Cabin door Adjustment


Easy Living,
I'm about to do the same on my 34 in a couple of weeks. My buddy has done it on his 40 and I've decided to wait for his assistance, he walked me through it over the phone but insisted a metal coat hanger is vital to removal and install of the bottom slides (which I didn't have on the boat). I'll post pics when we do it.
 
Brady's Bunch said:
Easy Living,
I'm about to do the same on my 34 in a couple of weeks. My buddy has done it on his 40 and I've decided to wait for his assistance, he walked me through it over the phone but insisted a metal coat hanger is vital to removal and install of the bottom slides (which I didn't have on the boat). I'll post pics when we do it.
Click to expand...

Thanks, Can't wait to see some pictures.
 
Easy Living said:
Thanks, Can't wait to see some pictures.
Click to expand...
The removal and replacement are easy enough, remove the door latch (2 screws) remove the hand rail (2 screws 2 bolts) remove top track bolts (6) with one person on the inside, remove bottom track (3 bolts) slightly lift door up and way gently out of the opening. Mu problem is my bottom track on my '05 after close inspection is a roller ball type and doesn't match the bottom slides I ordered. Mine is more similar to what Sea Ray uses (may have been replaced by a previous owner, shame on me for not looking closer). Any how, the whole removal and replacement took me and the Admiral less than 2 hours and that was with a cocktail break. at least I got the uppers changed and the worn out weather stripping replaced. However, the door is worse than it was before, it's on next weekend's tune-up cocktail list. Here some pics of the steps along with snow in AZ
1 Latch.JPG2 Door & rail removed.JPG3 door out.JPG4 old uppers.jpg5 upper & weather stripping.JPG6 weather stripping removal.JPG7 new weather stripping.JPG8 Track-roller-train-kit-2T.jpg9 snow.jpg10 sunset.jpg
 
I looked at converting our 330SS to the roller track, but never did it. Now that I have the 34pc we have to figure out the best fix. Did Formula purposely chose the slider's vs rollers? I can't imagine it was cost cutting here. Maybe the rollers move to easily and damage the door?
 
I’ve got similar problems with the door on my new to me ‘04 34PC. I took mine all apart and discovered a lot of dirt and debris in the bottom roller track. I put it all back together thinking that was the issue but it still didn’t work well. When I looked a little deeper, I noticed that the door does not make a good seal when closed and seems to be rubbing against the fiberglass section that the door slides into. It's almost like the door need to be reformed a bit.
Does anyone know if it’s possible to do that? What is the door made out of? Acrylic? Lexan?
 
So I reached out to TAG and they sent me some information that says there is supposed to be a shim at the bottom of the door which is missing on mine. I need to find what the proper thickness is and reinstall it to hopefully resolve my door closing issue.
Heres a picture of what the gap on my door looks like currently with the missing shim.
 

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gustaf said:
So I reached out to TAG and they sent me some information that says there is supposed to be a shim at the bottom of the door which is missing on mine. I need to find what the proper thickness is and reinstall it to hopefully resolve my door closing issue.
Heres a picture of what the gap on my door looks like currently with the missing shim.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the follow up. Did TAG say where you can get the shims?
 
Brady's Bunch said:
The removal and replacement are easy enough, remove the door latch (2 screws) remove the hand rail (2 screws 2 bolts) remove top track bolts (6) with one person on the inside, remove bottom track (3 bolts) slightly lift door up and way gently out of the opening. Mu problem is my bottom track on my '05 after close inspection is a roller ball type and doesn't match the bottom slides I ordered. Mine is more similar to what Sea Ray uses (may have been replaced by a previous owner, shame on me for not looking closer). Any how, the whole removal and replacement took me and the Admiral less than 2 hours and that was with a cocktail break. at least I got the uppers changed and the worn out weather stripping replaced. However, the door is worse than it was before, it's on next weekend's tune-up cocktail list. Here some pics of the steps along with snow in AZ
View attachment 9348View attachment 9349View attachment 9350View attachment 9351View attachment 9352View attachment 9353View attachment 9354View attachment 9355View attachment 9356View attachment 9357
Click to expand...

Curious on how the door came out. After you removed the slide screws, the door just "lifted out"? I would have thought there would still be an inch or two still recessed back into the "pocket that it slides into. No?
 
Brady's Bunch said:
The removal and replacement are easy enough, remove the door latch (2 screws) remove the hand rail (2 screws 2 bolts) remove top track bolts (6) with one person on the inside, remove bottom track (3 bolts) slightly lift door up and way gently out of the opening. Mu problem is my bottom track on my '05 after close inspection is a roller ball type and doesn't match the bottom slides I ordered. Mine is more similar to what Sea Ray uses (may have been replaced by a previous owner, shame on me for not looking closer). Any how, the whole removal and replacement took me and the Admiral less than 2 hours and that was with a cocktail break. at least I got the uppers changed and the worn out weather stripping replaced. However, the door is worse than it was before, it's on next weekend's tune-up cocktail list. Here some pics of the steps along with snow in AZ
View attachment 9348View attachment 9349View attachment 9350View attachment 9351View attachment 9352View attachment 9353View attachment 9354View attachment 9355View attachment 9356View attachment 9357
Click to expand...

Curious on how the door came out. After you removed the slide screws, the door just "lifted out"? I would have thought there would still be an inch or two still recessed back into the "pocket that it slides into. No?
 
Bringing this thread back up. We replaced the lower slide on our door, and uppers, and it still is a pain.

Here is what we have:

Upper
Standard upper slides, the two white pieces with three bolts each.

Lower:
A track with three captured balls that locks into the lower track. This has three slotted holes for screws that screw into the door. There is a shim in between the door and the front metal lip of the lower slide. Since there is adjustment on the three lower bolts, anyone know the proper settings? I have the door sitting flush across the whole bottom slide at the moment.

The lower that I removed only had two roller balls, and one would drop off the end of the track as the door was all the way open, jamming it. The new track has three balls, with constraints so that there is always two balls in contact with the track no matter the door position.

A brand new 34 PC at the boat show has the exact same set up, and the door was sliding very easily.

Any ideas? I cleaned the whole track when I replaced the lower slider.
 
I replaced the uppers and it still does not work correctly.

TurboJoe said:
Bringing this thread back up. We replaced the lower slide on our door, and uppers, and it still is a pain.

Here is what we have:

Upper
Standard upper slides, the two white pieces with three bolts each.

Lower:
A track with three captured balls that locks into the lower track. This has three slotted holes for screws that screw into the door. There is a shim in between the door and the front metal lip of the lower slide. Since there is adjustment on the three lower bolts, anyone know the proper settings? I have the door sitting flush across the whole bottom slide at the moment.

The lower that I removed only had two roller balls, and one would drop off the end of the track as the door was all the way open, jamming it. The new track has three balls, with constraints so that there is always two balls in contact with the track no matter the door position.

A brand new 34 PC at the boat show has the exact same set up, and the door was sliding very easily.

Any ideas? I cleaned the whole track when I replaced the lower slider.
Click to expand...
 
Easy Living said:
I replaced the uppers and it still does not work correctly.
Click to expand...

Hello Easy Living
Wondering if you attempted to also replace the two bottom slides and found that the sliders would not fit into the bottom rail slots, as I did.
I gave up and simply repaired the bottom slider in situ, and it worked fine all season until the detailers must have applied weight or something, and it is now very difficult to slide again until lifted in its tracks and pushed - my wife would not be able to do this.
I want to re-tackle this issue (seems it should not be as hard as it is), but am not clear from the above posts whether the door must come out to gain access to allow the new slides to go in, and if so how exactly to do it in my boat. Once the door is completely closed it does seem that at least two or three inches remain back in the pocket making removal impossible.
What was your experience?
My boat is a 2000 31pc, but I think the cabin door setup is similar across models - except for those that have captive balls in the lower track. Mine has four fixed (by three bolts) sliders - two on top and two on the bottom. i am not aware of any shim in my door.
Thanks.
 
I had enough of ours not sliding, so I ripped it all apart again to figure out how to make it work good. I have the version with three roller balls.
20191005_125214.jpg

I found that the roller balls would roll very smoothly in a direction until the hit the nuts that are used as a stop. Then they stopped rolling and started sliding.

20191005_125203.jpg

Formula insists that we don't use any lubricant. However, with out lubricant it simply doesn't work well, if at all. We sprayed a dry lubricant specifically for door and window slides someone at the marina had, and it made all the difference in the world. The door has never worked so well. I understand this may be a temporary fix. What we really need is a slide with captured rollers, but I'm not sure I have the height I need to do that. I may try to model it up and see if we have the room to put true center pivot rollers under the door while using the same track.
 
TurboJoe said:
. . .

Formula insists that we don't use any lubricant. However, with out lubricant it simply doesn't work well, if at all. We sprayed a dry lubricant specifically for door and window slides someone at the marina had, and it made all the difference in the world. The door has never worked so well. I understand this may be a temporary fix. What we really need is a slide with captured rollers, but I'm not sure I have the height I need to do that. I may try to model it up and see if we have the room to put true center pivot rollers under the door while using the same track.
Click to expand...

Good stuff . . . Although our bottom track is not of the "roller ball" variety, I did find that Pledge worked the best on our nylon sliders, although it is true that the channel then gets quite dirty.
Just looking at your pictures, it seems to me that - - from a design perspective - - the pictured "nuts" should not be stops (but should be beveled screws to fasten the track to the deck so that the balls roll smoothly over them), and the stops should instead be incorporated into the bottom of the door itself. In other words, four protrusions (stops) molded into or attached to the bottom of the door, resulting in three equal segregated areas for the three balls to roll under (one ball in each area), with those protrusions descending into the track itself to maintain the segregation. This would keep the balls both separated and rolling - at least in theory.
 
Last edited:
Kimo said:
Hello Easy Living
Wondering if you attempted to also replace the two bottom slides and found that the sliders would not fit into the bottom rail slots, as I did.
I gave up and simply repaired the bottom slider in situ, and it worked fine all season until the detailers must have applied weight or something, and it is now very difficult to slide again until lifted in its tracks and pushed - my wife would not be able to do this.
I want to re-tackle this issue (seems it should not be as hard as it is), but am not clear from the above posts whether the door must come out to gain access to allow the new slides to go in, and if so how exactly to do it in my boat. Once the door is completely closed it does seem that at least two or three inches remain back in the pocket making removal impossible.
What was your experience?
My boat is a 2000 31pc, but I think the cabin door setup is similar across models - except for those that have captive balls in the lower track. Mine has four fixed (by three bolts) sliders - two on top and two on the bottom. i am not aware of any shim in my door.
Thanks.
Click to expand...
Very Interesting, I was told by TAG that my boat did not have lower slides, I will check again this weekend and verify.
Thanks
 
Easy Living said:
Very Interesting, I was told by TAG that my boat did not have lower slides, I will check again this weekend and verify.
Thanks
Click to expand...

Your boat is 10 years newer than mine, so I would't be at all surprised to find that it indeed has the 'roller ball' setup vs. the nylon sliders. Certainly, TAG would know.
 
Kimo,

I did mine recently on an 02 34PC, likely similar to yours. I, like you read, this thread and maybe others and did not see any info on how to get the new bottom slides in. A month or so ago I was motivate to try and fix it.

As you said it doesn't look like the door comes out, but it did, very tight fit and required some work. I needed to remove the latch AND the trim that runs around the dash and stopped the door from moving the extra inch or so to get it out. This is the part covered in vinyl that goes between the tan top section and the white lower section. It is a two person job, one inside and one outside. Need to carefully lift the door up and out of the way. After the door is out the bottom slides can be put in from the inner end of the track.

With the door out clean the track really well. I was getting tied and sorry I started the job, so, I did not clean as good as I wished. The door works way better then it did before, but, I wish I spent more time cleaning the track with the door out.

Good luck.

gary
 
Hi Gary
Thanks for sharing your real-world experience with this. I'll take a closer look when I'm next at the boat.
This has been bugging me for some time now.
Mike
 
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