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John - you may be right in one way on solid covers. The forward most cover was a single unhinged cover. According to some of the historians, many state they were split covers. I should have used singles up front on mine. Here are a couple of good articles I read early on in my build:
http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/7/t/60364.aspx
http://cs.finescale.com/fsm/modeling_subjects/f/7/t/15507.aspx
I went with Ray Morton's Study of colors and it stated that gun port covers were painted lampblack on all six sided. Whether that's right or not, I went with that choice. I also chose to go with a white gun stripe instead of a yellow ochre. One thing's for sure - there's a lot of variations out there on this ship! LOL
I'm going to give some thought as to whether I'll change my up-front covers. Thank you so much for giving me some food for thought for checking in on my build. 
The plans in David Chappell's "History of the American Sailing Navy" are quite clear on non-split port lids. The U.S. Navy's Historical Branch is also my source for a single white stripe. Probably the reason for people thinking it was yellow ochre was that the white tended to yellow overtime. The heavy British frigate HMS Saturn was painted with a streak of white in an effort to pass off as one of the heavy American Frigates. However Saturn had black gunboat lids in the checkerboard pattern of the Royal Navy. Off Cape Cod she stopped a fishing vessel while she was wearing American colors. Saturn's Captain asked the fishing Captain if he knew what ship he was on, the fisherman responded "The Constitution" as he had seen her often but remarked that she "wasn't painted as she had been". (per "The Wooden Fighting Ship in the Royal Navy".) Broke did the same with HMS Shannon, (Broke of the Shannon And the War of 1812). Decatur of course had USS United States' gunport streak pained in yellow ochre. Of course recent research done on the paint used on HMS Victory may well change our understanding of the Royal Navy's colors. As per true yellow ochre being used on Constitution I have a dim memory (I don't have the book with me and haven't read it in years) the Stewart may have painted Constitution's gunport streak that way before setting off on her final voyage of the War of 1812 that culminated in her capturing HMS Cyane and HMS Levant. The book was written by either her Surgeon or her Chaplain.
You may find this of interest, it is from the US Naval Museum's guide to their exhibit of Constitution's Gun Deck;
"As Constitution drew near to her enemy, all was made ready. The captain took his station on the quarterdeck, from which he could direct the helmsman and order the handling of guns and sails. The marine detachment took their positions with loaded muskets, some on deck and others in the fighting tops. Gun crews checked the loads in their massive weapons and waited in silence for the action to begin.
When Constitution was within reasonable shooting range of her adversary—usually no more than a few hundred yards—the gun-port lids, which kept wind and spray out while cruising, were opened. At the command “run out!” men pulled on the side tackles to roll their guns forward until the muzzles protruded through the ports. One of the gun crew thrust a wire pick through the vent to pierce the cloth powder bag, inserted a priming tube (a length of quill, packed with fine powder) into the vent, and then primed the pan of the firing lock–similar to the locks used in flintlock firearms–with fine powder from a flask or horn. The lock was cocked, and the gun captain–the senior enlisted man of the gun crew–took the end of the firing lanyard and stood, knees flexed, behind the gun and sighted along the barrel."
The entire article and page may be found here;
http://www.navyhistory.org/the-constitution-gun-deck/I hope that you don't think that I am in anyway criticizing what you have done, I am rather very impressed. Constitution like many ships in most Navies of the time would often be altered slightly by whoever her Captain was at the time. She may have appeared differently under Bainbridge than she did under Hull or Stewart, there being Naval Conventions at the time but not strict regulations. Mad Jack Percival, on her circumnavigation had her, for a time, painted with a white hull and a red gunport streak (an attempt at keeping her cooler in the tropics) she may have been painted this way when she first checked out Pearl Harbor as a site for a possible Naval Base, and she was certainly painted this way when she forced the surrender (without firing a shot) of (IIRC) two armed junks at Da Nanang.
There's a build log here and more pictures here 
