Headliner/insulation

A previous owner had removed the original headliner and installed R13 fiberglass insulation in the aft stateroom, then screwed fiberboard panels up to the ceiling joists to act as a headliner and hold it all in place. But R13 is 6" thick and the joists are only 3" deep, which caused the fiberboard panels to bow down between the screws. It bowed down so much that the aft head door scraped the shiny finish off the fiberboard panel. The aft deck also leaked in a few places, so the fiberglass insulation and fiberboard had gotten wet, which added to the sagginess. In the salon, the headliner was brown from cigarette smoke and there were similar leak problems. Basically, the headliner was a disaster all over and needed to be replaced after we fixed the other problems behind it.

After removing all of the headliner and insulation, we rebedded everything that was leaking and stopped the leaks. Then we installed 2" foamboard insulation, using a bead of expandable polyurethane foam around the perimeter to bond and seal the foam panel to the ceiling. The results were very obvious when 3/4" of ice and sleet fell during the 2012 winter. By the next day, the ice on other boats' decks and salon roofs had melted, but it stayed for two days on MV Honey. The new insulation was keeping the heat inside the boat and should do the same thing for air conditioning in the summer.

Next, we installed the headliner. As a wooden boat aficionado, I like the look of wood batten moldings on headliners rather than the original welting. With the bright finished, wood batten approach, you can staple the headliner panels to the face of the support batten (the grey transverse board in the pic below) rather than on its edge. You then use varnished battens and moldings to cover the staple line. But no matter how you do it, you will be sore as heck by the end of the job.

When it comes to the choice of staplers, the Surebonder 9600 pneumatic stapler is the only way to go for most of the work. I also used an Arrow 50 electric stapler, but the recoil is so strong it takes two hands to hold it in place. When you're already using 1.5 hands to stretch and hold the headliner, you need a recoil-less stapler. The Arrow electric stapler is also heavier...not by much, but a few ounces adds up when you're hanging upside down all day long with your arms outstretched. For tight corner work, where you use the stapler head to tension the ends of the headliner, I found a manual Arrow or Stanley stapler to be the best. And of course, Stanley monel staples are the only way to go and much cheaper at large online retailers than even the local home center.

I'm varnishing the mahogany battens and molding now, which I'll use to cover the staple lines.

With the headliner hung in the salon, we focused on the aft cabin.

One more panel just as you enter the cabin and this one is ready for battens & moldings. The indirect LED lighting worked out very well here, too, around the window valences. The missus has also been doing a bang-up job on the blackout curtains. Two more for the aft-most windows and she's done!