: How the heck do you
: drill 1/8" deep holes 3/16" material without blasting through
: the other side? I have thought of adding additional layers of glass at the
: underside of the hatches so that there would be added thickness to work
: with. I've also thought of chucking up a router bit in the drill press,
: but that seems a little scary as well. Plunge router? Yikes...

I used a 1/2" straight bit in the router. With the depth set and fixed, you can't cut too deep. With the wide router base, and a curved hatch, most holes were cut a bit too shallow. This might be a good job for a laminate trimmer, but unfortunately, I don't own one. I used a dremel tool to make the holes a little deeper where necessary, a hair at a time. That was scary.

You could build up the thickness with fiberglass, but why not do that after gluing in the magnet. What I think I'll do next time is drill a shallower hole, let the magnets sit proud a tiny bit, then cover the magnets over with glass (and a slight fillet if necessary). The little knobs won't matter, as long as you install the hatch magnets before forming the hatch lip. The knobs will then match up with slight depressions on the lip.

Take a look at John Schroeder's pic's. They helped me get the sequence straight in my mind before I started. (Thanks, John - your pics and description really helped. And after reading your comments I installed a 4 oz glass patch over each magnet to seal them from moisture)

Ken