Chapter 14. Hatchway and companionways. 

 

06.01.2026

 

Fore Hatchway. 1/3
Еach grating on this ship has its own unique characteristics. I was very interested in thinking through every detail to ensure I could implement them all in wood. I've mentioned this many times before, but even before I started work, I designed all the gratings in a 3D program.
In the anatomy (photo above), you can see that the grating is square, but has a different number of horizontal and vertical slats. To achieve this, I calculated that the width of the smaller slats is 1 mm, and the width of the larger slats is 0.8 mm.
In order to mill the base and side parts of the grating at the same time, I made a jig and fixed the side parts in the prepared grooves using CA gel.
 After that, I reset the height. That is, I leveled the entire surface with a face mill and set the Z-axis on the router to zero.

 And here I made a mistake... for the first time ever. I expected it to happen sooner, as there are so many different points and places where mistakes can be made, but I only made a mistake on the third grating.
The mistake was that I needed to leave 1.5 mm on the side, but I immediately started routing with a 0.8 mm margin.

But since there was some material left on the other side, I cut out the required 1.5 mm fragment, tore it off and glued it in place of the one that I had mistakenly made smaller; before that, I had cut off this smaller fragment.

The end result was this:

 Now I changed the cutter to 1 mm and began to make grooves to the full depth with an interval of 1 mm.

 After polishing and removing the lint, I glued on 0.8mm slats and cut off 1.5mm on the sides. I glued the slats at different heights because I also made the cuts at different depths, just like last time, so I could sand them along the arc later.

Then I glued the front and back pieces and after trimming the edges I glued the side pieces.
 As a result, after cutting off the edges, I got this result:
And after separation from the slipway, it looks like this:
I liked the result, but something else was disappointing... I accidentally drilled all the way through the frame and hit the alignment table. (Oh, it happens.)
Finally, I cut off part of the base from the bottom of the grating, and after that, I'll be able to profile it, but that's for the next part. For now, here's what I got:

I haven't decided yet whether I'll build a single structure—a grating and frame—or a removable grating. I'm thinking of mounting the grating on the frame at an angle using supports, since the sailors used to walk through this opening (there was a ladder there). So, in theory, I'm thinking of making the hatch partially open, but I'll see if that's feasible.

 

 

09.01.2026

 

Fore Hatchway. 2/3
So, let's continue with the front grating.
First, we need to make it arched at the bottom.
I'll round the top surface later, but for now I'll make the frames for both hulls at once.
I'll mill all four parts (the front and back of the frame for both hulls) first flat, then along the edge to assemble the frame.

Then, using the width as a guide, I measure how to mill the side parts of the frame (for both hulls at once).

When all the parts were ready, I glued them together with liquid CA.

After that, I used a sander to cut off the excess on the sides.
Now it was necessary to trim the sides in the side parts and it remains to fix the two parts (but this is in the next part), but for now this is the result I got when I inserted the grating into the frame.

Besides that, there are two parts left to glue to the frames, but they still need to be given a semicircular shape, but more on that in the next post.

 

 

10.01.2026

 

Fore Hatchway. 3/3
Final touches on the gratings. First, I cut off the excess with a router and then sanded down the arc shape.

Then the final pieces had to be made. It's difficult to explain here, but the photo should make the process clear.

The end result was one frame for the first hull, and another for the second, with a partially open grating and supports. Since there's a staircase there, I decided to do it this way to show both the staircase and the internal structure of the ladder.

Nelson, as always, inspects the construction progress...

Well, almost all the gratings and frames are ready, but! I still need to nail the joints and fake bolts... I haven't decided how I'll do that yet (I'll have to see some samples), but the gratings are 90% ready...



15.01.2026

 

Skylight (companionway to captain`s quarters).



 

 

19.01.2026

 

Hatchway. (companionway to after platform)


 

Next...

 

 

 

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