Rebedding portlight

Has anyone removed the old style rectangular one piece port light found on 40 year old Taiwan Trawlers? These do not have an exterior trim ring. If so how did you remove it? I need to rebed one that is leaking. Thanks!

They are a bear to get out, as they used black polysulfide caulk in generous amounts. You basically take out the screws and start prying.

After discovering how heavy these things are, when I take them out I replace them. Not as salty, but I worry less about my walls deforming

I don't have that style of portlight, rather mine has the exterior trim ring.

I have removed mine a couple of times.
Cutting and prying caulk can be tough.

I use the Stanley wonderbar 55-045 . I now have 6 of them but the first three were the best. Chromed, [don't really care about the chrome] and the big pry end has a rolled and thinned heel rather than just a bend which many competitors do. That rolled heel makes a big difference in the effectiveness of the bar. I then ground down the tip thinning it out to a hair less than 1/16" on two of them so they can be worked behind the rings more easily.

Then use it to pry open a gap so a sharp cutting knife can be used to cut the caulk. Then I used the third unthinned one to open and hold the gap so I could move along and open the gap and cut again. It was slow but it worked. I also used pieces of aluminum and many times one of the bars to protect the surface I was prying against otherwise the bars can leave crush marks in wood.

To do the caulk cutting I use use the big Olfa knives, 3/4" and 1" blades.
Need lots of blades.
Be carefull as they are sharp and the constant bending will eventually break them.

There are two versions of the bars, the better chromed ones and the not quite so well done black and yellow ones.

I also have 3 of the black/yellow ones but the tips are much thicker as Stanley has decided to not do any thinning on these. TYhey still have the rolled heel. So i'm doing my own thinning and they work fine too, just more effort to get them to do so.

I have also used my oscillating tool, ROckwell, with a toothed blade which did the job but did some damage to both the trim ring and the fiberglass so the next time I will use the scraper blade, no teeth, along with the bars.
Next time I will also tape some of the thin kitchen cutting sheets to the surface the Rockwell rests against as the tool left some marks. THis stuff is tough and can be scissor cut.


I was poking today and see Amazon offers the black/yellow bars.
The older chromed ones are still around on Ebay.


I no longer use caulk for stuff like this but rather the butyl rubber tape from CMS on his site. It's now Marine How To

https://shop.marinehowto.com/t/bed-it-tape


Do yourself a favour and spend some time reading his site as he offers a huge amount of good info.

Yeah, what C Lectric said. Prying followed by cutting and repeat. The more tension you have on the caulk by prying the easier it will be to cut. I found that a crappy kitchen knife sharpened as well as you can is stiff and slim enough with a long-enough blade to get deep into those cracks to cut the caulk.

Some info here:

http://www.trawlerforum.com/forums/s32/removing-portlights-3611.html

Time is your friend , 1/2 dozen small wooden wedges driven lightly in will slowly allow the old goop to part.

Use a catch line on the port , as it may let go after many hours.No hurry!

Re bed with Dolfinite , and the next time it will be 15 min a port for R&R.

Yeah, next time I will use wood shims in addition to my arsenal.
Should have thought of that as I've done that for other things, just not the port lights.

I had to do all 6 of these on our previous boat. It’s a tedious job but stopped the leaks. Be patient and be careful with the knives. Good advise by all above.