The 1mm thick neoprene sheet arrived a few days ago and now that the main cabin light has been installed, it was time to make the navigation light gaskets.
Having done the major part of the work earlier with thin plywood to get the fit correct, the only thing I needed to do before cutting the gaskets was to find out what settings were required. I made a simple cut about 20mm long close to one edge of the rubber sheet at various powers and speeds until I got a consistent cut and then cut out two copies of the gasket.
As you can see they came out really well. The only downside is the black mess you get on your hands once the cutting has been done. Washes off easy enough but you need to do that before touching anything else !
After that I cut out the bulb holder shims on the laser cutter. This took four or five attempts to get correct as the fit had to be tight but not too tight. Here I have dry fitted the, to the bulb holder to check that they work the way I envisioned. They do, so that is a plus.
There are three parts to the shim, two outer pieces that are the same and an inner piece. The inner piece fits around the holder but into the hole in the brass support. The two outer pieces go around the holder and are as wide as the support. These will be glued together in the brass fitting and the bulb holder will then be pressed into the hole in the middle, so to speak.
Well, that’s the idea. This is the result. I used super glue to glue everything together and it looks to be pretty good. I probably need to put something on the metal to stop it corroding, some thick grease or similar. Lanolin is probably a good idea, I keep some of that on the boat for greasing shackles.
I’m not sure how the positive wire will be connected to the cable from inside the boat. The negative wire isn’t a problem, it will be clipped under one of the mounting screws as the negative from inside is at the moment. There may be enough room behind the bulb for a lever connector, I’ll have to check that out tomorrow.
There’s more work to be done on the nav lights, I have to cut out another reflector, mount both reflectors and the screw the things together with the new gaskets in place. I should be able to do all that tomorrow around making a cheesecake and wrapping presents for the family Christmas Lunch on Saturday.
We’ll see.
Time for a cup of tea.