Shifting lewmar portlights?, leaky windows

[chubby]

Ok so during the season the windows leaked, especially over younger daughter`s bunk!

So the plan was to remove them, one at a time, clean off the silicone sealant, check, replace seals and "glass" if needed and re bed or maybe just replace the whole thing and re bed in something butyl as per other threads,

so far so good.....except now they don`t seem to leak so much: do we get different size rain drops in the winter, and more to the point when I try to remove one, the inevitable happens, 3/4 of the screws shift but some are solid, perhaps SS seized to ally.

So forumites do you give up and leave alone hoping for a dry summer when daughter aboard, apply yet more silicon sealant to the outside and hope, bite the bullet and try harder to shift the screws....hammer, blow torch, hot water, drill them out.....or follow SWMBOs advice and pay a "proper man" to do the job, I think she means someone who knows what to do....however windows seem about the least popular boat job in the trade?!

 

[West Coast]

Best sort them properly! Any photos of the offending windows? Mine (lewmar from circa 1993) have SS bolts which are accessed from the cabin, tapped into the ally frame. I removed them all to get new Perspex fitted, but found also the butyl sealant between the frame and coach roof had failed, which is where the water was getting in. Like you I found some bolts would not easily come free, but did eventually just with mechanical force.

 

[Pye_End]

I did mine using some taps from an impact driver, and using a brace. Almost all of them eventually gave in, although one has broken. Once loosening them all it was a reasonably quick and easy job. Sprayed them some days beforehand, and tried some heat on some of them, but not sure whether this did too much - the brace was the most helpful tool.

 

[Carduelis]

Are you sure it is the window surround that's leaking. The older Lewmar portlights are made in two parts (upper and lower) with a horizontal expansion joint on each side. There is a gasket in this joint which fails after a few years and water then runs down a slot in the inside of the alloy and appears in the catches at the bottom of the window.

Lewmar recommend fixing without removing the portlights by scraping out the old gasket and replacing with a good quality silicone sealant.

Worked for me!

 

[howard easton]

On this subject I have two small leaks that seem to be coming from the turnbuckles that hold the windows closed. Presumably they can be dismantled . Do they have an internal seal - O ring maybe?

 

[smithy]

On this subject I have two small leaks that seem to be coming from the turnbuckles that hold the windows closed. Presumably they can be dismantled . Do they have an internal seal - O ring maybe?

If my memory is correct there is a plastic cap on the turnbuckle which hides a screw. Undo this and the catch comes to bits exposing the o ring, you might just get away with putting some silicone grease on it.

 

[skyflyer]

All this assuming you are sure that the rubber seals between hatch and 'glass' are OK?

Having found these both expensive (£40-ish) and bloody hard work to replace,(due yo need to remove all the gunk and old sealant from the groove in the frame) I was advised by Seals-Direct to use simple 8mm diameter neoprene circular section cord which costs about £2 per window. Cut the right length, glue the ends together with super-glue and fix in place into the corner of the frame with a bead of silicon sealant. (which is invisible from view once completed) Takes about 5 minutes per hatch and can be simply and easily replaced every few years if needed, although so far mine have shown no need for replacement.

The catches do indeed have O-rings in them, by the way, and previous poster is correct about the plastic cap to access the screw.

 

[jac]

I

Are you sure it is the window surround that's leaking. The older Lewmar portlights are made in two parts (upper and lower) with a horizontal expansion joint on each side. There is a gasket in this joint which fails after a few years and water then runs down a slot in the inside of the alloy and appears in the catches at the bottom of the window.

Lewmar recommend fixing without removing the portlights by scraping out the old gasket and replacing with a good quality silicone sealant.

Worked for me!

I had exactly the same experience and would strongly suggest checking this first. If the outside of the portlight has a horizontal line in the middle on both sides it's the older style pre 1999. If the sealant hasn't been replaced it's probably knackered.

Not a hard job to fix, remove old sealant (mine gave up it's attachment to the frames very easily ) then squirt in more sealant on each side. Probably 10 mins per portlight.

 

[Minchsailor]

After many attempts on my last boat with various sealants I eventually bit the bullet. Assuming you can get all the screws undone (big assumption), send the windows away to Eagle Boat Windows (www.eagleboatwindows.co.uk). They will clean them up, reseal the glass with pukka stuff and send them back with a non-setting mastic for resealing to the the boat. You can make the boat rainproof by 3/8mm ply sheets clamped over the aperture with hatch sealing tape. About 50 quid a window. Leak free.