I can already see that the weather stripping material supplied with my kit (Shearwater) is going to be WAY too thick to use, and I didn’t even use the hatch rims. Any suggestions on the size & type of material to use?
Something closed cell for sure. I used a gasket cut from a piece of 3/4" minicell and trimmed to the correct height with a razor blade.
Laszlo
the gasket material sent with the kits worked very well for mine.I put the weather stripping on the hatches then cut it down with a very sharp razor knife. lay the knife flat on a thin piece of scrap wood. Slide the knife and the scrap wood together while cutting the gasket. The gasket material is very easy to bend around the corners.
I thought the gasket material would be too thick also. But it compresses very nicely, and it makes a nice tight hatch. I’m glad I overcame my initial skepticism and used it. Jim
A tip given to me by the guys at Fyne Boat Kits:
The gasket material forms slowly to fit the joint. If you want to speed this up you can do so by applying more pressure. To do this, insert a couple of lengths of 1.25" dowelling (bits of broom-handle) underneath the straps and pressing on the side edges of the hatch, then tighten up the straps and leave overnight.
question I posted else where
is the gasket meant to hang over the small hatch rim?. The postion of my hatch rim doens't is narrower than gasket width, I don't know if this by design or the result of my build.
thanks in advance
brad
John,
And good thought it is. Your idea is similar to the way the hatches are formed on some of the boats sold here. Rather than building up a laminate, though, they work with material actually removed from the deck. That way the grain is a perfect match and the sizes match except for the saw kerf.
The ledge is identical to what you propose, but instead of a groove there's a ridge to position and compress the o-ring.
The o-ring is manually built up from an adhesive foam strip glued to the edge of the hatch for exactly the reason you describe - to keep it in place. It can aslo be an actual o-ring/gasket cut from appropriate material.
Your instincts are excellent. It's time for you to build a boat :-)
Happy New Year,
Laszlo
PS - click on the thumbnails to get larger images.