Repair & maintenance guides

How to Install EVA Foam Decking (SeaDek-Style Pads) on Your Boat

Closed-cell foam decking makes a hard fiberglass deck grippy and comfortable underfoot. Learn when a peel-and-stick DIY job makes sense, how to template, cut and prep, the temperature and gap rules, how to lay pads without trapped air, and how to clean, repair and eventually remove them.

How to Keep a Boat Maintenance Log and Organize Your Receipts

Set up a simple maintenance log that records the date, engine hours, work done, parts and who did it, and keep receipts and photos organized. Good records help with warranty and insurance claims, show buyers the boat was cared for and reveal wear patterns before something fails.

How to Keep a Dry Bilge, Including Dry Bilge Pump Systems

Standing water in the bilge causes odors, mildew and corrosion, and hides new leaks. Learn why your main pump leaves water behind and how to get rid of the last inch: cut the sources, clear limber holes, route AC condensate and showers to a sump, and add a small self-priming diaphragm pump if needed.

How to Keep Mice and Rodents Off Your Stored Boat

Mice love a stored boat: dry, quiet and full of soft nesting material and tasty wire insulation. Learn how to remove what attracts them, close their way in, choose deterrents and traps that actually work, avoid the risks of poison, and check the wiring safely in spring.

How to Keep Your Boat Fridge, Freezer or Icebox Cold (and Off Your Batteries' Back)

Most boat fridge problems are not a dead compressor: they are trapped heat, low voltage, leaky seals or too much frost. Learn the owner checks for air-cooled, water-cooled and keel-cooled units, how to estimate power draw, and how to store the system for winter.

How to Keep Your Boat in the Water Over Winter (De-Icers, Covers and Checks)

Wintering afloat can be safe if you still winterize every water system, keep the bilge pump and batteries working, use a de-icer correctly on a GFCI-protected circuit, respect the shock and thin-ice risks, and visit the boat regularly.

How to Launch and Retrieve Your Boat Alone

A repeatable routine for putting a trailer boat in and taking it out by yourself: what to do in the staging area, how to rig one long line so you can control the boat from the dock, when power loading is off-limits, and the safety habits that keep you, your boat and the next boater out of trouble.

How to Load Your Boat Safely: Capacity Plate, Balance and Stability

Too much weight, or the right weight in the wrong place, is behind most small-boat capsizes and swampings. Learn to read the capacity plate (persons, weight and horsepower), add up your real load, balance it side to side and fore and aft, and adjust for rough water, water aboard and towing riders.

How to Maintain a Bow Thruster (Anode, Prop, Shear Pin, Gear Leg and Batteries)

Keep your electric bow or stern thruster ready for the moment you need it, with seasonal checks of its anode, prop and shear pin, gear leg oil, motor compartment, batteries and heavy cables, plus how to avoid overheating it. Most thruster failures build slowly from corrosion and weak batteries.

How to Maintain an Anchor Windlass and Inspect and Mark Your Anchor Rode

Keep your electric windlass working with a seasonal clean-and-grease, sort out a dead or slow windlass from the breaker and solenoid to the motor, and inspect, mark and splice your chain and rope rode. Your anchor is a safety system; this guide keeps every link of it ready.

How to Maintain Your Boat's Air Conditioning Seawater System

Keep seawater flowing through your marine A/C by cleaning the strainer, checking the pump and overboard discharge, descaling the condenser coil when flow drops, cleaning the air filter, and winterizing the seawater circuit before a freeze. Most "A/C not cooling" calls are a water-flow problem.

How to Maintain Your Mainsail Reefing System and Practice a Reef at the Dock

Check the reef lines, blocks, hooks and cringles of a slab (jiffy) reefing system, keep in-mast and in-boom furling mains running smoothly, and practice tucking in a reef at the dock so it is quick and safe when the wind comes up.

How to Match Gelcoat Color for Small Repairs

Get a chip or screw-hole repair to blend in with your hull instead of standing out as a bright patch. Learn to polish first so you see the real color, find your builder's color code or a matched gelcoat, tint by tiny steps, test cured samples in daylight, and allow for sun fading.

How to Mount and Maintain a Kicker Motor Bracket

Set up a small auxiliary outboard (a kicker) the right way: choose a manual or spring-assisted bracket, through-bolt it to a sound transom with a backing plate, add a safety cable, sort out steering and fuel, and keep the bracket working season after season.

How to Mount or Re-Tighten an Outboard on the Transom

A loose outboard can steer badly, crack the transom or fall off the boat. Learn how to center the motor, check engine height, tighten clamp screws, seal and bolt through the transom with backing plates, add a safety cable on small motors and spot transom flex before it becomes a costly repair.

How to Mount Rod Holders, Fish Finders, Cleats and Antennas Without Causing Leaks

Add accessories to your boat the right way, with through-bolts, backing plates, sealed core and proper wire pass-throughs, so every new hole stays dry and strong. Also learn where you should never drill.

How to Paint a Boat Bilge (Prep, Paint Choice and What to Leave Bare)

A freshly painted bilge is easier to keep clean and makes small fuel, oil, coolant and water leaks easy to spot. Learn how to degrease and sand, pick between alkyd bilge paint and epoxy coatings, ventilate safely, and keep paint off the parts that must stay bare.

How to Paint Your Boat's Topsides (Roll and Tip)

When the gelcoat above the waterline is too chalky or crazed to polish back, a one-part or two-part polyurethane paint can bring back the shine. This guide covers choosing the paint, prep, weather windows, roll-and-tip technique and the safety gear two-part paints demand.

How to Prepare for a Free Vessel Safety Check

Volunteers from the Coast Guard Auxiliary and America's Boating Club will inspect your boat's safety gear for free, with no ticket if something is missing. Learn how to request a Vessel Safety Check, what the examiner looks at, how to get your boat ready and what to do with the fix list.

How to Prepare Your Boat for a Hurricane or Tropical Storm

Make a written storm plan before the season, then haul out or secure the boat with doubled lines and chafe gear, strip off everything that catches wind, and check it safely after the storm. Never ride out a hurricane aboard.

How to Prepare Your Boat for an Insurance or Condition Survey

Get ready for a marine survey your insurer or lender asked for: what a SAMS or NAMS surveyor looks at, the common findings you can fix beforehand (hose clamps, seacocks, bilge, fire extinguishers, wiring), the paperwork to have ready, and how to handle the recommendations afterward.

How to Prevent and Remove Mold and Mildew on Your Boat

Stop the musty smell and black spots before they start. Find and fix the water source, keep air moving, control humidity safely, and clean mold off gelcoat, vinyl and cabin surfaces with products that won't damage them.

How to Prevent and Remove Scale in Marine Toilet Discharge Hoses

A head that gets harder to pump, flushes slowly or lets water creep back into the bowl often has mineral scale building up inside the discharge hose. Learn a simple monthly vinegar routine, when to use a maker-approved descaler, what never to pour in, and when replacing the hose or switching to a freshwater flush is the real fix.

How to Protect Your Boat, Motor and Trailer From Theft

Practical, layered security for boat owners: outboard locks, trailer coupler and wheel locks, disabling the boat, GPS trackers, engraving and marking, photo and serial number records, safer storage, and exactly what to report (HIN and serial numbers) if your boat is stolen.