P19 & P-15 hatch workmanship.
Sam Finlay (sam.finlay@ey.com)
Thu, 25 Mar 1999 11:55:19 -0500
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West Wight Potter Website at URL
http://www.lesbois.com/wwpotter/
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Eric,
I know exactly how you feel. Like you, I hadn't noticed how out of square the
original hatch was. My P-15 had a real scruffy plywood hatch which was
a splinter farm and had to be replaced. While I didn't make the same mistake
(no skill, just lucky on this one!) I did decide to attach a board across the sliding
hatch edge to clean up the appearance. When measured, the hatch opening's
sides weren't even the same length and the sliding hatch edge was
basically wavy. My hatch "trim" board's edge is between 1/4" to 1/2" lower than
the original hatch and has never been in the way of anything. The board is well caulked
and attached w/ short screws from inside the hatch.
Depending on how far out your sliding hatch is, your idea of a hatch trim board should work
fine. In my case, the trim board, when lined up w/ the hatch wasn't parallel to the hatch top
so I arched the top of trim board just a bit to fool the eye.
Good Luck
Sam
PS. There seems to be some sort of rule in woodworking that the chance of mistakes
rises with the cost of the materials. I used cheap stuff ( and wish I hadn't ) but if
I'd used quality materials disaster would have been certain. :-)
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>Well, I took my expensive piece of marine-grade mahogany plywood and put it
>up against my old companionway door, backside-to-backside to prevent
>scratching, and using a router, cut the profile of the old delaminating wood
>into the new mahogany.
>I went to test-fit the new piece on the boat. It didn't fit. not even close.
>Took me a while to realize what happened - I basically made a mirror-image
>of the original hatch.
>NOW, it is perfectly reasonable to assume the profile of the hatch door to
>be symmetrical. It is not :( mine is every bit of a half-inch higher on one
>side (where it meets the sliding top) than the other.
>Before you all yell "turn it over", i had already made the angled cuts where
>the upper section meets the lower, so that isn't an option.
>As far as I can tell, at time of manufacture, someone must have just
>eyeballed the curve on either the hatchboard or the sliding hatch, and
>transferred this asymmetric curve to the other piece.
>I fear that now I've discovered this problem, even if i cut an identical
>piece properly from a new piece of wood, I'll forever SEE the asymmetry that
>I overlooked before. I'm thinking of just taking a piece of varnished solid
>mahogany and screwing it across the back of the sliding hatch, to
>essentially eliminate the arch in the back of the hatch, and cut the hatch
>board straight across too.
>I sure hope IM is building boats better these days.
>Your thoughts?