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Hi folks,
I’m not terribly proud of my galley hatch cuts. To improve the aesthetics as well as waterproof-ness, I want to add some edge guard on both sides of the galley hatch — i.e., the hatch itself as well the galley area. I’ve purchased several types of edge guard but just can’t find anything that fits well.
Any ideas or suggestions would be most welcome – especially any products you’ve used for this hatch or the doors.
John in Chicago
I wouldn’t recommend it… I’d use your random orbital sander to smooth out any rough edges, apply a few coats of epoxy, and continue on.
The weather seal is actually on the inside, where the squishy foam presses against the galley coaming. Adding additional edge gaskets may separate the foam from the coam. (Pun intended, I couldn’t resist.)
Oh, I think I missed the part about the foam. I knew there was the large gasket, but hadn’t seen about the weatherstripping you have there in the manual. Thanks for the tip. It’s pretty obvious now, I guess! Moving on…
John
I’ve had the camper built for a couple of years. Galley hatch leaked from the start. Problem comes from uneven build up of epoxy fillet where you have to hammer the gasket in place. Replaced the entire gasket, leaked. Gave up on that and went with Home Depot door gaskets and silicon. Leaks. One guy on the forum suggested a sump pump. Also installed a rubber flap on the top edge – outside to diverts water. Leaks. Then I installed 2 pull down tightner latches near the outside outward corners to pull hatch down tight against the gaskets. Leaks. Then I bought a really well fitting camper cover on Amazon. Problem solved.
You will also find problems with the door hardware rattling loose and the hardware falling apart, even with lock tight. Galley hatch and doors were over engineered and the correct installation beyond me.…so the take away is, “leaks.” Yeah, it won’t be perfect, I get that. The sump pump suggestion is maybe the best thing I’ve heard on this forum! In the meantime, I’ll still be on the search for the “perfect” gasket/edging/piece of rubber.
As for the damn doors, I nearly lost my #$#@% mind a couple of weeks ago. I have one door pretty tight, the other rattles more than it should. The handle hardware must be cheap tin.
The galley hatch and doors are definitely the weakest parts of the product design. But I still love it!!
One addition that I made makes the camper much more comfortable. I cut a piece of 3/4” plywood ta little less the interior width and about 28” avg height with rounded top corners, padded one side and upholstered with grey vinyl material. Placed it at a comfortable angle against the front. Had room to
store sleeping bags/pillows behind it and still have plenty of stretch out room. I’m 6’2”. It’s not fixed to anything. Just rides along. Great for lean back reading, hanging out.@tal Clever idea with the plywood cushion… I’m 6’2″ also, so will consider doing that mod.
As for the galley hatch, we’re in the final throws of finishing up our teardrop. Our galley hatch lays down perfectly on the weather gasket and I feel like we wouldn’t even need the 7/16″ foam strip to get a good seal… HOWEVER, once I lock in the gas springs, the pressure from the springs on the hatch bows it up, and when closed there is now a 1/2″ gap that I can look through on each side. I can actually see from one side of the camper all the way out the other side. So I see the problem as being that the hatch is basically not rigid enough longitudinally to handle the pressure of the gas springs.
I’m at a bit of a loss on how to fix it. Yes, adding the 7/16″ foam strip will fill the gap, but it won’t look very nice, and it sounds like it probably won’t keep the water out. I’m half-tempted to add two longitudinal stiffeners to the lid, but man, getting the right curved shape would be nearly impossible. So right now I’m leaning towards adding two latches about halfway up either side of the hatch to hold the edges down. Not a huge fan of that idea either, but…
@pandron – i actually have latches being delivered today to hold down the edges. Also not a fan, but at this point it’s just endless tweaking to get this sucker as water tight as possible.
<p style=”text-align: left;”>@wudboatVT What kind of latches are you going with? I’m considering doing some elbow catches from the inside which would be pressed down to latch from the outside, and then released from the inside when rotating the galley handle T (I installed one of the door handles as the galley handle latch).</p>
Something like so:
These horrible things. But incredibly adjustable. Still deciding:
I like where you’re headed – a bit beyond my engineering abilities i think!
Well, the engineering involved would mostly be careful measuring and connecting a wire to the door latch. The catch I had in mind was this one:
https://www.westmarine.com/buy/perko–cp-zinc-elbow-catch–111684
The risk of this setup is that if the wire comes undone (or I close the hatch before connecting the wire, for example while installing the catch) then the lid will be stuck closed (forever?).
Where would you mount those? On the outside sides of the lid I presume?
I just found this post:
Some clever solutions to the problem. Wished I had added a layer of glass to the inside face of the galley hatch (like I did with the doors). Would have made it much stiffer.
After digging into the Warped Galley Lid post I came across @geraldbaranski ‘s solution to the edges of the lid popping up and decided to replicate it. It seems like the least obtrusive solution (for the exterior at least) that I’ve seen.
When I try to add a picture my post gets deleted, so I’ll try to describe. I used 1/8″ Dyneema cord (doesn’t stretch and super-easy to splice), with some turnbuckles, and some thru-bolted pad eyes. It was pretty hard to guess how the wood would bend so I did some guessing. I put a lower string a couple inches higher and inboard than where @geraldbaranski did hoping I could get away with just one string. It wasn’t quite enough so I added a second near where the lid stiffener terminates. In hindsight I would position the lower string’s pad-eyes about 2″ farther outboard and aft, and the uppers about 1″ father outboard (basically exactly where @geraldbaranski did). That would allow for slightly lower tension in the strings, but I would still need the second upper string for my situation. Anyway, it seems to work!
I also ordered this weather stripping off McMaster that I plan to use instead of the 7/16″ foam that came with the kit: https://www.mcmaster.com/93085K566/
Note: McMaster has an amazing array of weather stripping (and edge guard) options that you can filter by size! I chose this one because it has a little flap that by sticks out. My hope is positioning that flap towards the outside it might drip the water down into the gutter.
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