The Stealth Fisha is a great kayak for saltwater angling, but the fish hatch requires two hands to feed a strap through a buckle each time you want to close down the fish hatch. I’ve noticed both myself and others simply leaving their hatch unlocked most of the time, simply because of the inconvenience of closing it. That may be fine for calm waters, but it just takes one unexpected wave crashing over the hull to quickly make you regret that decision. I designed a simple bungee mechanism that allows the hatch to be quickly locked and unlocked with one hand, making it much more likely that you will actually use it.

It is a simple design and requires a single hole drilled into the fish hatch lid. The bungee tie-downs are attached to the same holes that are factory drilled into the boat, simply requiring longer screws. The models can are available on Printables.

You’ll need two of the bungee brackets and one knob, along with a short piece of bungee and some stainless steel M3 washers. bolts, and nylock nuts. Optionally you can also replace the bungee brackets on the inside of the hatch.

The knob is designed to fit partially over the lip on the hatch lid, securely hold the bungee, and be structurally strong. It took a couple iterations to get the angles and curves right.

I designed two versions of the small bracket used to tie down bungee cords. One is basically a copy of the stock one used by Stealth. The other one has a single cord track in a U-shape – good for terminating the cord. Both are better designed for fitting M3 hardware,

A single hole drilled through the fish hatch. Try to do a better job than I did. It’s still in the recessed lip, so the hardware is not as much of an entanglement hazard. I also replaced the stock bungee brackets on the inside of the fish hatch with ones that are a better fit for the M3 hardware used.

The final product. The bungee brackets are bolted through the same factory-drilled holes as the bungee brackets inside the fish hatch that support the rod holder bungees.