and spend the extra money on true marine plywood. It will last and has a great finish compared to most treated plywood. I did both ways, and will only use marine in the future.

edit2 - actually you can even see the extra "string" we have coming out of the tube in that picture, just in case we need it again - much easier than fishing another up. Just tape it the wire as you pull the wire through by the first string works slick.

[bassNspear]

more and more people are getting away from carpet. So easy to keep clean and no hassel at all!

[traveler]

Boxmn..great idea about running the wire beforehand, and doing the string thing to allow for more wiring later.

[Northlander]

Go carpet. Vinyl is slippery when wet and its cold out. Besides women in bikini's like laying on carpet when its warm/hot out. They wont be laying on vinyl unless they have a blanket or big towel down. Carpets also softer.

[Walleye Guy]

My Lund Explorer SS 1800 has vinyl with snap in carpet. I rarely use the carpet. The vinyl is textured and is not slippery or hot. Clean-up is a breeze. I would have said go with carpet until I experienced the vinyl myself.