Skylight repair

Here in late November, there are some days where it is too cold in the tent, so I started to repair and renovate the parts that has been taken off the boat.

The skylight is in dire need of repair, in fact, some of the parts need to be replaced. The construction of the skylight is not particularly well thought out, because the wood in the middle between the two hatches is no more than 35 mm wide, thus it is impossible to screw two hinges directly next to each other with wooden screws. That is why I intend to change it a little so that the centerpiece becomes wider. The picture shows the old centerpiece.

I make the centerpiece in 2 parts like the old one, but the width will now be 50 mm instead of 35 mm, so it will be possible to mount the hinges with 20 mm screws.

 

The hatches now need to be 10 mm smaller, but since the old hatches are damaged, I'll make new ones instead. The old ones are made with tapped joints, but I'll make it a little more simple with a small cut and a stainless steel screw in the joints instead. It takes a long time to make tapped collections with the tools I have available and there won't be much difference in the end result.

December 23, 2008:
Now it starts to look like a skylight, I only have to glue the small water lips on the underside of the hatches and sand them, then the skylight is ready to be put together.

April 04, 2009:
I'm varnishing the skylight - 4 layers out of 6 are still missing. I have saturated with Owatrol D1 and I love the glow and color the Epifanes varnish gives the mahogany, and the brilliant shine looks fantastic. But it's not the easiest varnish to work with.