Lens material?
one (key?) part of this thread puzzles me. On my Olson, the fixed ports are Lexan and are unframed. My opening ports are all Lewmar and have acrylic lenses. From experience and observation, I know that the Lexan (i.e. polycarbonate) is easily UV degraded/"fogged". OTOH, the acrylic plastic used in the Lewmar ports and hatches is far more resilient to UV -- it compensates for this by being easier to break or crack. "Everything's a compromise."
My '88 Lewmar ports, with their near-vertical orientation, are still quite clear, and the lexan fixed ports and that we replaced almost a decade ago are quite cloudy (again!).
Both Lewmar opening hatches, with their flat exposure to UV developed oodles of little surface cracks and haze after a decade and have both been replaced by us. We nowadays have Sunbrella covers on both hatches when we are away from the boat.
So, when the thread started, the original Ericson-34 ports were ID'd as being lexan. I thought that all the Ericson ports in the 80's were custom/OEM Lewmar designs -- and therefore acrylic.
The test would be to whack one with a hammer...
:eek:
Any Lewmar or Ericson factory lurkers, please chime in!
Steve, thanks for the link the Sportys site. From the description, it sounds like it is for acrylic. Did you have good luck using this stuff on the big lexan windows?
Loren in PDX
1988 Olson 34 #8