Cork Flooring Sheets in a Sail Boat

As a special treat after coming back from his vacation, iFLOOR.com’s CEO, Steve Simonson, forwarded this great email to me to post in our blog as a post Memorial Day extra.
Q: Good morning, Steve,
For years (it seems) I have been researching sources for replacement cork flooring material for my Tartan-34 sailboat.
This boat, built by a quality builder, Tartan Marine in 1974, has a 1/8th inch (or maybe slightly more) cork material on the cabin sole (floor). The original material was in sheet about 18″ x 36″ that were glued to a 1/2″ marine plywood floor. The environment being a sailboat that is both raced and cruised, does get wet, esp. when we hose down the interior in the spring before launching, or after an “unfortunate” spillage inside. There were chips at high wear areas but very few serious stains, even after 33 years but the good old cork has suffered and is ready for replacement. It has withstood some horrendous treatment over the years but has held up beautifully and I would like very much to redo the floor in cork once again (a great testimonial for cork’s amazing durability). One of its most gratifying features is its non-skid characteristic even when very wet (water).
I’d like to know what the current options are for replacement cork material. One of my concerns is finding large enough ‘sheets’ to be able to minimize the number of butt joints. The floor is flat for the most part but does angle up at the left & right edges to seats/bunks that have teak “kick moldings”/trim. I am concerned about using small 12″ x 12″ tiles — too many joints which create an interrupted pattern, too. Attached is a photo of the interior (decades ago) that shows some of the floor’s shape and contour characteristics.
What do you suggest?
Peter
A: Mmm…
This is a tough one.
First from the photo I couldn’t really tell what the floor was made of. (it almost seemed like linoleum from the view I saw.)
If you are going to do cork in a boat – you should use the 12×12 glue down style and put a ton of finish on the top of it. It will work well. (like the last stuff you had)
I hope this is helpful to you.
ss

As promised here is the photo for this boat