I am in the process of puting flush hatches on my Guillemot Exp single and had a couple of questions. I cut out the hatch covers from the deck am glassing the lip that the cover sits on.

Questions:

1. I glassed the lip with the hatch covers taped flush to the deck. In retrospect I'm thinking I should have glassed it with the hatch pushed in 1/8 inch beyond flush to allow for the thickness of a compressed gasket. I am concerned that when I install a weather strip gasket the hatch will no longer be flush if the shock cord don't compress the gasket enough. Should I be worried?

2. I coated the hatch cover with "Butchers Wax" having heard that it works as a mold release. I had to do a lot of prying with a putty knife to get the hatch off after 6 hours. It didn't seem that the wax helped much. Anyone got a better way to do this? plastic wrap maybe?

3. In Nick's book you see him grinding a notch into the edge of the flush hatch. This is described as a duel drain and finger notch to pull off the lid. My question: is a drain hole necessary. The tolerences between my hatch and deck are 1/16th in. I wouldn't think enough water would be getting in there to need a drain. I assume this is more to give you a place to get your finger under the lid when opening the hatch. What tolerances should I be shooting for between the hatch and deck?