sherwindu wrote:
I have several 8VS zippers on my boat cover, which was made for me
about 5 years ago. The teeth and sliders of this zipper are in
excellent shape, but the pin and boxes have dried out and
disintegrated.

The pin and box is the small item at the start of the zipper to guide
the slider on.
I am told this item is integral to the zipper and cannot be repaired.
I think YKK's recent fix for this problem of using UV
resistant zippers is not necessarily the best fix, but the only choice
in using
a YKK system. Years ago YKK zippers had a removable pin and box
piece that could be attached if the original one broke, but now
everything
is one piece to save costs. Although YKK hints at paying for the
material
costs of new zippers, labor could cost me as much as 35 dollars each
to replace and I have over 20 zippers on this cover.

Sherwin D.

The zippers with large teeth do not need the end stops moulded into the zip
tape. I worked in the trade before retiring and bought the zipper in rolls
of 100m and the sliders separately. The stopper at the end of these large
zippers can be simply a piece of zip tape sewn horizontally thru the teeth
and triple-tacked. The teeth are soft p[alstic and an industrial sewing
machine will punch right thru them, but a domestic machine would need a
little coaxing, or if you are stuck a sailmakers needle and palm can be
used.

You make a kind of box at the end if you don't want the zip slider to open
out to two seperate pieces, but if as with most applications on a yacht you
want the zip to open fully simply leave the teeth at the end of each zip
section and push these into the slider, but sew separate end stops at the
other end to stop the slider from coming off the end as you pull the zip
together.

Whether this unmade zipper is available to the public is dependant on the
country you live in.

Dennis.