1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Deck Headliner Track Prep II

At long last, the aft deck headliner track preparations are done. The necessary woodwork is installed. The ceiling wiring is done. The One-Mile Ray searchlight is sufficiently installed. And the helm radio box is done. Time to call the Whisper Wall headliner installer.

That’s a good sign

That’s an empty Whisper Wall track tube. Which means all of the track that was in it has been used. That’s a good thing, since those tubes have been under foot and otherwise in the way for years.

Looks great!

Port aft corner of the aft deck hardtop

The tracks here are only fitted and stapled in place. The installer still  has to drill and screw, then staple the heck out of the tracks to lock them in place.

The new speaker mounts are at the perfect height

The tracks further forward are fully screwed and stapled in place

This is gonna look great

Leaping ahead just a bit, I’m hoping I can tap into the boating braintrust of readers of this blog and get some ideas for sliding door hardware. One of the future challenges I’ve got to deal with is making then installing doors for each space on the boat. Hinged doors are challenging enough, but I’ve already got the hardware for those. The bigger challenge is that I need to find low-profile sliding door hardware. For more than two years I’ve been pondering on this challenge, even ordering various bits and pieces to see if I can cobble something together using unconventional approaches. Sliding drawer slides…total bust. Sailboat traveler cars and tracks….extremely low profile tracks (<1/2″), but they’re bloody expensive and the traveler cars are too wide. So if anybody has suggestions for low-profile sliding door tracks and rollers (~1″ overall height), I’m all ears.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Deck Headliner Install Begins

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: V-berth Bed Surround Padded Headliner

There are lots of things going on simultaneously, from the aft cabin back wall to resawing big mahogany boards, so I’ll continue jumping around the various projects before we finally launch into getting the aft deck headliner installed. But first, I thought I’d thank everybody who’s hit the tip jar and give a run-down of the refit plan going forward.

To install the aft deck headliner, all of the wiring in the ceiling of the hardtop–12v supply for marine radio, stereo, speakers, overhead lights etc–have to be installed. To install the headliner track, it has to have something to attach to, so we’ll have to install wooden cleats all around the perimeter and spacers across every 2nd ceiling frame, same as we did in the v-berth, salon, and aft stateroom. The headliner tracks also have to butt up against finished surfaces, whether painted fiberglass or varnished wood, which means lots of solid mahogany and plywood panel work is coming up on the aft deck.

Once the aft deck is done, I need to install the raw water standpipes for the main engines, then install the hoses, valves and strainers. I need to finish installing the diesel supply lines, and attach them to the engines. While I’m working in the engine room, I’ll have the painter come in and spray ICA top coat in the V-berth, salon, and aft stateroom.

The swim platform has been ready to install for years. Once that’s done, the boat will be able to float. But I also have to install all of the big chromed bronze cleats, so dock lines have something to attach to. And as long as I’m installing big pieces of chrome, I might as well finish installing the stanchions and safety rails. There are also a bunch of bilge vents that are open to the weather. I need to polish and install the stainless steel scoops that will keep the rain out. I also need to have canvas made for the aft end of the aft deck and helm doors on either side to keep the weather out.

At that point, the project won’t be done, but the boat will be ready to come out of the tent and maybe even float. I have no idea how long it will take to do all this stuff. When it’s done and ready to float, I’ll make the call for the travel lift.

That said, the headliner installer had a nice little surprise for me recently. He installed padded Whisper Wall around the V-berth bed surround, just exactly as I requested!

First, tracks get installed all around

Acute corners need filler panels

Basically, the tracks need to butt up against the finished panel at 90°, otherwise it’s impossible to push the fabric into the track.

Tracks are done. Time for padding

5/8″ thick foam surface is just a wee bit higher than the track

Spray glue does the job

That looks great!

Some day, I’ll finish off the plywood edges with moldings

Nice!

If you’re wondering how that bed will work out, here’s the thing. There’s eight feet between the pointy ends of the bunk. 18″ forward of the aft edge, where the edge of the mattress will be, that’s down to 6’2″. I’m 5′ 10″, so if the missus and I have a spat, which is unusual anyway, this will be a cozy doghouse. Granted, the forwardmost part of the bunk is only 3′ across, but we don’t plan on having guests stay onboard all the time. When they do, having a slightly uncomfortable space can have it’s advantages (they won’t want to stay long!). Most of the guests we’ve had on our boats have been individuals. And unless we have someone visit who’s freakishly tall, this odd-shaped bunk will be just fine.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Helm Station Mahogany

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Installing the Aft Stateroom Whisper Wall Tracks

A lot of work has gone into getting the boat to this point. The Whisper Wall headliner tracks are installed in the aft stateroom!

It may not look like much, but this is a HUGE leap forward

Looks pretty good around the new sliding door box

So THAT’s how he does the corners

The Whisper Wall installer still has to put in the transverse tracks that attach to every other ceiling frame, but the perimeter tracks are all cut where they’ll join. I’m going to get out of his way and head into the V-berth to get it prepped for the headliner track installation.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Getting the V-berth Ready for Headliner Track Installation

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Installing the Last Aft Stateroom Overhead Filler Boards

With the aft stateroom fascia panels installed, I’m getting pretty close to having the Whisper Wall installer come and put in the headliner. The last few things I have to do is 1) install the final filler panels between ceiling frames at the entryway to the stateroom; 2) make a box to hide the aft head slider door hardware, and 3) do something to make the forward bulkhead in the aft stateroom pretty.

I need to remove some insulation before I can fit filler panels

The filler panels are required between the frames so the Whisper Wall tracks will have solid attachment points all the way around the room perimeter.

Every gap between the frames has too much insulation

 

 

 

I didn’t plan to use Whisper Wall headliner when I did the spray foam insulation

After a bit of work with a putty knife, I was ready to make the filler panels

50-year old 3/4″ plywood will make great filler panels

Good ol’ Chris Craft Doug fir plywood looks perfectly solid

Getting closer

ShopSmith bandsaw is handy for cuts like this

Nice!

And another

The last filler panel, glued and screwed in place

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Making the Aft Head Sliding Door Box

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Salon Entryway Sliding Screen Tracks II

I got the  salon entryway sliding screen tracks machined and am now waiting for the painter to finish spraying ICA polyurethane base coat clear on the mahogany panels that the screen tracks fit into. There’s lots of other progress being made on the Roamer, but I also have a 1968 Chris Craft Commander 42 that needed some maintenance. I took a week off work and drove the boat to the closest marina with a travel lift, had it hauled, and have been sanding and painting the bottom. She splashes at noon today.

Commander 42 coming out of the Potomac River

While the boat was being blocked, I strolled around the boatyard to check out the relics on purgatory row. There was one boat that  caught my eye…and what a surprise!

At first, I thought this was an old woody

Gryphon looked like a planked wooden boat from a distance.

It’s definitely plank construction, but that’s funny looking wood

Gryphon’s planked with aluminum!

Back to the Roamer…

I set up my ShopSmith to machine the screen tracks

Ready to go!

Looking good!

The other track is trickier

These sliding cabinet door tracks I’m using are different top and bottom. The upper track is shorter than the bottom one, so I’ll have to machine the tops off to get the second track down to the same height as the first. It has to be the same height so it’ll fit through the jig I made that holds the track in position as it goes past the router bit.

Next I sanded the tracks to smooth the machine marks

Nice fit…but that’s an ugly screen frame

Might as well replace the screens since I’m in here

400 grit sandpaper + Collinite 810 Chrome Wax cleans up the aluminum nicely

Ohhh! That slides smooth, like butter

Second screen frame is cleaned and waxed

Looks good!

The tracks and screen frames fit perfectly!

Now I just have to get those mahogany panels installed…once they come back from the painter. In the meantime, there’s lots of other stuff going on.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Polishing Stainless Safety Rail Stanchions

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Salon Entryway Sliding Screen Tracks

I got the new board made for the salon entryway, and it’s off to the paint shop to be coated with ICA base coat clear. One challenge I’ve been trying to figure out for the last…oh…maybe eight years or so, is what to do about the retractable screen tracks that fit in the salon entryway boards. The original tracks broke on removal back in 2008. Every once in a while, I go online and try to find replacements, but I’ve come up dry every time. I finally came up with an option that I thought would work. It ended up being a bit more complicated than I thought.

Knape & Vogt P2417TAN48 Plastic Sliding Door Track looks about right

I bought these tracks years ago for the 1/4″ cabinet slider doors in the heads. But I have two packs…plenty for the salon entryway.

The track fits in the slot of the original (cracked) board

It’s a bit too tall, though.

Bigger problem: the screen frame is 5/16″, not 1/4″

That’ll teach me to eyeball a dimension from memory instead of putting a tape measure on the actual part. But the thing is, no matter where I looked online, I couldn’t find a 5/16″ double track. So I started staring at the Knape & Vogt track and noticed there’s a lot of material to work with. If I can machine off the fat part that runs along the tip of the center section and maybe remove some material from either side…maybe I can make them work with my screen tracks.

First try with my table saw seemed promising…at first

Unfortunately, there’s a gap between my table saw blade and the table. As the track passes over the blade, there’s nothing supporting it on the outside edge. And the plastic is somewhat flexible…so it flexes….which is bad.

OK…that’s not going to work.

Things were going great until the track got about halfway cut, then it moved just a bit aaaaand there went the edge of the track.

Next I tried whittling it with a razor knife

That kind of worked, but the surface the screen frame needs to ride on was very inconsistent. What I need is something that’ll hold this flimsy track in position while it passes a cutting tool. Oh, and the tracks are 48″ long.

I’m gonna make a jig

Joint the 2×4 on my MiniMax FS35

That’s pretty

Next, I cut a slot in the 2×4

Nice fit!

The track slides smoothly through the jig, with no side-to-side slop.

A little work with a hole saw and jigsaw, and the jig is ready

I converted my ShopSmith to router mode, clamped the jig to the table and up tight to the fence. Time to do a test run.

It’s looking good!

The center track machined pretty well…the fat part at the top is gone

The near side of the track in the above picture is the one that got destroyed on the tablesaw. It works much better using the jig and router.

Finish machining the rest of the track to test the approach

I removed ~1/32″ of material from both sides of each track lane

It works!

Now that I know how to modify the tracks, I need to bring another set to the boat (having destroyed this one during R&D) and machine them. If you look at the aluminum screen frame in the above pic, you’ll see it could use some attention, too. I also need to replace the screens. While I’m at it, I’ll make the screens for the V-berth and aft stateroom hatches pretty, too.

Oh, and in other news, I took some time off the project in 2017 to cut up some trees I had taken down. I paid to have the stumps ground, but the tree company left a big chunk of stump in the ground, and it made a mound that I couldn’t level. I finally got that sucker out of the ground last week. It was right at the limit of what my Kubota BX23 can lift, but we got ‘er done.

Making firewood

That’s a lot of stump

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Salon Entryway Sliding Screen Tracks II

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Salon Headliner Prep

The aft stateroom headliner prep is coming along nicely. I decided to jump into the salon for a change of pace and get it ready for headliner, too.

Also, I wanted to express great gratitude to those of you who hit the tip jar. I’ve been documenting this refit as a labor of love, but it feels really great to know people put tangible value on my effort. Plus, since I went from the free WordPress site that had all those irritating ads to my own ad-free domain, every donation helps cover the cost of hosting. Thanks a lot!

Whisper Wall perimeter track will work great here at the salon aft bulkhead

The trouble starts here, at the helm station chase

There’s got to be a continuous surface for the headliner track to attach to. I’ve discussed the problems I’ve discovered on the port side–the broken salon fiberglass under the helm window, the mahogany safety rail in that area that was clearly not original, the stainless stanchion pipes that had obviously been replaced. My theory is that when they were doing the repower to the twin turbo SuperSeamasters, they dropped one of the engines on the port side helm windshield, which broke the salon roof and the mahogany safety rail, and bent some of the stainless stanchions. It also caused some of the salon ceiling frames to get way out of alignment. In the picture above, you can see how the horizontal frame doesn’t meet its counterpart in the corner…it’s higher. And like a teeter-totter, if it’s high on one end, it’s going to be low on the other.

All of the framing in this area has been pushed down

The horizontal cleat didn’t move

But the ceiling framing is 1/2″ low!

There’s no way the Whisper Wall track will work with this

I want to have a separate little hatch panel here, so I can access the wiring and cables under the helm station. But with the frames 1/2″ out of alignment with the perimeter cleat, that’s just not going to work. Plus, the frames are far enough out of alignment that they’ll ‘print through’ onto the headliner…can’t have that.

Something really heavy must have landed on this area to cause this problem

I’m not going to tear off the cabintop and start over, and the fact of the matter is that the ceiling is stable in its current orientation. So what I need to do is add material to bring the perimeter cleats to the same height as the rest of the ceiling framing.

First, I need a long, tapered cleat

This EurekaZone track saw workstation is great for making angled cuts quickly

That’s a nice fit

Nice transition between the cleat and frame

The taper will smoothly bring the track down to the original perimeter cleat

Looks pretty good

Cut a short tapered piece of mahogany for the side of the helm chase

The cleat is a bit too narrow

3/4″ okume plywood scrap will make a good filler piece

The filler piece will go here

Next, I drilled pocket screw holes with my Kreg jig

Last step: glue and screw everything in place

That’s a nice transition for the headliner track to attach to

Looks good on the other side

Wood flour-thickened epoxy is the glue

The 3/4″ plywood filler piece is glued, screwed, and clamped in place

Well, that’s one problem solved. I wish I knew for sure how this damage happened, but I’m sticking with my theory until something proves me wrong. If I’m right, can you imagine the horror on the mechanics’ faces as the engine and gear tumbled to the ground, wreaking havoc all the way down?

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Salon Entryway Panel

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Stateroom Headliner Prep

NOTE: If you got two notifications about this article, I apologize. My email subscription provider “updated” his app recently without apparently beta testing it. The new version is completely buggy, so I and many other users have had to switch back to the old version, which, unfortunately, is permanently set to auto update. I published this article this morning, but it doesn’t appear that any notifications were sent out. So I’m trying to republish after having reverted to the old email app. Hopefully, the notifications will go out properly.

The Whisper Wall headliner I’m going to use has tracks that hold the material in place. The perimeter track butts up against walls or other vertical surfaces around each panel, and a separate track is used where the headliner material joins another headliner panel. Which means there need to be horizontal panels for the track to attach to where there are walls around the perimeter. So I’m going to be spending several weekends installing lots of little plywood panels to fill the gaps between overhead frames and give the tracks something to sit on.

The perimeter track is the one on the left

Gaps between frames are all different

The biggest horizontal panel will secure the aft head sliding door track, too.

Good thing I kept this 3/4″ okume plywood scrap

That’s about right

Not bad, but I need to knock a bit off in the middle

Plane it down to the pencil line for a perfect fit

It’s amazing how much trouble 1/32″ too much material across only 2″ in the middle of a 46″ panel can cause. Fortunately, a hand plane knocks that off quickly.

Next, I used my Kreg mini jig to drill pocket screw holes

1″ x 1″ mahogany cleat will secure the panel to the frame

There’s not enough room between the wall panel and frame to use pocket screws, so I’ll use a cleat instead. Everything’s dry fitted and ready to go.

Epoxy seal the top-side of the panel

After wetting out the cleat with epoxy, I applied wood flour-thickened epoxy glue

I clamped the cleat in place and went home. It was cold overnight, so the epoxy hadn’t fully cured by the next morning. But it was enough to hold the cleat in place while I installed the panel.

Next day, the panel is glued and screwed in place

Ready for door and headliner tracks and a valance panel

I’ll install a sliding door track here, but I also need to make a valence panel to hide the track. I’ve got plenty of mahogany in stock for that. The Whisper Wall perimeter track will then butt up against the valence panel for a nice transition from horizontal headliner to a vertical mahogany valence panel.

Does that make sense? It does to me, and I suppose that’s what matters. 😉

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Aft Stateroom Headliner Prep II

1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Headliner Tracks & LED Bulbs

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I’ve been talking about Whisper Walls, the headliner material I’ll use, and how all of the new LED lights need to be positioned just so to match the height of the Whisper Wall track. I broke open the tubes of track and brought one of each to the boat so I could confirm I’ve been installing things properly. I’ll also be installing lots of support panels for these tracks around the perimeter of the aft stateroom, salon/galley, V-berth, and aft deck, and I wanted to have at least one track on site to make sure I’m doing this right.

Whisper Wall headliner tracks

Left side = perimeter track; right side = inside track

You should be able to click the picture and open the full-size version.

As I understand it, the installer will push the edge of the headliner material into the clamp part of the track with a fancy putty knife. The clamp part of the perimeter track has to butt up against a panel or solid stock that’s at 90° to whatever surface the track is attached to.

Marked off for screw holes

I found an installation manual online that indicated that, because of the high tension these tracks are under, there have to be #8 x 3/4″ screws every 2 inches. But the installer indicated that he uses a nearly continuous line of staples instead of screws.

The track is exactly aligned with the bottom surface of the LED mounting panel

That’s good news…I think it means I finally got those mount panels installed right. I’m going to leave that track there to keep it out of the way. I’ll let the installer permanently attach it and the rest.

I’ve also been messing with LED lights that fit in the OEM Chris Craft light fixtures.

10w LED looks good

It looks like there’s room for a bigger bulb

On the notion that ‘brighter is better,’ I ordered some 15w 12v LEDs, too.

Ebay purchase took a month to get here

Looks good!

Doh!

OK, so the OEM fixtures can only take a 10w corn bulb LED. The 15w units are a bit too wide, and it looks like the 12w ones are the same size. There’s one more LED option I’m looking into, but those are a month away, too. Stay tuned. In the meantime, the 10w bulbs are reportedly equivalent to ~70w incandescent but with a fraction of the amp draw. This is a great upgrade.

Next up in our 1969 Chris Craft Roamer 46 Refit: Porthole Gaskets