Pilot house hatch for C Dory 22 suggestions

c-brats123

New member
I am in South Florida. Looking for ideas on installing a hatch on the pilot house roof as well as dorade cowling vents. Appreciate your help. I am new to the group and bought a 22 Cruiser last fall.
Thanks, Jim
 
I just put in a AC unit so I had to cut in a 14/14 roof hole to accommodate the Mach 8 Coleman AC We just bought a 2300 genset so this should power the AC Good luck with your hatch
 
There are any number of small hatches. Which you could put on the roof. Remember that the roof is crowned--you can build a flat surface, as I have done for the air conditioner--and put a hatch on that. (Build up with resin and glass, keep fair and level.

There is a low profile hatch by Lewmar which is about 10 1/4 x 10 1/4. That is a good size. You want ventilation, but not a lot of sun coming in. If you had hatches, you might want a shade under them. They collect a lot more heat than the cored cabin top. I had a sky light in my motor home--and it had two shades under it--one translucent, and one which was light occlusive. It was double layer acrylic; air space to give some insulation.

In several of my sailboats which had pilot houses, I put in the small hatches as the above Lewmar. One faced forward, and one aft. That gave ventilation, and a good way to see the sails from the inside station. Those boats were sailed in the tropics extensively.

Opening the front window and side windows gives a good air flow. You need to run the boat before starting to cut. Dorades don't give a lot of air flow. They are designed for ventilation, where there is serious water--so that the water is trapped and drained off, where as the air goes thru the baffles. They usually have a shutter in the bottom port where they come into the cabin, so the air flow can be totally cut off. Fit and used well on sailboat boats--I found the small hatches were far better than the dorades for circulation. By the time the air flows thru the baffle system, there is not a not of velocity.
 
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