upholstery staplers and one piece hatches

[Jono]

I'm going to be replacing some skins on my 96 supersport. What kind of stapler will do the job? Will a manual arrow do it, or do you have to go pneumatic? The local home depot has a 22 gauge paslode, and an 18 gauge porter cable, but no stainless steel staples.
I'm not sure if I'm going to replace the sunpad or not, but I will have to atleast staple around one corner that I took apart to fix a hinge. Around the perimeter of the sunpad there is an edge made of something different than the deck that takes the staples. Although it looks like I have pulled out T50's out of it, I have my doubts that I can put them back in with a manual gun in such a hard material.

Also, to anyone who has experience with taking apart the one piece hatches....
- what kind of screws are supposed to secure the hinge to the deck? Wood screws or bolts? Whoever had the boat before me used some picture frame hanging plugs that worked loose. The holes have enlarged so much, I filled them up with epoxy, and drilled new holes. I used screws that went all the way through and bolted them down from the top. The problem is that now I have a stud poking up. For sure that would go right through the foam and vinyl if it was stepped on, so I was just going to grind off the excess stud. Does this fix sound good enough?

[areford]

Hi,

I would definitely recommend an air stapler as it really works well in wood and the plastic parts, especially those that are somewhat fragile. Removing the staples seemed to go well if I used a gasket scraper, which looks like a screw driver, but has a 1" wide scraper head on it. Really worked great and could be lightly hammered in tough spots to pop the old staples out.

I replaced my whole interior with this baby from Amazon. It takes the T50 staples and worked just fine. If you shop around at Lowes and Home Depot you can find a combination of SS and Monel staples. Monel is supposedly for Marine use and they seemed to work great so far. I used a combination of 3/8" and 1/2" staples. The whole boat took about 8 boxes total if I remember correctly.

http://www.amazon.com/Surebonder-960...8984529&sr=8-2

This is a narrow crown unit, but given the price it worked for me. A wide crown would be preferred, but the guns were pricey.

Sorry, not much help on the hatch. Perhaps a nut cap would work and not hurt the feet so much?

Good luck!

[wake_fun]

I need to replace my rear deck vinyl also......subscribed.

[DanielC]

Cut the excess part of the bolt off, and use a hand hacksaw. If you use a power tool on it, it will heat up the lock nut, and destroy locking ability. Alternatively, remove the bolt, cut it, and file off the burrs, so the burrs do not cut the nylon insert on the lock nut.
If you have extra vinyl, put a flap of it over the nuts, and bolts, then upholstery foam, and then reskin the part.
You can get away with a hand held stapler for a few staples. You may have to take a small hammer, and finish driving the staples all the way in.
With a more powerful pneumatic, or electric stapler, you have to be careful to not drive the staples in to far, and cut through the vinyl.

[SoldTheBayliner]

This is on my winter project list too... Bad vinyl, loose hinges and apparently stripped holes (?) on the side with the hydraulic lift. Are they bolts or screws from the factory? Can you use a carriage bolt (rounded flat top) and a nut on the bottom instead of poking the bolts into the vinyl?

[Mikeski]

This is what I use, works great and doesn't require air or power.

http://www.amazon.com/Factory-Recond...9094426&sr=8-5

Don't forget to use monel staples

[Super_sport]

On my list of things to do also... this winter..... Back Deck and front Playpen Pad skins.....

[mrbobolina]

Be sure to use stainless steel staples. I was able to do my stapling using a staple gun from Home Depot and t50 staples. Stainless steel is important though or you will get rust and then rust runs as the corrosion hits. GHETTTTTTTOOOOOOOOOO