Tinted Companionway Door

 

I was fortunate to find a scrape piece of acrylic that was tinted and .5 inch thick. It was from an old junk boat. The acrylic had many scratches on it and was not the correct shape for my companionway. I knew by looking at this item that I had an opportunity to learn two new skills: cutting  and sanding/polishing acrylic.

I used my current companionway doors as a templated and cut the plastic after marking cut lines with tape. Using a track saw and cutting approximately .12 -.24 inches in each pass as low blade speed made the cut clean without danger of cracking or gouging edges.

Picture on the left displays the huge amount of crazing on the plastic. All of which needs to be removed.

Picture on the right displays top part that is opaque (sanded area) with bottom area clear (sanded followed by polishing).

Bottom left has been sanded and polished; Bottom right is spot checked for additional areas to be sanded and polished again.

 

The picture on bottom left displays most of the scratches and crazing removed. The picture on the bottom right displays one small area that needed additional attention. This entire project took lots of experimenting with sand paper grits, and polish compounds at different speeds to get the feel and knowledge of what process and medium worked best.

The picture below is the end result of all that experimenting sanding and polishing.

New Hand Rail Covers

 

The Sky Blue color of the Sunbrella hand rail covers were starting to show their age. One may note that the material was thinning where it was exposed to the sun. 

I wanted to change the color to Navy Blue because it would match the Bimini, the Wheel cover, and the Boots at the base of the masts. The Navy Blue color also matched the boot stripe on the hull.

The Navy Blue is really makes the deck pop because it is a darker contrast to the white deck. In the picture on the left note how the handrail dark color frames out the hatch covers. 

The companionway hatch also needs to be replaced as it too is showing wear. I have note decided on the color of the hatch but it should be replaced next year at the latest (2025).

The picture on the left shows the hand rail cover where there is about .25 of an inch of space between the cover and the deck. This space was an important part of the new design because the previous hand rail cover touched the deck and acted as a dam for rain water. Many times I discovered small leaves and dirt piled up on the deck and required a cleaning. My hope is that the new hand rail covers will allow the water with the dust, dirt to freely more to the side decks.