Hatch Locks Version 1

I really didn't like the original straps that were holding down the hatches.I also wanted some way to lock the hatch covers for some marginal theft deterrent. there is no way to totally secure the covers, but I thought some thing with a padlock hanging off of it would help deter some people.

I bought some of those stainless finger hooks that are sold for putting up mesh storage hammocks. I bent the "finger" part down to a 90 degree angle and it stuck out enough to grab the cockpit coamings. The aft cockpit one is shown here. I put them on the back edge because I was going to lock the cover from the front.

Here is the overall view of the cover.

Up at the front end is a slot I cut into the plastic with a hot knife. This fits over the eye shown below. I ground off the edges of the locknuts on the outside so they would be a litlle harder to loosen.

Here is the eye that sticks through the slot in the hatch cover. Initially, I tried backing it with washers, but they didn't work real well.

So I sanded down a piece of polyethelene plastic into a "D" shape so that the rounded end fit inside the coaming groove from the inside. This worked much better and had a stronger feel to it.

The whole peice had to have a slight curve to match the cockpit opening radius.

Here is what the hatch looks like when it is on. It takes a little trick to hook the back hooks under the coaming and then "slide" the cover on from the side over the eye. That is why the slot is cut longer to one side.

I did the same thing on the forward hatch. But since that one is so long, I spread the little hooks out so that one was at the end and one was sort of on the side. I kept the eyes facing toward each other (just on opposite sides of the cross-tube) so that I could run a stainless cable between both and just use one padlock to secure both.

 

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