| Offshore Foolishness |
He Hates BatteriesActually ... that's not true - its battery wiring, splitting diodes, vsr's and all the rest that he hates. Amazingly after two days wrestling with red & black cables it all works... we have heating & lights. Somehow though I suspect a problem as the Skipper is very unwilling to start the engine; "next weeks project is alternator management and some tricky soldering or not".Why is it every boat job is a bit like moving house and before you can eat or sleep you have to move back again? The entire contents (cushions, bedding fishing rod etc etc) of one aft cabin moved to the pointy end. Plus contents of both lockers, the companionway stairs, most of the aft head and anything else that moved once unscrewed! For example to refit the VHF speaker (removed last season to make room for a new instrument head in the cockpit), the cable runs from the top of the companion way behind the steps, under the floor into the nav seat (past the fridge compressor), back into a void behind a locker in the aft cabin then forward again to the main switch panel! The only plus point was that splicing more cable on worked and we now have a switch to turn the speaker off if required! And that was an easy task! The wiring from the battery switches ran back under the aft head through a piece of grey downpipe (I kid you not - Jeanneau realy know how to build these things!). Unfortunately it was obviously all put in place prior to the heads being installed so the fixings were impossible to reach so the new cables follow the top of the drainpipe and don't go through it (apparently my fishing rod didn't fit through but did manage over the top but he only told me later!!). Note to oneself - remember to replace mousing string BEFORE it rots. After two days we now have a nice new gismo, though I'm not certain what it is telling me yet - this digital battery monitor says how much current is going in and out. The luddite in me has yet to understand why the good old analogue meter needed a modern friend. The Skipper is at pains, as I type, to explain that his handiwork has also increased our domestic battery capacity by 50%, added a new dedicated engine battery and a new charger complete with all new wiring - trouble is you can't see any evidence of any of his heroic efforts of the last two days! Still the lights seem brighter. Next week apparently is the tricky bit - soldering stuff to the altenators (yes plural as there are apparently two of them). Then it is back to the simple stuff - evaluating water makers, wind pilots and cockpit tents (the later two assigned to yours truely). Oh and moving on board again - can I get to work in Guildford from Dingle (our summer cruising base)? 10:08 PM - Jan. 29, 2006 - post comment
|
Description When you reach a certain age and have done more than a few offshore races the time comes to look for a little more comfort.  Home User Profile Archives Recent Entries - Happy New Year - End of the Line - The project becomes a Project! - eBay: Not Exactly Where You'd Look for a Classic Boat... - Its been a while |