New Hatch fabricated

Nasher · 21 September 2012, 17:46

As previously mentioned My Ocean 6.5 ‘The Nashers Revenge’ has a large underdeck void
topped off near the bow by a simple hatch, which I’ve never been happy with.

Bearing in mind it’s a commercial hull, so was never finished to leisure boat standards,
the builders jig-sawed a hole in the deck, screwed some 2x1 underneath to form a lip then dropped the bit they’d cut out back in the hole with a couple of latches

Any water that gets on the deck just goes straight down the hole and fills the void which doesn’t drain anywhere.

I’ve tried various things over the years to seal the hatch without success, and couldn’t bring myself to spend silly money on a readymade hatch when I could have all the fun of making one.

Plan A was to completely replace the hatch with an alloy one which I was going to machine lips in etc in my milling machine, however after I’d cut it to shape and put it loosely in place I hated it, so wanted to find a way to use the existing piece and keep the patterned deck.

I didn’t take many pics I’m afraid, but I’m pleased that the total cost to me has been a favour called in at work, the remainder of a tube of Sikaflex I had in the garage that was already open, and a few screws, nuts and washers I had hanging around.
Plus several hours of my time of course - but I enjoyed it.

Pic 1 & 2
How the original looked.

Pic 3
First step was to thinly flowcoat over the bare wood to protect it, then screw and Sikaflex a vertical aluminium strip around the inside of the hole. This sticks up above the deck @3mm, the plan being to give a consistent flat surface to seal to, plus small amounts of water running over the deck would be diverted around the hole rather than down it.

Pic 4
Through a contact at work I had a 1.5mm thick Stainless steel ‘Bezel’ laser cut from flat sheet to my design. This would have been £30, but I was owed a favour.

I spent an anxious 1/2hr carefully turning the outer 5mm edge of this over to 45deg using a mallet and various sized bits of scrap steel I had laying around. It’s not too easy to see in the image but shows up better later on.

I was going to drill countersunk holes in the bezel to screw it too the original hatch, but decided it would look much nicer if I welded hidden studs to the back of it instead.
I know there are proper weld on studs available, but I turned the heads down on some M5 countersunk set screws I had laying around the garage instead to avoid spending any cash.
The original hatch was drilled and countersunk to allow room for the welds.

I also added a strip of self adhesive Neoprene strip to act as the seal on top of the vertical Aluminium strip mentioned before.

Pic 5
With the front polished up it looks quite nice, apart from the marks still showing from the welding.
The images seam to highlight these more than they show in the flesh.

Nasher · 21 September 2012, 17:47

Pic 6 & 7
Show how it’s assembled with the studs plus some more Sikaflex after I’d cut 3mm from all around the outside of the original hatch and re-flowcoated it. In the image you can see two small areas that annoyingly refused to go off because of something soaked into the wood, and the state of the original flow coat on the back which obviously had the same issue when it was originally done.

I’ve also added a secondary seal with another length of self adhesive Neoprene strip.
Both seals are superglued where they join to prevent a gap.

Pic 8
Finished and fitted.

Nasher.