( This is a "repackaged" version of a very old web site I did about
some projects to my old Santana 2023C sailboat)

Underberth Storage  

O.K., here's another scene for you - - I know you've all been there: You have the berth cusion (and all the stuff on top of it) that you are holding up with your head, while you fish around in the dark locker with one hand for something that's not in there anyway. The other hand is both holding the wooden locker cover and trying to help your head hold up the cushion....

 

I cut any number of square(ish) holes in the front wall of the berth support. I made sure that there was enough wood left to support the berth (and a sizable occupant). I wasn't too particular about the cutout sizes because there are a zillion different sizes of bins available to match, I just tried to maximize the useful area.

 

CONTSRUCTION DETAILS:

1) I started with four 1 inch drilled holes for the corners of the openings. This gave a nice appearance and allowed easy (relatively) cutting with a jigsaw of the four straight lines needed to complete the opening. I had to finish the edges with a barrel sander on the drill to make them look nice.

2) There is a 1/2 inch lip at the bottom for two reasons. One is that my jigsaw, when sideways, left exactly 1/2 inch of wood panel. The other (the one I tell everybody) is that it keeps the bins from sliding out.

3) I carpeted the inside floor so that it wouldn't be so slick. Under the carpet, I glued 1 x 2 strips dividing the openings so that the bins would stay fairly centered in position.

This arrangement is probably the most useful project of all of the things that I have done so far.

 

Oh! Oooh!, I just remembered - you can just see it in the picture to the right, but for you Santana owners, those really long (I think they are christmas paper boxes or something) bins fit really nice under the cabin step and go waaay back! You can just pull it out and get to everything without crawling on your stomach back there.