V-Berth: Fit New Headliner

Fitting headliner in the V-Berth is very fiddly indeed. The shape of the ceiling is such that there are lots of awkward corners to shape the wood around - and the best way I found of doing it was to make a lot of small panels. This, of course, means lots of joins and these were covered in a plastic strip and screwed into place.

The material used was PolyPly supplied by Plymaster but phone ahead, they don't always have stock but they are happy to order it if you phone a few days ahead. 

A certain amount of fiddling around the funny-shaped walls and various bits of hardware.

The bits that required a slightly different finishing approach were at the aft end where the headliner meets the wood, and around the forward hatch. Both were finished with white plastic angle, the latter sealed with sealant to stop any water from getting above the headliner.

The replacement headliner was a lot thinner than the original so I needed to put spacers in a few places so that there were not gaps where it met existing timbers and trims.

Lots of panels mean lots of joins to cover but, with care, it all came out in the end.
This turned out to be a time-consuming but satisfactory job. It really does look good now.

Replace Forward Hatch

Both hatches were in a pretty grotty state with crazed glass, corroded frames, sheared bolts and broken fittings. They could have been restored at some expense but still the light coming in would not be what it could be. We went for replacement. The usual financial investigation indicated an import - this time from New Zealand.

Once the old hatch had been removed, the deck could be measured up for cutting (the new hatch being about 5mm all round bigger than the old). The excess was dremeled away and the gap filled with epoxy fairing mix. The old screw holes were drilled out and filled with epoxy to seal them, and new holes were drilled oversize and filled ready for the new self-tappers.

The hole fully prepped.
Before embedding the frame in Sikaflex, the deck and frame were masked off. The plan is to run seal around the mating area, and snug the frame down with self-tappers. Then the masking tape can be removed and the Sikaflex smoothed down with a finger.

Deck and frame masked prior to embedding in Sikaflex.
Next day the frame can be screwed down tight and the hatch fitted to its frame.

Fitted hatch.
 

Hatch dogged down.
The last thing that needs doing here - and its a job that can wait for a while - is to rub down the epoxy for any old holes that lay outside the hatch rim. These will be exposed to the sunlight and I'm concerned that, over time, UV will break them down. Once they have been rubbed down a couple of mm, they can be filled with gelcoat repair and buffed up to a nice deck-like shine.

Install Anchor Winch

As the anchor winch was shot, we fitted a new one - the South Pacific PRO CV1000. This windlass is a direct replacement in that it will be set up so that the rope and chain are handled in the same way - manually fed into the locker.

The main problem with fitting this is that there was a big brass bracket through-bolted to the deck right where I didn't want it. Not only that, it was completely seized in. The only option was to cut it out and that's where the Dremel came in.

Having cut the fitting out, I was left with a great big hole where I didn't want one. I also needed to extend, make good and shape the existing hole. This was done with epoxy resin, glass fibre matting and various epoxy extenders (glue and filler). This was the result...

Took a lot of effort to get here but things are coming together. The structure of the deck has been made good ready to accept parts.
The result of the initial preparation was fairly unsightly and I could have spent a lot of time making it good with various potions. I forgot all that and covered the lot with a stainless steel sheet. Not only does this cover the mess, it will also help spread the winch loading on the deck. Like everything else here, the screw-holes were drilled over-size and filled with epoxy.

This stainless-steel plate is more to hide the repairs to the deck than anything else. It has been screwed down on to Sikaflex 291T and has holes ready for the winch studs.
Having prepared the area and masked it off, the winch is dropped onto a bed of Sikaflex. The nuts are snugged up, masking tape and excess removed before waiting 24 hours for the mastic to go off. Next day, the nuts are tightened to compress the Sikaflex.

That's the winch dropped in. Again it's Sikaflex 291T for the sealant.
As there was a wiring option for an up and down switch, I decided to fit both. These were fitted through the deck with the usual epoxy treatment for the through-holes and the screws.

The finished above-deck parts. As well as the winch, there is an up and a down foot switch.
There are 2 ends to the electrics; the forward parts and the aft parts. The forward parts get their own control box. This consists of a solenoid that switches high current to the winch to rotate it for up or down, a low-current up/down switch, and I replaced the supplied low current fuse with a circuit breaker (so that I don't have to hunting around for fuses if something pops).

Here's a circuit diagram of the forward control box.

Forward winch wiring. The yellow shaded parts are inside the control box. Main power comes in from the left.

Below-decks components. The winch and foot switches are obvious. I made up a box for the other components and wired it all up in the usual way.