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hey guys id really appreciate the help my 17' montauk bow railings keep coming loose ive tried bigger screws, 5200 and its gotten to the point where i have huge holes so i took it to a shop paid 400 bucks to have it done "right" and now there loose again supposedly they closed the holes and reinstalled them, any one know of a way to secure them well???
Rattling rails are very annoying.
What about using Stainless Steel Rivets instead of the screws?
Are you experiencing heavy vibration from your motor to cause the railings to loosen up so quickly?
Before trying the rivet idea, you might want to put some kind of sleeve or wedge between the rail and the fitting, and then rivet. This may help if your standoffs are well oversized.
The rails on my 82 Montauk were for ever loosening. My fix was to remove the rails, drill the existing mounting holes to 3/8" by 1 3/4 deep. Then i took a Dremmel dimond shaped burr. ------<> and ran it aroung the bottom part of the hole. This was then filled with thickened epoxy I then used the remainig epoxy in the cup to find the correct size drill to use and not crack the epoxy on reinstaling the rail. Now my rails are remounted with no need for sealent as long as you don't drill through the epoxy and use a 1 1/5 screw. Been a year or so and none have loosed up yet.
Dave
We added a thru-bolt backing plate to the last railing upright. The middle upright had one however in the last never did. By adding that extra stanchion it greatly reduced the amount of screw stripping and racking in heavy seas. We bought these from our local BW Dealer and I think they were about $50 for the pair. Contact Sue Lodel at twin cities marine she will be of great help sourcing these and might be able to get a better price.
Next I went around to all of the flat mounts at the bottom of the and refilled the holes with 5200 and reinstalled the screws.
Then finally we had the canvas shop who made are cover and mooring cover install Stainless Steel rivets into all of the fitting where screws went through a fitting and into the rail. After all of this the railing was as good as a weld railing. We sold the boat 3 years later and it was still like new.
Here are some photos.
[img]http://www.whalercentral.com/forum/attachments/railing%202%5B173%5D.jpg[/img]
