Leaky Hatch

[ianybw]

Hello,

I have a perspex hatch and the rain drips in between the perspex and the metal frame. I really should fit a new one ( its crazed as well ) but I would rather spend on other bits for now and get some more years use out of it. How easy is it to remove the perspex, add some 5200 or whatever and replace the perspex?

Has anybody tried it? Am I wasting my time? Does it work or should I just replace the whole thing?

Great Forum the the way, thanks in advance.

Thanks
Sylvesterthecat

 

[Cloven]

Worth trying Captain Tolley's Creeping Crack Cure (yes it really is called that). It's sorted the problem for me on two different hatches.

http://www.captaintolley.com/

 

[vyv_cox]

I'm only familiar with Gebo hatches, where this is a very easy job. The perspex is largely held in place by the sealant, with eight self tappers through the frame and into the prespex. Undo the screws, level the perspex out, scrape off old sealant, rebed on new sealant and replace screws. Cut off extruded sealant when cured. I did mine in October, took about an hour total.

 

[homa]

I have done exactly as you want to do.

I had crazed hatches and degraded rubber seals.

I removed both Canpa hatches, and sent to a re-furb place in Norwich - they quoted something like £400 to remove old perspex, clean, install new perspex and renew seals.

I thought I'd save a few punds by removing old perspex myself and cleaning up the frames then send to them for fitting new perspex.

In the end after I had removed the perspex (with a hammer) and cleaned the frames (scraper & wire wool) - I realised that I had done the hardest part.

I took the now empty frames to a Pespex supplier in Colchester, he cut the new perspex to shape and advised me how to fit the perspex myself.

I bought some new rubber seals from sealsdirect.com. Whole lot came to around £100 for materials.

Hardest part was removing the hatches from the boat - would have been easier with 2 people - one inside holding the spanner and the other outside with screwdriver - to remove the bolts.

If you fill in your bio I'm sure some forumites could recommend local suppliers for the replacement perspex.

Good luck

 

[gandy]

We sealed ours last winter, and it seems to be holding out. I didn't remove the perspex, I just raked out the old sealant between the sides of the perspex and the frame. That created a vertical slot around the perspex, a couple of mm wide and around 10mm deep. I injected Sikaflex into that space, all the way round. To reduce the mess, I used masking tape to protect the frame and the perspex before sealing. As I say, it works so far.