Yacht Insulation

The Problem

Production yachts have little to no insulation. If you have a dark hull and refrigeration in the tropics you and your drinks will be hot. Even a white yacht with no insulation in the tropics you will be hot. That said you too would have difficulty staying comfortable. When the chill sets in, some boat's interiors begin to “rain”. Water condenses on the ceiling and drips. We wished to avoid those conditions as much as possible. While refurbishing Elysium we decided to insulate every place we could easily reach. If we opened up an area and the fiberglass was visible, we insulated. In every living space, behind the Teak ceiling strips, the entire ceiling, and the complete engine compartment.

The Process

(1) In large expanses we first added the backing material for interior and exterior attachments

(2) On the ceiling; as in the images it was then covered with epoxy sealed bead board.

(3) On the hull sides all raw fiberglass was epoxy painted. The ceiling was epoxy sealed..

(4) Following the paint sealing we installed a UV vapor barrier touted as some Space Age material. A foam product with Aluminum covering on both sides

(5) Where we had more room; ie under the teak ceiling strips we used fiber fill similar to that used in synthetic warm weather clothing. When there is any wetness it still insulates. And BTW it seems impossible to be wet. I tried

(6) Teak covers now installed.

Msc We felt that at anchor the coldest part of the boat would be the bow so we insulated the forward bulkhead with Blueboard.

Engine Room

(1) We chose a Synthetic barrier - insulation from SoundDown Corp. We have friends that used the foam and even Sounddown indicated that that foam is only good for 10 years or so. When our friends replaced theirs they told us how messy of a job it was. That would not be in our future! No way ! We used Soundown !

(8)The forward bulkhead of the engine compartment we covered with a mica board. Here we would attach various gear needed for the boat