I took some foot straps off my windsurfer and I want to put them on my catamaran.
I have extremely thin hulls (F18HT) so I need to make sure that I add some kind of backing plate for support.
will big washer be ok? should I epoxy and fiberglass the inside ?
Can someone tell me what they did.
Thanks
A big stainless washer for each bolt should work. You probably don't need to epoxy it in place, just make sure you loctite the bolts so they don't work loose. If the screws are too close together for that to work epoxying a 1/8 aluminum plate as a backer inside the hull would probably work better.
Bolt and washer if you can behind it if not it is amazing how well the screws that come with the straps hold. JMHO, YMMV, Ricardo.
I have a pair on my HT just aft of the rear beam, allowing the fwd two screws to attach to the beam, and the rear two screws go thru the sandwich, and thru a one inch wide pc of aluminum. I do reccomend bedding the backing plate with some thickened epoxy to evenly distribute the load to the inside skin. Goop up the plate and gently tighten the bolts, let the epoxy dry completely and then tighten them up a bit. I'm happy with this placement of the footstraps for this boat, you want the ability to have yourself(if solo) or crew that far aft for downwind in bigger air.
Dave