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Catalina/Capri 25/250 Sailor's Forums

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Hatch slide material or mods.

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TakeFive
Master Marine Consultant

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Response Posted - 05/18/2012 : 16:20:12

UPDATE: I had a presentation to prepare at work today, but couldn't settle down enough to get it done, so I left work early and headed to the boat. Opened the front hatch (nice easterly breeze blowing in), plopped my laptop on my new table, went to work in the beautiful environment, and had my presentation done in a couple hours.

While at the boat, I took a close look at the acrylic hatch. It definitely has some side-to-side play. And the edges of the acrylic are machined thinner than the rest of the hatch. The fiberglass rails are bare on both sides. But when I looked closely I could see a few remnants of adhesive on the outer side of each rail. This tells me that my rails probably had slider material at some point, but it was removed. I could probably remove the adhesive remnants, but I'd have to remove the HDPE strips on both sides to get to it, and there could be a risk of spashing the solvent on the hatch and etching it. So I'm going to leave it.

I have about 3/16" clearance between the acrylic hatch (when it's opened) and the pop top fiberglass, but if I push down on the pop top with my hand it flexes enough to come into contact with the acrylic. That's enough clearance that I could probably fit new slider strips on the rails, but the clearance would be awful tight - enough so that the screws and finishing washers might contact the pop top.

Intuitively, I think that these tolerances are awfully tight, and things like manufacturing variability and localized temperature could cause some boats to have a more serious problem than others - especially those that have the slider strips that reduce the clearance even more.

I'm also interested in hearing what Paul had on his boat when it was brand new.

Edited by - TakeFive on 05/18/2012 18:34:17

delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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Response Posted - 06/29/2012 : 22:51:11

Update: today I took the old UHMW tape off the lower rails, and replaced it with 1/32" HDPE (I think?) shims:

The box you see behind the cut up shims contains a bunch of different thickness shims that are all color coded. I cleaned up the slide area on the lucite hatch (yes it's clean, it just doesn't look so good, moss and green slime grows very quickly up here), and attached the new slides with 3M heavy duty double stick tape. This might have been overkill, but it's what I had on hand.

Here you can see three of the four slides I installed. The hatch slides pretty well, but I wasn't able to get all the glue from the previous slide material up (yet), so it's slightly sticky as the hatch moves aft to close it.

The shims are called "[url="http://www.handi-shim.com/"]Handi Shims[/url]" and I bought them at my local Woodcraft store.

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britinusa
Web Editor

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USA
5404 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 09:57:32

David, yes, JD had the tap on the rails (not on the underside of the hatch)

Paul

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TakeFive
Master Marine Consultant

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2272 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 10:29:21

David,

I'm curious about the teak support at the front end of your hatch. Mine is relatively thin, and the thickness is the same all the way across. It's so thin that it would not appear to provide any stiffness to the hatch. Yours looks thicker than mine, and also thicker in the center than at the sides. It that true, or is it just fisheye effect from your camera lens?

FWIW, my aft wood piece is definitely thicker at the center than the sides, providing some upward force that bends the hatch upward slightly, presumably to provide more stiffness and faciliate drainage toward the side channels.

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delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 12:12:55

Rick,
Offhand, I'd say it's the same thickness all the way across (lens artifact), but I'm not actually sure. We're going crabbing tomorrow on opening day, so I'll take a look.

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Nautiduck
Master Marine Consultant

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3704 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 12:56:02

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by delliottg
 Rick,
Offhand, I'd say it's the same thickness all the way across (lens artifact), but I'm not actually sure. We're going crabbing tomorrow on opening day, so I'll take a look.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">

Oh, man. I am so jealous. I LOVE crab!

Do you use the 250 or your dink?

Edited by - Nautiduck on 06/30/2012 12:56:36

delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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USA
4479 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 15:05:20

I'm debating dragging the newly cleaned dink behind us, but I'm not sure if I need it (probably not). It might be easier to pull the pots from it, but not sure. This is our first time crabbing from SL. The last time we went crabbing was off of a friend's 25' fishing boat. Our traps are collapsible, but they're still 3' across when set up, so not sure how easy it'll be to pull them and empty them of crab.

In any case, going to take SL to do it in, and may or may not bring the dink. It's supposed to be a nice day, but not much wind, so we'll probably go drop our two pots off of Magnolia and just hang out on the hook while we wait.

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TakeFive
Master Marine Consultant

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2272 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 17:39:47

You might want to shackle a block to the end of your boom, then swing it wide to raise/lower the pot. Not sure if lifelines would get in the way. Topping lift might raise it high enough.

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delliottg
Former Mainsheet C250 Tech Editor

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4479 Posts

Response Posted - 06/30/2012 : 17:54:43

I've been thinking that exact thing. I've got a snatch block from my climbing days that's already in my sailing bag. I'm planning on rigging it to the end of the boom, then rig a preventer to keep the boom slightly over the side. I'll probably tie off the boom with the halyard as well as the topping lift.

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