If you have experience installing new portlights now available from SailboatOwners for my old Hunter, I would like to hear about your successes and failures. I want to replace all mine but would like the benefit of your experience first please. Curious most about how the new one seals to the outside of the cabintop, how that interface is sealed against water penetration.
New Portlights for 1981 Hunter 30' sloop
- Thread starter mike4751
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Hi Mike,
I did all of mine three years ago. It's actually pretty simple. I had some rot around the bottoms so I dug and ground back the core an inch or so all the way around to get to solid core, and to seal the core from further moisture damage. A Dremmel tool works good for this. Then filled with west epoxy with colloidal silica. I ground down with the Dremmel tool again, clamped them in their proper place, drilled all my holes, sealed with life caulk and let set up. Lots of c clamps are a big help, or the small bar clamps. When everything is in place, seal the trim rings on and you're done. Mine seem to stick out quite far, but I haven't had any lines or anything else catch on them, so I left them the way they came.
My biggest problem was that someone had sealed two of the old ones with 5200. I had to heat them up with a heat gun to get them apart. It's a time consuming process, but not all that difficult to do. Just take your time, and do it right.
Hope this helps
I did all of mine three years ago. It's actually pretty simple. I had some rot around the bottoms so I dug and ground back the core an inch or so all the way around to get to solid core, and to seal the core from further moisture damage. A Dremmel tool works good for this. Then filled with west epoxy with colloidal silica. I ground down with the Dremmel tool again, clamped them in their proper place, drilled all my holes, sealed with life caulk and let set up. Lots of c clamps are a big help, or the small bar clamps. When everything is in place, seal the trim rings on and you're done. Mine seem to stick out quite far, but I haven't had any lines or anything else catch on them, so I left them the way they came.
My biggest problem was that someone had sealed two of the old ones with 5200. I had to heat them up with a heat gun to get them apart. It's a time consuming process, but not all that difficult to do. Just take your time, and do it right.
Hope this helps
We just finished doing ours, a couple days ago.. After removing the windows make sure you clean the old silicone, 4200, 5200, 795, what ever was used to seal it last time, and make the surface as clean as possible. Size your new ports up first, we had to dremel a little bit of the edge away to fit the new windows because of the drains on the new ports. We aslo used through bolts so we had to drill new holes for those as well, ALL VERY EASY TO DO!!!! Then we simply taped around the outside and inside edge of window with painters tape to ensure that no silicone got on the fiberglass, then put an ample amount of DOW CORNING 795 silicone ( awesome stuff to work with) on both the outer and inner sides of the window, pushed them in place and then secured them with the thru-bolts and BAng, we were done and they look great!!!!!
If you ahve any more questions please ask!!
If you ahve any more questions please ask!!
There are several great articles on this in the owner mods section. Go to Boat Info -> Owner Mods then use the search function. Search on ports, or Grey, or even Beckson.
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