Simple security for sliding doors
Issue 96 : May/Jun 2014
There are all kinds of pins. There are hairpins, clothespins, straight pins, and tenpins. But there is only one kind of Reinpin! In the September 2013 issue, I wrote about Ken Reinink’s refit of his 1978 Ericson 27, Reinsnest, in the course of which Ken — a guy who thinks outside the box — created and incorporated many innovative ideas.
One of these ingenious creations was his “Reinpin,” which holds sliding locker doors securely closed in any kind of seaway. It is simplicity itself in design and foolproof in function.
The Reinpin is made from a 2-inch length of 5⁄16-inch wooden dowel. The dowel is attached to a standard wooden cabinet pull knob by drilling a shallow 5⁄16-inch-diameter hole on the back side of the wooden cabinet pull and gluing the dowel into the hole. The other end of the dowel is tapered for half its length.
To use the Reinpin, Ken inserts it through a slightly oversized 5⁄16-inch hole in the outer locker door. The hole is positioned so that when the pin is inserted, the tapered end engages the edge of the inner locker door and prevents both doors from sliding. When not in use, the pins are stored in convenient holes located in the locker frame directly above the locker doors. The pins are readily available and unlikely to be lost when kept in these storage holes. The Reinpin concept can be easily adapted to many boats with sliding locker doors like those on Reinsnest.
This is one of those ideas that made me slap my forehead and say those oft-repeated words: “Why didn’t I think of that?”
Jim Shroeger has been sailing for 50 years. He began in Jet 14s at the University of Michigan and progressed through a series of small to medium-sized daysailers including a Star. In the early 1970s, he and his wife, Barbara, and their two kids began their summer family cruises on the Great Lakes, which they continue to this day in their current boat, Sundew, a Watkins 27.
Thank you to Sailrite Enterprises, Inc., for providing free access to back issues of Good Old Boat through intellectual property rights. Sailrite.com
