Anatomy of a Baja 38 Special engine hatch

[JuneC]

How hard can it be, right?  Never expected to find such elaborate woodwork under the foam and vinyl.  I'm rebuilding it in plastic. 

The boxes on the ends will accommodate cup holders.  There are only 2 cup holders in the entire boat so I"ll be adding 4 in this project.  Real fun cutting all those funky angles with nothing more than a jigsaw.  If I had it to do over, I'd just go out and buy a table saw - it would have saved me scads of time.

The black plastic is sitting on the fiberglass engine hatch.


1/4" PVC board was added at the sides to increase the width.  I could have made the original pieces wider, but never expected the fiberglass lid would be a full 2 inches narrower than the opening in the boat (which, BTW, has no channels for water that drips off the sides of the hatch.  It just drips straight over the engines.  We'll be adding a channel of some sort to catch the drips and funnel them into the bilge. 



The underside has cut-out holes so the upholstered cup holder trim board can be screwed in place from underneath.



Bolster piece before fiberglass.  This one holds the "pillows" and is upholstered separately.  It gets screwed on to the main frame from underneath after it's all done.



Last bit of construction.  This piece is fully supported underneath and doesn't need to be fiberglassed so I used PVC board.  The black stuff will adhere to fiberglass.



Starting the foam work.  Check out that bevel!!  I LOVE the Bosch foam saw.  I could never have done that with my turkey carver.



More to come...

June

[jeepdoc]

 :o   Nice cant wait to see the vinyl work

[Mike8560]

Looks like a lot of work.  Were do you buy your PVC board June ?
I asume your doing it all inside. Bolstered front seats and side panels?  I look forward to finnished pix in the boat

[JuneC]

I had no idea it would be so much work looking at the old seating installed.  It wasn't until I removed the pieces that I saw all that rotten wood structure underneath.

The black stuff is a nylon composite with a rough finish that holds fiberglass really well.  Heavy and expensive, but has a 1000 psi holding strength for screws.  It'll outlast the boat.  I get all my plastic sheets from Piedmont Plastics.  The black stuff is their exclusive product - AquaPlas V. 

I'm also replacing all the foam with dri-fast.

June

[Peppy]

Wowza! Thats a hunk of plastic! I did a motor cover for a Donzi a while ago, not nearly so intricate, and the thing must have weighed close to 300lbs. Whats this thing weigh? You might need Benny Boomtruck to lift it in, no?

Can't wait to see it skinned! Where are the dingle balls going?

[JuneC]

So some of the pics got squashed in the virus eradication.  Here they are again with some new ones.  Progress....







Pattern on paper with lots of reference marks:


3/8" seam selvedge.  Lots of seams so 1/16" error x 18 or 20 seams = big problems


1/4" sew foam is sewn to the back of each piece.  No glue - I don't like the way it leaves an uneven finish sometimes.  The foam has to be oversized a bit since the scrim doesn't stretch as much as the vinyl will.




Got the sun bed mostly sewn today.  Pics in a day or two.

June

[bobbin]

Beautiful work, June!  How many hours do you have into the job?

I love my foam saw, but often prefer the carving knife for bevelling because it's lighter.  But it's taken years to get a really good, smooth, even cut with it.  You can't beat alternating blades for a smooth cut!

[JuneC]

Thanks!  The foam saw gives me issues with the size of the grip more so than the weight, though it DOES get heavy after a while. 

I've got maybe 40 or 50 hours into it so far.  Most of my time was spent on the structure since I'm
a)  not a carpenter
b)  didn't have the right tools

Sawing the length of the boards with 30 and 45 degree cuts was a PITA with a jigsaw as the blade heated up and stuck in the plastic every few inches.  It would take me 1/2 hour to make one cut.  The plastic, once heated, was hard as a rock and made a tough spot to get through so I'd have to anticipate the heat and stop cutting to let everything cool down.

June

[JuneC]

So now all I need are a couple of 200 pound gorillas to stretch it on while I staple  ::)





June

[bobbin]

Do you use fabric stretchers?  I've never used them, but a friend of mine in the awning industry swears by them and uses them all the time when he has to crank fabric around a frame and tech. screw it in place.  He says they really save the fingers, and reduce hand fatigue.