Wondering about removing the glued in carpet from my older runabout, cleaning the residue, laying down fresh coat of gelcoat over the existing fiberglass on top of plywood, and then making snap in carpets. I don't ever plan to run without the carpets in, so gelcoat job is just to smooth and level the floor. I'd just like to be able to easily clean the carpets if / when they get dirty. I see there are several companies that will make carpets to your patterns, but has anyone tackled this themselves? Does the carpet require a backing more than regular marine carpet? What is the best choice for binding the edges?

I did mine last year. Ordered what I wanted off of greatlakeskipper.com, cut it out to what I needed, took it to my local interior shop and had him sew on a piping around the edges and install the snaps in carpet. He gave me the male ends of the snaps with the screws to install on my boat myself. Laid carpet down, started at one snap and started installing them. Easy day and only about $250

25 year flooring installer.
You can get outdoor carpet from Home Depot if you like what they have . The V loc carpet don't require binding around the edges but anything woven will. Most flooring companies will have binding services and if not they a have someone who does it for them. Last time I checked it was about 1.50 a foot but most places have a min charge. You can get a snap kit at Home Depot but I found it much cheaper to get a larger kit (more snaps) online.

make sure the carpet you get is for snap in, it is different, found out the hard way when shop used the wrong on mine years ago and snaps started pulling right thru..