Practical Boat Owner - July 2018

Great ideas and tips from PBO readers

Practical projects

M

otor-sailing

close-hauled in the

wheelhouse, sipping

tea while all around other

yachts are heeled over

taking spray and waves over

the top, I often feel rather

pleased with myself (you

might even say smug).

When the biggest effort for

me is switching on the screen

wipers, it’s obvious that our

Shelving solution

Keith Calton converts an underused

hanging locker into handy shelving

to the back of the shelf

• gloves, socks etc – was lost
  forever. On the starboard side,
  I wanted to retain a bit of
  hanging space, so I decided to
  position new shelving deep
  into the locker. But the key
  alteration was to add a new
  cupboard door to the side of
  each of the lockers to enable
  access deep within the space
  from the forepeak cabin.
  Firstly I carefully positioned
  my new shelves, then marked
  out the size of the new door,
  making sure to give it the
  space to fully open.
  Cutting accurate ‘blind’
  holes in an 18mm bulkhead
  was next to impossible a few
  years ago, but with the advent
  of the Fein Multimaster and its
  many imitators it’s become
  much easier. But wonderful
  tools that they are, they can
  still wander! As my boat was
  ashore and level, I was able to
  use a spirit level, which I stuck
  to the bulkhead with
  double-sided tape to use as a
  straight edge for cutting along.
  Just remember to clean the

bulkhead down

so that the tape

will stick well.

Once all four

sides were cut I

used the vibrating

sanding attachment

to finish off the edges

inside and out. For me, the

finish was more than

acceptable and the actual cut

width was only about 1mm.

Fitting trim is often incredibly

fiddly and normally involves

glue and brass tacks, but to

me it seemed another use for

good quality double-sided

tape. Using a mitre saw and

1in tape, I cut the top and

bottom lengths first,

temporally sticking them in

place with ‘tabs’.

Once the upright beading

was firmly stuck down I was

easily able to fit the horizontal

sections. When I’d fitted all the

trim, I rubbed on a bit of pine

wood filler and dusted off.

The final fitting was the

elbow catch. Fitted the normal

way these extend quite far into

the cupboard space, so I

reversed the catch plate and

filed off the latching part so it

would take much less space.

I then created the finger

holes, and finished the whole

thing off with a couple of coats

of varnish.

Macwester Wight doesn’t

need two cavernous hanging

lockers to dry our oilskins!

Located forward of the main

bulkhead, each locker is about

40in (1.0m) deep and conceals

a standing rigging knee at its

far end. I had already put in

two shelves on the port side

locker which were accessible

via the full-height side door, but

anything which worked its way

The port-side

locker: once

the second

access was

created, the

whole of the

space became

usable

The Fein Multimaster makes

blind cutting relatively easy.

Note the guide block fixed

below the line with double-

sided tape

I used double-sided tape to

secure the trim, using small

‘tabs’ while cutting to size

before sticking the entire

length of trim to the bulkhead

Elbow latches were fitted in

reverse to save space

The completed starboard-side

locker door

Port-side door with trim and

latch fitted, interior painted

The starboard locker still

retains some hanging space

TOP TIP

The first cut should be

the side where the

hinges will go. Screw on

your hinges then do the

remaining cuts: your

door will definitely be

correctly aligned!