Here is a great small project that doesn't make too much dust but that covers a common problem on boat with impact on the looking and utilization of several equipments: chafe issues.
Especially on a carbon boat it can happen that ropes or other metal parts chafe on painted surfaces and leave nasty marks or even damage the fibers of the rope, the standing rigging or the boat. It's therefore important to prevent chafing and protect the surfaces.
There are several ways of preventing chafing. Let's take the example of running rigging like furling lines, sheets, halyards, etc.
First of all by making sure that the lines don't touch the painted surfaces and run freely. This is the most obvious one but not always the easiest. Sometime there are pulleys involved that are not always under tension, so bungee cords can help to keep them away from the painted surfaces.
Other way is to have a sacrificial surface for the chafing. At the top of our mast we have an extra layer of carbon plate to prevent from impacts of the spinnaker lock. An other example would be the chafe guards on the hull around the cleats and padeyes that are used for mooring lines when at the dock. Those thick carbon plates are to prevent chafe marks on the hull. We just got them recovered for esthetics with an additional layer of carbon to have a nice finish. Those plates have to be redone and clear coated on a regular basis to keep their "as new" aspect looking. Will take some pictures and share here below.
An other option is the "Millionaires Tapes" - because they are not cheap but very effective. It's available in rolls of width of 51mm or 152mm.
But it would not be a D.I.Y. project if there wasn't any customization involved. The rolls of Protect tape and the bigger sheet have been cnc cut to special shapes. Our stepcraft 840 has the option to install the drag-knife to cut vinyl or in our case the Protect-tape.
We cut some special patches to protect around the butterfly latches the keep the transom hatches in place - no ropes involved but metal parts. We want to protect the painted surface on bottom face of the hatches from marks and have a protective layer between the different latches and the painted carbon panels. Have a look at the pictures and check our our cnc cut shapes.
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