Triton Large Port Remodel

[Triton106]

I have thought about this issue for a long time but have not been able to do anything about it. Now that my engine alignment problem is finally addressed I can focus on this project.

As you might know the west coast Tritons have large fixed ports in the main cabin that are mounted on the exterior. It does not match my personal preferrence although it is a very strong installation. I have thought of different ways to address that issue including buying bronze port frames like the east coast Tritons but they are very expensive. So, my thoughts are now revolving around moving the fixed glasses (polycarbonate or in my case Lexan) to the interior of the cabine as the attached diagram illustrates. I would still use barrel bolts to fasten the glass to the cabin for strength. I was also inspired by Dave's approach to building an interior woord frame for the glass (see picture from Dave's Renegade which I have droolled over many a times).

I would very much appreciate your ideas, thoughts, and comments to this approach.

[triton318]

From the outside, I'm not sure how having the Lexan or glass on the inside of the cabin looks any better than having it attached to the outside. I have just removed the bronze frames from my Triton as I will be bolting new Lexan pieces to the outside and attempting wood trim pieces on the inside. Other than being neat with the sealant and having the cabin sides freshly painted before installing the windows, I'm not going to do anything special for the purposes of esthetics on the outside. But then that's just me; I've never been too concerned with looks, as long as the boat is comfortable and seaworthy.

[Triton106]

Jay,

I agree it is purely personal preference. I have always like the look of window glass that are recessed. I believe Morris Yacht and Tayana and maybe some other builders have used that approach.

Morris Yacht M29 Recessed Windows

[Hirilondë]

Hinckley mounts their fixed port lights from the inside too. But the openings, like Morris, are shaped on the outside with a round over to create a finished opening. What would your detail be? The glass in the Hinckleys is held in by aluminum trims on the inside that are screwed into the fiberglass with machine screws into drilled and tapped holes. There are no fasteners through the glass. Unless you are going to fabricate a structural interior trim that gives you a mechanical fastening that does not use any holes in the polycarbonate I would recommend against interior mounting.

If the look of interior mounted glazing is important, then by all means do it, but it will be very labor intensive to do it well.

[Triton106]

Dave,

Thank you for your input. I realize this won't be an easy project to take on. There will be alot of details to be worked out.

As a starter what I envision I will do is essentially move the glass from outside to inside the cabin. I will use the existing holes in the glass and use barrel bolts to fasten the glass to the cabin wall. I will also use bolts from the outside and I will paint them white to match the cabin exterior so that they are not conspicuous. I could use threaded inserts like Hinckley but I am not sure about the strength since the glass will be inside the cabin. As you said Hinckley uses aluminum frames (I think Tayana too but they use Sika 295 to bond the glass to the frame). In my case without the aluminum frames a large boarding wave can potentially cause it to cave in.

The details that I have not worked out is how the bolts will be hiden (or not) from the wood trim. For now, I think I will through bolt the trim to add to the structural strength of the setup. I really like the way you did your port lights but in your case the glass is outside the cabin.

Best regards,

[Tim]

I believe Morris Yacht and Tayana and maybe some other builders have used that approach.

Sure, those look great, but there are numerous details to the installation and construction that won't work on the awful port cutouts I've seen on every Triton that I've had the pleasure of being on.

Morris and Hinckley ports aren't just tacked on from the inside of a saw-cut opening. They're designed into the molds and detailed as Dave describes above. Recreating that on your boat would be time-consuming and challenging. Sticking the existing plastic on the inside of the existing opening probably won't look too good at all.

If you're worried about boarding waves, interior mounting as you've described is not a good option either, in my opinion. You'd be relying on the grip of small bolts bearing only on the plastic to hold the ports in place against potentially unimaginable forces--I don't think that would stand a chance, honestly. Fasteners through the plastic also weaken it, particularly in the application you suggest. At a minimum, you'd need a strong interior frame to secure them against this sort of situation.

For that matter, the standard interior/exterior frame system used on EC Tritons and other boats isn't strong either. It works for coastal sailing, which is what the boats are intended for, but even so it's almost night-sweat inducing when one sees how little of the frame truly bears on the window or the boat itself.

[Rachel]

I also like the appearance of those "set in" ports, and of course you could make yours that way with enough dedication to the concept.

That said, I remember you mentioning offshore plans. I made a few offshore trips on a Hinckley with that type of inset, large fixed port; we fitted Lexan storm shutters. Either Hinckley or a PO had added them: Helicoils were set into the (thick enough to take them) cabin side around the ports and then hex-headed machine screws secured them. When they were not mounted, the shutters fit under some berth cushions and white plastic screws were put into the helicoils to make them look more finished off and less noticeable.

Rachel

[Hirilondë]

Either Hinckley or a PO had added them: Helicoils were set into the (thick enough to take them) cabin side around the ports and then hex-headed machine screws secured them.

Hinckley does that on many models. Little Harbor does something similar.

[Triton106]

Tim, Rachel, Dave, thank you very much for your insightful comments.

When I started this thread I had the feeling that this is going to be a lot more complicated than how I initially envisioned. Obviously I had not flushed out all of the issues which is the reason I asked for help on the forum. Thanks to Tim and Rachel's observations I realized that one of the issues I need to address is how to incorporate storm shutter (or Lexan) into the design. Another approach I also thought about could address the storm shutter design issue but I am not sure if the overall look will be right. Here is how I would propose to do it:

I would epoxy a frame (made of mahogony or G10 type of material) to the inside of the port opening and will overlap the opening by about 1 inch and extend into the opening by one inch (see diagram below). I would then directly bond the Lexan to the frame using Sika 295 (or similar glue). The Lexan glass will basically sit in the recessed portion of the open port. I will then imbed threaded inserts around the port which is now thicker due to the mahogony (or G10) frame. As Rachel suggested when I am not going offshore I will screw painted bolts into the inserts.

[Zach]

Idea:

You could core the cabin sides with foam, round over and glass the openings to the shape you want... when you glass the inside, make a flange to overhang the opening, and bolt the lexan to the outside of the flange.

You get the look from a distance... shrink the portlight openings, and stiffen up the cabin sides in case of a boarding sea.

With tinted glass and black painted fasteners you'd get the look from a boat length away.

Then make your trim... paint some prussian blue, or dab on some gelcoat color to the heads of the bolts on the inside, and recess them flush with a forstner bit.

I've mulled over getting the look... but ended up just buying some half inch thick lexan and setting the plan to bolt it to the outside of the cabin. I figure the stuff folks use as storm shutters, ought to do the trick as every day portlights.

[Triton106]

Thanks very much for your idea Zach. Obviously, there are many ways to skin the cat (do people really skin cats, that's cruel). I admit my ideas in many ways are constrained not by my lack of imagination but by lack of skills, time to complete the project, funding, and trade off for other projects that are waiting for my attention. However, I do believe the ports are very important from asthetics, seaworthiness, and functionality point of view. I would like to hear more ideas and input from others on the forum before deciding on the final design.

[Duncan]

...As you might know the west coast Tritons have large fixed ports in the main cabin that are mounted on the exterior. It does not match my personal preferrence although it is a very strong installation...

From the way you say it, the issue is how they look, not how they perform.

In this case, why not simply improve the look by installing exterior trim rings?
This keeps you from messing with something that works ("if it ain't broke, don't fix it").

The exterior trim rings can be tapered to mitigate the transition from glass to cabin side.
They would look, on the outside, like Dave's ports look like on the inside.
That would be a pretty nice result, without changing everything around?

(If you don't like how it ends up, you could revert to the "inside route", without having wasted much time or material
- the trim rings would be re-usable on the inside anyway.)

[Tim]

I think you need to prioritize your actual goals for this potential job. What really is the goal? Aesthetics? Strength? Minimizing time and cost? One can never have everything in one package. Decide what's the most important thing, and proceed towards that goal. Perhaps it won't take you where you thought, but it'll take you to the goal. True goal and desire aren't always the same thing.

If you're thinking of going the route of a full interior frame, inside-mounted glass, etc., with all the fussy finish work and reconfiguring of the existing openings that it may entail, may I suggest that given your stated purpose of having the boat be offshore-ready, perhaps you'd be best served replacing the existing deadlights with "real" cast ports truly suitable for such a task.

Not only would this give you the impact protection and strength you hope for, but given the potential amount of work required to rework the existing setup--only to have it still be semi-marginal for the hypothetical "worst" conditions--it seems the energies might be better spent glassing over the openings and starting fresh.

If cost is an issue, then leave the externally-mounted deadlight glass as is, which is relatively strong for what it is, and accept its aesthetic limitations as the trade-off in the strength-looks-time-cost-etc. conundrum.

[Triton106]

Thanks Duncan, Tim. There is an old Chinese saying - bitter pills, excellent medicine.

What you said may not be exactly what I want to hear but they are exactly what I need to hear. Upon further reflection I do think I started with the wrong premises. I do think the two ideas you proposed (either customize the trim for the existing exterior mounted glass or glass the ports up and reinstall opening bronze ports - and I have thought of them both) are better than interior mounted solutions. Opening bronze ports are not in the cards for now due to cost. I need to think a little more how to adapt Dave's interior trim to exterior trim. The main question is how to fasten the trim to the cabin wall that does not trap water or cause leaking.

Thanks again for steering me in the right direction.

[earlylight]

I'm not sure of the size or quantity of opening bronze ports you might need, but New Found Metals has both bronze and stainless opening ports for the approx cost of a suitable aluminum opening port, Check them out at: http://www.newfoundmetals.com

I installed six of their stainless ports in Early Light and the quality is superb. Just my 2 cents worth.

[Hirilondë]

My wood interior trims are held in place with Sikaflex 291-LOT. There is no reason at all you can't install exterior dead lights and do the same thing on the exterior. This covers the fasteners, but when the time comes to reglaze, you carefully cut the Sika with a razor knife and remove the trims. This makes the hardest part of the whole project fabricating the trims.

Now you are headed for a safe solution with a reasonable amount of labor. Well, reasonable as it comes for boat work ;-)

[Triton106]

I'm not sure of the size or quantity of opening bronze ports you might need, but New Found Metals has both bronze and stainless opening ports for the approx cost of a suitable aluminum opening port, Check them out at: http://www.newfoundmetals.com

Dick, those are beautiful openning ports on Earlylight. I am aware of New Found Metals' openning ports. If I am not mistaken Earlylight is featured on their website, right? NFM ports are well constructed and reasonablly priced. Still the size of the openning ports on Tritons are over $500 each. A set of four will be over $2,000 which is still out of my reach.

My wood interior trims are held in place with Sikaflex 291-LOT. There is no reason at all you can't install exterior dead lights and do the same thing on the exterior. This covers the fasteners, but when the time comes to reglaze, you carefully cut the Sika with a razor knife and remove the trims. This makes the hardest part of the whole project fabricating the trims.

Dave, I will attempt to immitate your trim design but I doubt it will be anywhere near the level of your workmanship. Can I trouble you to share your trade secrete and give me an outline of the construction process?

[Hirilondë]

Ray, I will be glad to make an attempt at a write up of the process I went through. Keep in mind that it is a very time consuming process to build these trims and it is best done after the dead lights are installed. This would lead me to recommend that you proceed with the installation as if you were not going to fabricate and install wood trims. I say this for a couple reasons:

1. You might decide along the way that you don't want to build the trims at all.
2. You might decide along the way that building them is much lower on your list of priorities than it was originally.
3. You might decide along the way that you would rather get the boat in the water and make them a year later. (my interior trims were done 3 years after I "finished" my major refit).
4. You may decide dressing up the interior is more important, at least at first.
5. I bet you can come up with another reason or several on your own.

My dead lights are merely 1/2" polycarbonate cut to shape. 3/8" would be most adequate, I had 1/2" at a price I could not refuse. I rounded the edges over with a router. I then sanded with progressively finer sand paper to 1000 grit before removing the protective paper to yield an almost shiny finish. This is where I ended the process. They are installed over the openings from the outside and no trim used at all (exterior trim). I will take some time shortly to do a write up of how I would make the exterior trims to apply over the dead lights. I had considered making exterior trims as well for Hirilondë at some future date. But I came to the conclusion I have more exterior bright work than I enjoy taking care of as it is. Actually, I like all of my bright work, but I have learned to say no to more. I am having fun coming up with wood working projects for the interior which once done require far less maintenance.

[Triton106]

I want to report back on the progress I have made on the WC Triton large port remodel project. I debated whether to start a new thread or continue with this one. I decided to go with this one so that other WC Triton owners can benefit from my struggles and avoid many hours of frustration with different ways to improve the esthetics of the WC Tritons, hopefully.

Since the last post I really had not done a whole a lot as other projects preoccupied my "spare time" (as much as a parent of three children and a demanding job can have.) Through pure luck I contacted Tim about the old bronze frames that the owner of the one of the projects he is working decided not to reuse. That turned out to be way too large for Tritons. However, Tim mentioned that he has a set of EC Triton frames that he would consider selling to me. I made a template of my WC Triton port and sent to Tim and as it turned out they are not as different as I thought (i.e. I won't have to do any major cabin top rework.) Tim in his usual thorough manner took several pictures of the tempalte and the frames (see below). I also contacted Jim Baldwin and sought his opinion on the strength of the Triton frames in an open ocean. I then went to look at a friend's EC Triton. Everything confirmed that they will meet my primary objectives - (1) improve the esthetics of the WC Triton ports, and (2) strong enough to be used in open ocean. So, I made the decision to buy them from Tim and a couple of weeks later I received them on my front porch.

WC Triton 106 exterior with bolt-on large ports



Template overlay on top of EC Triton frame

[Triton106]

With the frames on hand I took the first step on the project - modify the port openning to fit EC Triton frames. As you can see from the last post the two main differences between the EC and WC Triton port dimensions: (1) EC ports are about 1 inch taller, (2) WC ports are about 1/4" or so longer. So I made a jig for the size of the openning and proceed to cut out the cabin top.

The second step is to glass together the cabin hull and lining. I used similar approach to what has been documented by Glenn in this thread. The difference is that my approach is a lot simpler since the hull thickness is pretty consistent (about 1/4" all around) and I used some 1708 bixial tape between the hull and lining to increase the total thickness to about 5/16".

I consulted Tim on how to deal with the little corner where the existing openning is too wide for the frames. Here is what he suggested (of course, in full detail):

Ray,

I agree about the Waanderlust frames. I think they'd look absurd on a Triton--just far too big.

To reduce the size of your openings, with your intended needs at hand, I'd suggest you should laminate new material using the normal methods, to ensure ultimate strength. For a very small void, I imagine you could get away with filling the small gap with a structural epoxy mixture and installing a layer of glass over one or both sides afterwards, depending on your cosmetic/repair concerns. But the bonding area using this method would only be whatever the thickness of your cabin trunk is.

Ideally, if you really want to dive into the project, I'd say the best way to proceed would be to taper the edges of the opening on one side, install a mold on the other side, and lay up a wide band of new material, overlapping onto the tapers and extending a couple inches into the opening. Then, simply cut brand new openings all the way around, positioning the frames as need be. A lot of work for what's a small patch, but for real strength and the best results, of course this may be the best way.

The cast ridge also holds the glass in place. The very width of the frames--only about an inch, chosen for cosmetic purposes--necessarily limits how much overlap you can possibly have with the glass on one side, and the cabin side on the other while leaving room for screws (originally) or bolts in between. So I don't think removing the cast ridge is the way to go.

Plenty of boats wi th similar frame styles (and weaker) have made passages. The true offshore answer to the size and strength of these deadlights is rugged storm shutters to cover them with when making passages, I guess. There are natural limitations to the strength of these things. The through bolts certainly help, as you'll get a better "pinch" of the cabin side between the frames. The original dead-end screws are always a crapshoot whether they grip well enough.

The shape of your cutout, according to your template, isn't much different than the cutouts on East Coast Tritons. The areas of least overlap are always the rounded corners. Otherwise, the bronze frames look like they'd more or less work the same as on EC boats...for better or worse. You might even need to slightly enlarge your existing openings in some areas. Remember, on these frames the screws all pass through the large cabin side opening, not through the fiberglass at all.

Tim

[Triton106]

Thank Tim! I don't know what I would do without your help.

Here is Jim Baldwin's advice on how to deal with the gap and the strength of Triton frames:

Will try to answer your questions:

1. Yes the 1/4" overlap (between the frame and cabin) is strong enough because there is little chance of that entire perimeter ever
giving way to a wave strike or anything similar.

2. This would be a good question for Tim. I can't think of an easy method. Grinding a large bevel
and adding fiberglass as you said is probably what you need to do. On the other hand, if you did it
carefully, you could avoid a lot of work and expense and just bolt the glass outside without frames
as I recently did on a Pearson 35 in the attached photo.

3. If you grind away the frame's inside ridge I'd think it will make for a looser fit for all the components
though if you cut the glass bigger and filled the gap and masked it all off during a dry-fit before final
assembly I guess it would be okay. Lots of grinding though and probably to little purpose since there
is no problem as it is.

James

The actual approach I took is the easy approach that Tim suggested. I just can't imagine that I need to grind out a three inch round bevel to fill a 1/4" gap. Here is a picture of the fill job I did this weekend.