Custom Boat Project - Brackets & Mounting panels

Brackets and mounting plates are great D.I.Y. projects and depending on the materials, some are more dusty than others.

Lots of equipment that needs to be mounted on a boat. In our case as the hulls and superstructure are carbon sandwich - we don't want to screw anything into the hulls or bulkheads.

We have been making lots of brackets and mounting plate of different shapes for the individual equipments on board. Most of them have been designed in 3D by Sebastien and than cut on our Stepcraft 840 CNC machine. One of the advantages of the computerized cutting is that the mounting holes can also be predrilled which improves accuracy of the installation. We often base ourselves on the technical drawings of the supplier in their installation manuals but double check on the equipment itself to guarantee a perfect fit.

Here are some samples cnc cut out of different materials. 

Materials that we are using on using mostly: 

• G10 - this is compressed fiberglass (at 10 Bar), great material as very stiff and it thick enough, possible to tap and screw into it as well it is non conductive. Downside is the weight and price as well not always easy to order. Can be glued in with structural glue, epoxy and/or laminated over
• Forex/Starboard: light panels, easily available at shops like Home Depot/Castorama. We use it for mounting light electrical equipment. We use Methyl Methacrylate adhesives for glueing to the hulls. This glue has a short curing time and works well for our purpose. The downsides of forex is that is not as strong enough for heavy equipment but it's relatively cheap and easy to get.
• Carbon C-plate or sandwich structures: for heavy stuff and complex shapes. Downside is that it's conductive (carbon) and the production is long and expensive.
• Fiberglass: similar to the carbon brackets mentioned above. Mostly it's the man hours that are the expensive part and the resins not the cloth itself, so there is often not a big difference with the carbon version. Advantage over carbon is that fiberglass is non conductive but need more layers to have similar strength.

Enjoy the pictures - these are only some samples as there are numerous applications and this also means many more D.I.Y. projects in this category to follow...