Making a Hatch out of HDU Board and Coosa Composites

None of Phoenix's original hatches were intact when we bought her. The hatches that did come with Phoenix did not fit properly, as the previous owner resized each hatch opening when he began re-decking the boat. We had already built new hatches on the foredeck and aft cabin as well as the butterfly hatch on the main cabin, and had made a "temporary hatch" on the aft lazarette out of ipe and old Lexan.That hatch was never intended to be a permanent solution, and the time had come to design and build a new hatch.

Our other hatches are made of camaru or teak with Lexan, and were built to let light into the cabins. The lazarette, on the the other hand, is a storage area on the aft deck that doesn't need Lexan. With Phoenix's canoe stern, the aft deck is narrow, so we wanted to make the most of the real estate and have a strong hatch that could be walked on, so a nonskid surface was a must.

We had some 1/2" high density urethane (HDU) board left over from our windshield coaming rebuild, and some scrap 1/2" Coosa Bluewater board as well. As we mentioned in the windshield coaming post, HDU is a strong, naturally waterproof material that is much lighter than wood, thermally stable, paintable, and can be machined much like wood. It comes in a variety of thicknesses, and it works well with fiberglass and epoxy.

Coosa is HDU material reinforced with layers of fiberglass. It has all of the properties that we love about working with HDU, along with the strength and structural properties of fiberglass. It comes in two varieties: Nautical (reinforced with continuous strand fiberglass) and Bluewater (reinforced with layers of both continuous strand and woven roving fiberglass). 

Given the structural properties of both materials, and how much of each we had left over from previous projects, we decided to laminate two pieces of HDU together to serve as the top of the hatch and use the Coosa Bluewater material for the sides of the hatch.

Our lazarette hatch is a trapezoid with the largest edge forward near the aft cabin. When building the Coosa frame, we opted to make the front edge taller than the trailing aft edge so that water would drain down the hatch rather than pool anywhere on top. We glued the edges together with Precision Board's HDU Adhesives, and used screws to hold the pieces together while the urethane adhesive set up. [Note: HDU and Coosa tend to move when the adhesive is applied, so clamps, screws, weights, etc. are needed to help keep the pieces in place.]

While the framing was setting up, we cut out two trapezoid pieces out of the HDU board --a larger piece to sit on top of the framing and one slightly smaller (1/2" on each side) to fit just inside the frame. The two trapezoids were laminated together, then glued and screwed to the Coosa frame.

Next it was time to test fit the new frame in spot. We installed Whitecap stainless hinges on all of our other hatches (excluding the butterfly hatch), so we checked those for placement with the hatch as well.

Whitecap Cast Stainless Hinges

Test fitting our new lazarette hatch made of Coosa Bluewater board and Sign Foam HDU board

We were then ready to remove all of the screws and prepare to fiberglass the hatch. We filled all of the screw holes with thickened epoxy, routered all of the edges, and laid down 20 ounces of woven fiberglass on the top and a 10 ounce layer on the inside as well.

Another design consideration for our hatch that we had to consider is that our rudder post is in the aft lazarette; in the event we need to use our emergency tiller, which attaches to the rudder post, we wanted to be able to install the emergency tiller without having the hatch completely open. Chances are you will only need the emergency tiller when the proverbial sh*t hits the fan, in which case, the decks are probably awash. Why add insult to injury and deal with water dumping down the hatch if you can avoid it?

To combat this issue, we decided to install a 4" access port to the hatch that we could open and insert the emergency tiller through if needed. We could also install a cowl vent in the port to allow airflow into the lazarette when running the generator. We measured for placement to align the emergency tiller with the rudder post and used a hole saw to cut the appropriately sized hole.

Lazarette hatch glassed and first coat of microballoons applied

Next, we used epoxy mixed with microballoons to fair the hatch smooth inside and out, sanding with an orbital sander between coats.

Fairing the lazarette hatch

When we were satisfied with the fairing, it was time for primer and gloss coats of paint. The entire hatch was primed inside and out, and we concentrated the finish gloss paint on the edges, around the access port, and inside of the hatch.

After allowing the gloss paint to cure for several days, we taped off the main top portion of the hatch, lightly scuffed the paint and applied the white Kiwigrip nonskid paint. We've been very happy with our Kiwigrip nonskid on Phoenix, and have used it both on the decks as well as in our nesting dinghy.

Gloss coat done and taping off for Kiwigrip non-skid application

Kiwigrip non-skid on Phoenix's lazarette hatch

Kiwigrip has a thick, yogurt-like consistency that is applied with a notched trowel, about 1/4" thick. You then use their "loopy-goopy" texture rollers to roll in the desired texture. Kiwi-grip dries pretty quickly -- usually touch dry in an hour, and can be walked in after 24 hours. Once the paint was dry, we installed the access hatch with stainless screws and butyl tape to make a watertight seal.

Access port installed and ready for install

I will be sewing a sleeve or boot to go around the emergency tiller to keep water from entering the hatch in the event we need to use it (probably out of neoprene). We don't really need to run the generator at this point, but we can pop in the cowl vent when necessary.

We now have a strong, walkable, low profile hatch on the aft deck that looks great! HDU and Coosa have really become our new favorite boat construction media. They are slightly more expensive than wood, but if you want to do the job once and never worry about rot or water penetration again, I would highly recommend working with them.

Building a Custom Fiberglass Propane Locker

As we continue outfitting Phoenix, one of the many questions that we've been pondering is where we're going to put the propane tanks? In Bruce Bingham's original Andromeda design, there was plenty of space between the main cabin and the main mast to allow room for a deck box to store the propane. However, one of Phoenix's previous owners extended both the main and aft cabin tops, so there's no room for a deck box on the foredeck.

As a stop-gap solution, we've used 1 lb propane tanks and Bill attached a 20 lb tank to the stern rail with a L-bracket that he made. While effective in the short run, we wanted something that was more secure and would permanently house two 20 lb propane tanks, and that vents overboard off Phoenix's stern.

Our temporary propane tank holder -- a L bracket attached to the stern rail and holding the tank in place with stainless hose clamps

We began researching different above deck propane locker options, and weren't really happy with sizes we found commercially available. Trident makes a really nice propane locker, if you're willing to spend $1,000+ for a box. That seemed a bit crazy to us, especially since the dimensions of their propane locker are too large to fit under Phoenix's stern rail.

Nothing we found really fit our needs, so we started to design our own propane locker. We began by purchasing a 12-inch cement form from the local Home Depot. There was a surprising amount of size variability between the "12-inch" tubes at our Home Depot, so we had to sort through the stack in order to find one that was truly 12 inches in diameter.

Bill cut down the cement form to make two tubes of equal height and then used some spare cardboard to make a bottom and to fill in the gap between the two tubes. He used packing tape to hold everything together and then systematically covered the cardboard exterior with more packing tape. Viola, his  "Frankenform" was complete!

Making our propane locker form out of cement forms

Bottom view of the propane locker form

Top view of our propane locker form. Each 12" tube is large enough for a 20 lb propane tank

We painted PVA mold release on the form, and then applied one layer of 10 oz Hexel fiberglass cloth, 2 layers of chop mat and a final layer of 10 oz. fiberglass cloth to the form with fiberglass resin to get the desired thickness. Once the resin was fully cured, we removed the cardboard form from our fiberglass shell and checked for fit. We purposefully made the locker taller than we needed, and Bill used a hacksaw to cut the fiberglass base to the desired height and to get a clean edge.

Several layers of fiberglass and resin on the propane locker base

Cardboard form removed from our propane locker base

Cardboard form removed from our propane locker base

Perfect fit for two 20 lb propane tanks!

Cutting the propane locker base to size and making a clean edge

We followed a similar process for the locker's lid and made it slightly larger than the base. However, we incorporated some exterior grade plywood (5/32") to help add some weight and stiffness to the lid.

Fiberglass and resin on the propane locker lid before removing it from its form

Once the lid was done, it was time for dewaxing, fairing and preparing to paint the propane locker.

Propane locker base fair and ready for primer

Propane locker lid with primer

Propane locker base with primer

Nice high gloss with the finish paint

Our new custom fiberglass propane locker

With the propane locker painted it's time to move on to installing the propane system and making it ABYC compliant. 

 

Lazy Jacks

Phoenix's 9.8 ounce, 448 sq. ft mainsail is very heavy and stiff. When Bruce Bingham first visited us for our initial sail and he helped me flake the sail, he laughed when I told him that I'd eventually beat the sail into submission. He had little faith that at 5'2" I'd be able to tame our mainsail.

Flaking the mainsail had been a chore to date, and luckily the hardtop dodger and bimini that we built is strong enough that we can crawl, and even walk on top to wrestle with the mainsail. However, we're getting ready to install our solar panels on top of the bimini, which will limit our crawl space on top. It was fortuitous that our local West Marine was going out of business and all line was marked down 75%, so we decided it was time to make and install lazy jacks to make flaking the sails a much easier task.

When we made our sail covers, we didn't install slits to accommodate lazy jacks, and we knew we wanted lazy jacks that we could pull forward to the mast to get out of the way when we cover the sails. After quite a bit of online research, we decided to make a 4-legged lazy jack system similar to what John from Morgan's Cloud created, but modified slightly for Phoenix's main and mizzen sails. John does a good job of describing the measurements needed for determining the lower line termination and attachment points, and the basics of the overall system can be proportioned to any boom.

We used 1/4" double braid line for the lazy jacks, and knowing how to do your own double braid eye splices definitely came in handy for this project and helped maintain the cruising kitty, as each side of the lazy jack requires 5 eye splices (10 per mast, 20 in all since the Andromeda is a ketch rig). Local riggers charge $20 per splice, not including the price of the line, so 20 eye splices would definitely hurt the pocket book! Contrary to many lazy jack systems we've seen online, ours didn't take nearly as much line. We used 150' of line for the main's lazy jacks, and 120' of line for the mizzen.

Unlike Morgan's Cloud, we decided against using blocks in the upper sections of the lazy jacks and cheek blocks along the mast. To minimize chafe, we felt stainless O-rings would be a better choice against the sail on the upper segments. Along the boom we opted for eye straps, partly because we had them on hand, and partly because the system doesn't really have much load or friction, so we didn't think it warranted going out and buying new cheek blocks at the time.

There are basically three lengths of line on each side of the lazy jacks -- the upper/mast termination section, the middle section, and the longest length of line that attaches to the boom and serves as the 4-legs. The mast termination length has an eye splice at one end, and an eye splice with a stainless O-ring at the other end. The middle section has eye splices with O-rings on both ends. And the boom termination length has an eye splice on aft end.

To minimize noise and additional holes in the mast, we attached the upper end  to the lower shroud tangs, just  below the spreaders with a bale sling hitch.

Bill installing the upper, mast termination leg of the lazy jacks on our main mast

Bale sling hitch

The middle section was attached to the upper piece with a cow hitch through the upper's O-ring. The lower section was also attached to the aft section of the boom with a cow hitch, and the un-spliced end was lead forward -- through the aft middle O-ring, down through the eye straps, back up through the forward middle O-ring, and to the cleat on the forward section of the boom.
 

Close up of lower line going through the middle section's O-ring

Cow hitch on aft section of boom

Lazy jacks installed on the main

It helps to lay out the design on paper and dry fit before cutting the lines and putting in the eye splices. If you take proper measurements and think of the of the various segments as either a 90 degree triangle (upper and middle legs) or close to an equilateral triangle (lower legs), you can get fairly close to the correct line lengths needed. Essentially:

• The upper leg length is the hypotenuse of a 90 degree triangle that terminates several feet directly over the middle of the cleat and eye strap. 
• The measurement for the foot of the upper triangle can be measured on the boom
• The forward leg of the triangle is total height (boom to lower tang attachment) minus 2 times the height of the lower triangle. In our case, each vertical leg height was approximately 1/3 of the boom to lower tang measurement. 
• Calculate the middle leg as if it were a 90 degree triangle to get the approximate length of the hypotenuse. 
• Once you've calculated all the lengths, dry fit with some cheap line. 
• If all of your calculations are correct, the only line you may need to adjust/shorten is the back leg of the middle section. 
• Keep in mind that if you want to collapse the lazy jacks and pull all the lines forward like we do, much more line is needed on the lower leg.

Sailing with the lazy jacks on the main

It took a little playing with the determine how tight/slack to make the lower legs so that the sail drops properly, but the system has plenty of line to allow us to experiment and pull the entire system forward when we cover the sails. If we have them deployed when raising the sail, you need to really make sure to point the boat into the wind, otherwise the battens can hang up on the lines. This is really important for a full batten sail like our mizzen, but equally important for our 3/4 batten main.

Phoenix's lazy jacks

With the lazy jacks in place, it is much easier to drop the main and mizzen without either sail flopping around the deck. Flaking both sails is much easier as well: simply pull the flakes aft to make them neater, attach the sail ties, and voila!

Our system was certainly cheaper than the commercial lazy jacks on the market, are tailored to fit our rig, and are very simple/easy to use. The more we use them we definitely agree with John from Morgan's Cloud -- there's really no reason for the lazy jacks to go up higher than the spreaders. Also, the system doesn't need to be wider than the mast width (i.e. attached out under the spreaders) in order to properly cradle the sail.

We do lead the lines forward every time we cover the sail (we're pretty particular about protecting the sail from excess UV damage). Eventually we may add slits to the sail covers so that we can keep the lazy jacks in spot all the time, but it's so easy to deploy and/or stow the lazy jacks at this point, I'm just thrilled that my wrestling days are over!

New Boat Hooks

Phoenix is a heavy boat with a minimum of 6' free board. Both attributes can make for an interesting docking experience that makes your normal, 6' aluminum telescoping boat hooks seem too short when trying to grab a line and quite feeble when fending off a piling!

A few years ago, when Bill transited the Erie Canal to bring Phoenix home, someone at the NY State Canal System recommended that he screw hooks into some 2x2s and use them to help grab lines and push off the walls in the locks. This proved to be an invaluable tip and the sturdy 2x2s were much more effective than a light weight boat hook.

Bill and JD aboard Phoenix in the Erie Canal, 2x2s in hand

JD, Justin, Bill and Brian pushing off after visiting with Brian's parents

Brian and Kieth in the Erie Canal

Fast forward a few years, and it was time for more traditional boat hooks on board. My parents gave us new stainless steel boat hook tips for Christmas and we had one galvanized tip on hand, so Bill set to work making proper boat hooks for Phoenix.

New boat hook tips

We decided to go with 8' poles, and given the length, we didn't want to go with teak or other exotic hardwoods -- the weight would be unmanageable. Sitka spruce or Douglas fir would give us nice strength without the excess weight, and since Douglas fir is more readily available in our area, the choice was pretty easy.

We don't have a lathe or a shaper, so Bill opted for a more traditional woodworking approach. He started with 8' long 2x4 boards, that he ripped in two. He faceted each board with several passes through the table saw, then used a hand planer and spoke shaver to shape each board into a round pole with a tapered end to fit into the pole tip.

Boards ripped and one faceted

Soon to be boat pole ends

Bill hard at work with the hand planer

Tips attached and ready to float and taper

Once satisfied with the general shape, we floated each pole to determine their "waist" (each tip varied slightly in weight, so the waist was located on a different spot on each pole). He then tapered each pole from this waist to the tip to remove excess weight and flotation, and from the waist to the handle to remove additional weight and make the pole more manageable. This tapering allows each boat pole to properly float upright if dropped in the water. For a finishing touch, he shaped the ends to make them easy to handle, and drilled holes for line attachments.

Each pole was sanded with 80 and then 120 grit sandpaper for a nice finish. Since the poles are going to be used quite a bit and probably abused along the way, we decided not to finish them with Cetol or another varnish. Instead we opted to try Deks Olje wood oil. We had some on hand from a previous boat, touching up is easy, and the finish is not slippery like varnish or Cetol when wet.

Boat hooks ready for the Deks Olje

Several coats of Deks Olje later, the boat poles are finished and ready for our next sail!

Boat hooks oiled and ready to go

Tapered pole handles

Nice taper!

Squall-Proof Wind Scoop

Summer weather on the Chesapeake means you need to always be ready for a pop-up storm. We were very impressed with the aft cabin hatch dodger's performance during our recent trip to Still Pond -- we had the hatch open the entire time and the bed down below stayed nice and dry. Great for the aft cabin, but we definitely wanted to improve the airflow in the forward and main cabins while riding out the storms.

Phoenix's forward hatch acts like a wind tunnel when we have it open at anchor! It's 26"x31" and typically provides enough airflow to dry clothes in the forward cabin faster than they line dry on deck! While we love our 4-way wind scoop in lighter air, we needed something a bit more substantial to handle squalls.

We've long admired Terry Sargent's Squall-Proof Wind Scoop design, so we decided to make one for Phoenix. Terry's design is featured in Jim Grant's The Complete Canvas Worker's Guide, and further modifications are mentioned on Terry's blog. Similar in concept to a dorade box, the scoop is essentially a baffled box that fits over your hatch to funnel air down below while keeping the rain on deck.



Terry Sargent's wind scoop design

After taking all of the measurements, we figured we'd need 4 yards of fabric to make the wind scoop. We still have forest green Sunbrella on hand from previous projects, but not enough for this project. It's been a while since we had to buy any Sunbrella, and I was floored by how much the price has gone up. The sixty inch wide marine grade Sunbrella is currently retailing at almost $25/yard! While we know that Sunbrella is great, there had to be a cheaper alternative...

So with some online research we stumbled upon Aqua Gun -- a solution dyed polyester fabric (Sunbrella is solution dyed acrylic). Like acrylic, polyester fabrics are inherently water proof, and from everything we've learned to date, Aqua Gun's UV characteristics are on par with Sunbrella's. The fabric is slightly heavier in weight than marine grade Sunbrella (11oz versus 9.25oz), is 62.5" wide, but has an unfinished edge so you really have about 61" of working width. The draw backs are that it's currently only available from one supplier, and your choices are limited to three colors (blue, forest green, and tan). The HUGE plus, however, is that it's currently selling for $6.88/yard!

We called around to some different commercial canvas shops that are working with both materials to get their thoughts and those that we spoke with said that Aqua Gun was as durable as Sunbrella. At that price, we decided it was worth the experiment. All of our other exterior canvas is forest green so you'd think we'd buy that color, BUT, recent experience with the aft hatch dodger made us realize that on partly sunny days, that dark color gets pretty hot and can heat up the air on its way down below. So we opted for tan, in the hopes that it would be less inclined to blow hot air down the hatch.

Once the fabric arrived we were off to the races. Like Terry we went with a peaked roof for the wind scoop, though we added a few more attachment points and a second topping lift to help shape the scoop and to keep water from pooling on the top. We used 1" strips of heavy duty Velcro to secure the front and inner flaps, and used common sense fasteners to secure the scoop to the hatch base.

We had previously installed common sense studs to the hatch for our everyday hatch covers, so we followed the same pattern and installed the eyelets to the scoop where they aligned with studs on the hatch. With those in place, we did not need the weighted rod at the base of the hatch in Terry's picture above.

The original design called for fastening the lower part of the scoop to the toerails. This wasn't an option for us, and we're not big fans of grommets since they tend to rip out of fabric, we sewed webbing loops to the two endpoints. We ran lines forward to two cleats, and aft to the dorade guards to pull the lower forward edge down. We also sewed webbing loops to the sides of the scoop at the base of the inner flap, which were used to help tighten the flap base. An additional design modification was to add a bottom panel to the forward scoop. This addition helped funnel more air down the hatch compared to the original design.

Side view of the wind scoop
We found that with a little finessing, you can pull the lines tight enough to remove the wrinkles seen here

Back view, attached with common sense fasteners

All flaps in place, ready for some serious weather!

Front flap up with additional  bottom panel for better air flow.

Both flaps up for maximum air flow

The second night we were anchored in Worton we were able to try out the new wind scoop and it worked like a champ! We were able to pull the lines taut and it didn't have any of the wrinkles like in the pictures shown above.

It rained most of the night and we had the forward hatch wide open. There was so much airflow it was almost chilly in the crew's quarters! I'll get a better shot the next time we use the wind scoop, but in the meantime, this one will have to do.

The squall-proof wind scoop in action!