Sliding Hatch Door Squeel

[Mark Prouty]

Does anyone have a solution to the squeel in the cockpit sliding hatch door. Whenever I slide it open or close, it lets out a squeel. I want to be able to sneek-out at night without waking everybody up.

[Steve K]

I've been thinking about this.
I wonder if I clean out the tracks real well and then spray some "Liquid Rollers" or MacLube in there, if that would help.

The best my sliding hatch ever worked was a couple months ago. It snowed a couple inches and melted. The residual water in the hatch tracks froze the next night. The hatch worked like it was on skates.

SK

[Don T]

Hello:
I flush my tracks with water to keep them clean. Compressed air helps too. I do not recommend lubricating the tracks in any way. Liquid lubes just attract dirt and wear thing out faster. Dry lubes help keep things clean but let me tell you from experience, going up on deck and dropping the main can be very dangerous if that hatch slides easily. I nearly broke my neck after lubing the tracks.

[Duane Dunn, Allegro]

This is probably the most anoying (embarassing) thing on my boat right now as well. Mine only squeels going forward. Closing is silent. I can also stop the squeel if I lift from the inside while I open it.

My file is going to be busy this weekend. Got to stop the noise.

[HERNDON]

My boat hatch does not squeak it hollers. As I move the hatch forward
the interior acoustically amplifies the sound. Neighbors across the street and several houses down stand in wonderment what form of prehistoric animal is being slaughterered. I fear for my boat's safety if I were to take it out into the ocean. Some horny female whale might want to have its way with my boat, although once veiwing its 8HP tail would probably laugh and swim away. Lookout you guys with 50 hp motors!!!!!


Rob H.

[L Scott]

I placed on the bottom of my hatch some of those felt stickon furniture pads..
one on each corner of the hatch...It raised it just enough to keep the hatch fiberglass from rubbing on the deck fiberglass...and it also left a small gap that made it possible to flush out any dirt that gathers....

[Jack O'Brien]

A year ago I bought "Japanese Glide Tape" which is designed for just this problem. I think I got it from Defender but can't find it in their 2004 catalog. I haven't installed it yet so can't report effectiveness.

[Jim]

Try bees wax. I get it from a craft store in small sticks for $1.00 or so. I found that if I slide the hatch open and shave off small bits and put it in the tracke that the hatch slises on, it wares the wax in and away went the squeel

[Frank C]

This is along the same idea as the felt pads. I used the 2" wide version of velcro from Home Depot - the fuzzy half only. Though I first installed it without removing the hatch, it's better if you do remove it. Anyway, take a self-adhesive strip of the fuzzy portion that's about 3 inches long. Stick it down to the hatch surface by wrapping it from inside the hatch, under the edge flare, and back around the outside surface of the hatch. Now the hatch fiberglass never contacts the deck or the hatch rails.

[dclark]

Push the hatch all the way open. Then take some sand paper and go forward by the mast. Sand and push it back until it doesn't scrape any more.

Clean out the tracks real good and spray some sail kote or something similar in there. Careful...to slick and it'll be sliding on it's own when you are moving.

[Sloop John B]

My hatch slides forward when I'm trailering. I have to keep the open pad lock in the slot to prevent this.

[Duane Dunn, Allegro]

Follow up

Well I actually went out, crawled way up under the tarp and looked into the source of the noise. I got real close and moved the hatch to locate the exact source of the noise.

What a surprise. The squeel does not come from the tracks. It is caused by the front center of the hatch going across the non-skid on the cabintop.

It looks like I just need to remove about a 1/8" of material from the center half of the hatch lid. I'm trying to decide if I should try with the dremel or a saw with the hatch in place or if I should pull it off and use the belt sander.

[Rick Mathews]

Our 2002X has always had this hatch noise problem, too. Blue Water Yachts confirmed what Duane discovered: it is the forward edge of the hatch scraping the cabin top that makes the noise. They recommend sanding the underside of the edge. I have sanded and sanded that edge, and it has made it quiet--most of the time. I've concluded that it is very temperature sensitive. If it's cold, it still tends to make noise. If it's warm, usually it doesn't. I'll probably sand some more to hopefully make it so it won't squeak even when it's cold. It's difficult to sand it when it's on the boat, but I'm not sure I want to just pull the hatch off over the "bump". Besides, even if I was able to get it off that way, I'm not sure I could push it back over the bump to put it back on without cracking the forward part of the hatch.

Sanding also puts gelcoat dust in the tracks. The furniture pad idea, and maybe better yet the velcro idea, is interesting. We already have some industrial-strength sticky-back velcro around, so we might try using some of that. It seems like it would also help lessen the possibility of the hatch eventually grinding off the gelcoat in the track, which would be bad in itself but which also would make the hatch ride lower and start squeaking again!

[dclark]

Push the hatch all the way open. Then take some sand paper and go forward by the mast. Sand and push it back until it doesn't scrape any more.

Clean out the tracks real good and spray some sail kote or something similar in there. Careful...to slick and it'll be sliding on it's own when you are moving.

Like I said. No need to pull it off. Hand sand for 5 minutes with some 60 grit.

[Duane Dunn, Allegro]

I'm going to cut it back so there is a clear 1/8" gap all the way across. Looks like it should be easy to do with a jig saw and a mettal cutting blade.