Buyers Market (Old Post 4-13-12)

This past Friday (4-13-12) we drove into Annapolis and dropped off some of our worn running rigging at the West Marine store on Hillsmere Drive.  They offer a rigging service and several of our lines needed eyes at one end.  The dude who usually does this was off that day so his apprentice took over for him.  This is a young guy, mid twenty's, who's only been working there for a year.  He offered to splice the eyes in the double braided lines and whip the ends.  My only other option was to use plastic clamps which might be plenty strong but just don't have that "good seamanship" look.  I took my chances with the kid.  The lines we replaced were the roller furling for the Genoa, the Mainsail out-haul and the Staysail roller furling, sheet and out-haul.  We used single braid line for the roller furling and Sta-Set X double braid for everything else.  In less than 90 minutes the kid had everything finished up and I gotta say I was very impressed.  He whipped the ends of all the lines, running a needle down through the center in four places to prevent the core from slipping.  The eyes were spliced in neatly and he explained to me that the whipping he added on the splice was really just for looks since the friction of the splice was plenty strong enough on it's own.  The "kid", Mike Johnson, does extremely nice work and I highly recommend him.

We spent most of Saturday getting the boat cleaned up in anticipation of some buyers coming the following morning.  This qualifies for our Spring cleaning so we pretty much killed two birds with one stone.  I washed the boat topsides then polished and waxed all the smooth surfaces using McGuire's products.  The tricky part was doing the transom since the boat is in the water and we have our dock lines crossed in back.  The transom is what's called a "sugar scoop" and provides a narrow step that's used for a swim platform and easy access to the dinghy.  It is pretty narrow though and requires hanging onto the railing with one hand while polishing with the other with 90% of your weight hanging out over the water.  Good circus act for young folks but miserable work for an old geezer like me.  Cheri cleaned things down below and then helped me with the topside chores by adding a fresh coat of teak oil to the eyebrow and toe rail.

Sunday morning we staged the boat with some nice music quietly playing in the main salon and the movie "Ratatouille" showing silently in the forward stateroom.  We left the boat with high hopes of a good showing because our broker had told us the people were local and he thought we had a good chance.  We drove into town and took care of some chores then headed back to the marina with the intention of sitting in the shade and enjoying a nice cigar while we waited.  As we were getting out of the car we got a call saying they were done looking at the boat (after about 45 minutes).  That's not a good sign.  Their broker saw us in the parking lot and walked over for a talk.  After asking a few questions about the history of the boat she mentioned that it was about $100k higher than what they had been looking at and Cheri and I both mentally wrote off our labor as wasted time.

Aside from the disappointment we had a beautiful day, mid 80's with a nice breeze, and it was only 2 in the afternoon.  We decided the best thing we could do was to go for a short sail.  We had the boat outside the breakwater by 3 and enjoyed the nicest day-sail we've had in a long time.  Out on the Bay the wind was pretty steady at 16 to 18 knots out of the WSW.  We sailed out towards Poplar Island (click here) at 6.5 knots on a broad reach and midway into the shipping channel, just past G4, we came about and headed home.  The return run was close hauled at 6.5 knots, running into the wind so we donned our jackets.  We had a direct run all the way into Herring Bay where the wind got kinda funky and we furled the sails and motored the rest of the way home.  Just a short 3 hour sail but it lifted our spirits and turned out to be the just what we needed.

Once we were back in our slip we had just finished hooking up shore power when we got a call from our broker.  He said the showing had gone really well and the folks were extremely pleased with the boat and planned to put in an offer.  Wow!  Guess we read that one wrong!  It'll be interesting to see where this goes.

In the meantime we're still moving ahead with our plans.  We decided a while ago that it wouldn't pay to put things on hold while we tried to sell the boat.  Nothing is certain until the ink is dry and you have money in hand.  If nothing comes from this showing then we still plan to take our vacation, whether it's doing the DelMarVa or just taking a few weeks on the hook.  I'm still working on getting the electronics installed.  I knew this was going to turn into a marathon at the end.  We called MTS before we left for San Diego and contracted with them to get the radar mounted on the mast.  They finally got it done yesterday (4-16-12) and I'm really pleased with how it came out.  I still need to put in the circuit breaker for the radar but should be able to get that done this weekend.

You Call That Progress?

Over the last few months we've made some progress on several of our projects.  Of course, how we define progress may be a little different than how you do.  For us it's mostly "one step forward, two steps back".  Still, I'm a "glass is half full" kinda guy so I tend to focus on that one step forward.  I thought I'd do a quick blurb here to show some pics of what we've been doing.

In the aft head and aft stateroom we finally got around to closing in the air ducts from the Espar heater installation.  Needed about 14 months to really give it some serious thought.  In the end we had our good friend Anthony design some nice enclosures for us.  They're made with solid teak and milled to match the surrounding cabinetry.  There's also a recessed grill to let the heat escape.  We're really pleased with how this turned out.  The piece of teak used on the face in the aft stateroom is dark but in the picture it looks much darker than it actually is.  The shelf with the sombrero used to be about 3" wide and Anthony widened it to 10".  Much more usable now.  In fact we were originally thinking to put cabinets in there that would extend up to the ceiling but changed our plans when we decided to sell the boat.  With that nice wide shelf it would be very easy to add cabinets in there now using that shelf as the base.  Good project for the new owner!

We also got some work done on the instruments by adding a multi-function display at the helm.  I had the grab bar modified to create a mounting plate that would hold the display lower and be less of an obstruction.  It also allows it to be turned around so it can face forward.  Handy for when the boat is sailing on it's own with auto-pilot.  The display is mounted in a plastic instrument "pod" that comes from the factory in an "arctic white" that just didn't look right with the Island Packet beige.    I was unable to find a good match in a spray paint and struggled to make the most of it.

In my last installment I told about my first effort and how it came out two shades too dark.  For round two I tried a different paint, slightly lighter.  I sanded the original coat and sprayed on the new paint.  It reacted with the old paint and wrinkled up across the entire surface.  Yikes!  What a mess!  I sanded it down and tried spraying on a coat of primer thinking that would form a barrier for the new paint.  The primer also wrinkled up.  Grrrrr.

I ended up sanding down the entire housing, by hand, removing every bit of paint.  The original paint I used was a store brand and was incompatible with anything else.  Yes, I know, ya gets what ya pays for.  After 6 hours of sanding I sprayed on a coat of primer and two coats of color.  It's not an exact match for the Island Packet color but it's a lot closer than "arctic white".  That was a fun project.

Once I got the display mounted I ran into another minor headache.  The data cable for the radar had a plug end that wouldn't fit through the grommet that I mounted at the back of the steering pedestal.  In the picture the grommet is the round fitting with the black rubber center below the shelf.  I had to pull the wire back through the entire length of the boat and feed in the small end first through the grommet.  To save some time I attached one end of some twine to the data cable before I pulled it back to the cockpit.  Once I fed it through the grommet I was able to pull the string from the end up by the mast and drag the cable back into place without having to yank up the entire cabin floor.  This actually worked pretty well and with Cheri's help the job was completed pretty quickly.  This is good because I only have so much hair left to pull out in frustration.

We took a vacation from March 28th to April 7th and visited with Cheri's brother and sister-in-law (Scott and Terri) in San Diego.  They have a beautiful home in Point Loma overlooking the entire bay and city down below and you can see down the coast line all the way to Mexico.  Incredible.  We had a great time visiting with them and it was especially cool to stay in a place bigger than 250 square feet that had flushing toilets.

When we got back on Sunday the 8th the weather was clear and breezy so we decided to go out for a short sail.  As we got out into open water the wind was blowing a steady 20 knots, gusting to 30, out of the WNW.  We had a quick sail across the Bay on a broad reach under full main and staysail.  Once we got to Bloody Point Light outside of Eastern Bay we came about and sailed back close hauled.  The wind increased to a steady 30 knots, gusting to 35 and occasionally getting as high as 40 knots.  The waves weren't bad though and it was a nice sail, still under full main and staysail.  As we got into Herring Bay we had to tack back and forth and on the 3rd tack the outhaul on the main let go with a loud "crack", like canon fire.  Cheri thought we hit something and was mentally preparing to abandon ship.  Because of the racket caused by the main flapping in the wind it quickly became apparent what had happened.  The picture shows the outhaul running along the top of the boom to the clew of the mainsail.  We fired up the engine, furled the sails and headed home.  To finish off the day we backed into our new slip (lucky #13) in 30 knot winds coming at us across our port side.  Took us a little longer than usual but we managed OK with no raised voices, no grrr at all.  I'm talkin' teamwork here!

So now I've got another project to take care of before we can even consider our sail around the DelMarVa.  Our running rigging has dropped the subtle hint that it needs to be replaced.  Let's see, I've got two weekends to get ready.  Something tells me we're not going to make it.  Might have to fall back on that "glass is half full" mentality and adjust our plans and make the most of it.  On the bright side, we'll soon have all new running rigging.  Of course we'll also be penniless.

Half full, half full.

You Can't Match This

Almost all Island Packets come from the factory with a unique creme colored hull.  Designer Bob Johnson deliberately chose this color for his boats to make them stand out in a crowd and it really works.  You can spot an Island Packet from a mile away just from the color of it's hull.  Most fiberglass boats are done in white and it's not just white but a stark, bleached white like the sheets from your bed after your Mom did the wash and hung them out to dry. You look at these boats on a sunny day and you have to squint because the reflection is so bright it hurts your eyes.  Island Packets are easy on your eyes in more ways than one.  They are beautiful boats with traditional lines and when you stand back and look them over they have that "just right" look to them.

After I got the chartplotter mounted at the steering pedestal I took a few pictures to show off the results of my hard work.  What they actually showed was the glaring white of the new instrument housing in contrast to the creme color of the cockpit. I learned in my model railroading hobby that you have to take a picture of what you're doing to see it the way it really is.  You might think you're done and you've constructed this awesome model but then you look at a picture and realize you neglected to paint the left side of the building or you forgot to add the smokestack to the locomotive.   It will always show up in a photo.


So, I thought I was finished but in reality I was just starting down another path of creative frustration.  I wanted to match that creme color that Island Packet had used so my custom installation would look like it came from the factory.  If this was a car it'd be a snap because you can go to the local auto parts shop and pick up a can of spray paint that's specifically mixed for your "Midnight Blue"1969 Buick Skylark.  Boats don't have the same kind of following that cars have though.  White is pretty easy.  I guess that's why the instrument housing came in white.


I went to the "Island Packet Yacht Owners Association" web site (click here) and asked on their forum if anyone knew of a matching color in spray paint.  No luck there.  I also wrote to the Island Packet factory with the same request.  Karsten Johnson (Bob Johnson's son) wrote back with a formula for mixing my own paint using Awlcraft paint.  He also suggested trying an "ivory" or "clotted creme" shade of Rustoleum spray paint but nothing specific.

I ended up removing the floor panel that covers a compartment under the Nav Station and taking it with me down to the local hardware store.  This is a new store and they have something like 4,348 different colors of spray paint.  Holding my sample up to the caps on the paint cans I found one perfect match in an indoor/outdoor enamel that's compatible with plastic.  Woohooo!


When I got back to the marina I carefully disassembled the housing, removing all the brackets and hardware.  The only piece I couldn't get off was the nameplate so I covered that with some masking tape.  Next, I washed the housing with TSP to remove any wax and oil that might have been applied at the factory.  Then I scrubbed it with a green pad until I had knocked down the high gloss finish.  This will allow the new paint to really grip on and have a lasting finish.  We have a group of storage sheds up by the parking lot and I just happened to know that the one next to ours is empty and thought it would make a great spray booth.  I got a cardboard box from the dumpster and taped up all the seams and corners with the flaps on the top taped open to extend the size of the box.  I placed the box on it's side with the opening facing towards the front and put the instrument housing inside.  This'll control the over-spray and protect the new paint from dust until it dries.  I sprayed two light coats and let it dry overnight.


The next morning I went up to the shed to see the results of my labors.  When I opened the door to the shed my first thought was that the housing looked kinda dark, darker than I had expected.  I held the paint cap up to it and sure enough it was about two shades darker than the cap.  Grrr.  I took the housing down to the boat, hoping it would look better there but it definitely was darker than I wanted.  It was a good match for the cockpit cushions but that wasn't my goal.

I took the paint cap, since that had the color I was looking for, and went to another hardware store.  These guys had a smaller selection but different brands of paint.  I found one called "antique white" that looks like it might be "The One".  I couldn't try it out though because the original two coats need more time to cure so I'll hafta wait until next weekend.  I think I'll try it out on a scrap piece to see how well it matches before I go to all the trouble of repainting the housing again.


We did have some success on another project though.  Our friend Anthony has been doing some woodwork for us.  He's building a teak valance to cover the heat and air conditioning ducts in the aft head and stateroom.  The one in the stateroom runs down the port side under an existing shelf.  Anthony widened the shelf to 10" and added a face panel with a recessed grill to allow the heat to escape from the duct inside.  The valance looks like a headboard for the bunk and the shelf is now wide enough to actually be useful.  He took the time to match the trim and existing woodwork in the cabin and it looks really nice.  He also did a few other projects for us in the forward stateroom, including  some teak trim to hide the wires for the home theater.  Cheri and I will be doing the stain on all this next weekend so I'll post some pictures when it's finished.

So here we are coming up on Spring.  We never made it out to go sailing this Winter, even with all the mild weather we had.  The last time we got away from the dock was the weekend following Thanksgiving.  When Cheri asked me what I wanted for my birthday (3/15) I said I wanted to spend the weekend on the hook so the plan is to have three days on the Wye River.  I think that's our new most favoritest spot on the Bay.  Maybe with the use of our new cool-man chartplotter we can avoid running aground this time!

Doin' This and Doin' That

 This past weekend (02-18-12) I finally got some serious work done on our electronics project.  Until now I've managed to avoid working on it as much as possible.  There's just so many really good excuses out there. 

On Friday I picked up a Navionics Platinum + card for the chart plotter.  Cool!  Now we're all set with 3D charts and tons of additional info.  I rushed home to try it out, fired up the display and plugged in the card.  Nothing.  Hmmm.  Maybe I should read the instructions.  I went into the manual for the chartplotter (a PDF file with 114 pages) and read through everything.  It says to go into the 3D application and set it up the way I want.  OK, where's the 3D app?  I spent hours going through the program but didn't see anything about a 3D application.  Grrr.

More importantly, whenever I plugged in the card I'd go into the menu and look around and after about three minutes the chartplotter would freeze up.  I couldn't even turn off the power.  I eventually figured out that when I pull the card out the chartplotter would reset itself after a minute or two.  If I left the card in it stayed hung up.  Bad card?  I kinda doubt it.  I'm thinking it must be a problem with the card reader.

Monday was Presidents Day so I had the day off.  I played with the chartplotter some more and tried calling the Raymarine helpline.  They were on holiday too.  I called MTS, the dudes I bought the unit from, and they sent a tech over right away.  I mean, the guy was walking down the dock in five minutes.  Now that's what I call great service.  The tech, Ryan, fired up the chartplotter and showed me how to set up a new application to be used for 3D charts.  Oh!  I see! That makes complete sense.  Too bad they didn't mention that in the manual.  Then he put the card in and the whole thing froze up.  At least it's consistent.  He also tried his own card and that froze up too so we were able to verify that the problem was in the chartplotter, not the Navionics software.  He also tried a factory reset and that didn't help it either.  In the end it was decided to send it back to the factory for repairs.  It's supposed to be back in my grubby little hands in about two weeks.

Since I couldn't play with my new chart software I decided to pull the wire for the radar and autopilot.  I started at the foot of our bunk in the forward stateroom.  All the wiring that goes up the mast runs into a compartment located here and is connected to terminal strips.  The idea is to make it easy to disconnect the wiring when it's time to pull the mast.  So this is where I began by adding another terminal strip to connect power for the radar.  From here I ran 10 gauge, 3 conductor wire (#10/3) to the DC breaker panel where we'll be installing a 10 amp breaker for the radar.  To get the wire pulled from the forward stateroom to the Nav Station required dismantling the starboard side settee and pulling the wire through three compartments underneath.  Two of these compartments contain the fresh water pump and the water heater so while I was in there I also did a quick visual inspection to ensure all was well.  It was.

Next I had to pull the control wire for the auto pilot and the data cable for the radar down through the steering pedestal into the compartment under the cockpit where the genset will eventually go.  This meant unloading the aft cabin's bunk (aka the garage) and crawling through the access panel in the aft bulkhead.  I had to go back and forth between here and the cockpit a number of times because the wires kept getting hung up inside the pedestal.  I finally used my trusty fish tape (click here for more fish-tape adventures) to get it pulled through successfully.  Once I had the wire into the genset compartment I combined it with the wiring for the rudder reference and the power cable (#8/2) and clutch (#14/2) for the linear drive.  I had to feed this bundle down into the trough for the propeller shaft and then pull it through a wire run into a storage bin under the floor in the galley.  From there it gets pulled through underneath the cabinets and into a compartment under the Nav Station.  This is where the course computer will be located and all the auto pilot components will tie into that.

I also had to find a place for the fluxgate compass (click here for Wikipedia's explanation of a fluxgate compass).  It's supposed to be located pretty much centerline in the boat to minimize the effects of side-to-side and front-to-back motion, but has to be away from large cast iron masses such as the engine, which is also pretty much centerline in the boat.  I think I found a good spot for it just forward of the fuel tank on the aft bulkhead of the bilge.

With the worst of the wiring out of the way I feel like I'm pretty much on schedule with this installation.  I still have to mount the radar and pull wire for it up through the mast.  A friend of mine just finished this job on his boat using a 20' extension ladder.  Our mast is a bit taller than his though so I think I'm gonna have to use a bosun's chair.  The biggest problem with this is that I'll need Cheri to haul me up the mast using a winch or maybe even the anchor windlass.  I found a better option here.  A guy up in Maine was selling a fairly new (used only once!) single-handed ATN MastClimber (check it out) for half price.  Using this Cheri won't have to destroy her arms trying to hoist me up and I'll have complete control over how fast I go and when I stop.  Best of all, no screaming back and forth.  Perfect!

While I'm waiting for the chartplotter to come back I attacked the cockpit with polish and wax.  After I laid on the polish I hit it with a power buffer and it really brought out the shine.  This poor boat had spent about eight years down in the BVI and all the fiberglass was looking very chalky.  Last year I buffed out everything but the cockpit so now I'm pretty much caught up.  The buffer really brought out the gloss, looks mighty nice.  I also tried out a 3M product for restoring plastic.  I used this on the bezels for the instruments and also on the line locks for the running rigging.  Wow!  Everything looks brand new!  That's really amazing stuff.

My biggest problem now is that the boat looks so nice I don't want to sell it anymore.

Winter Update

We're now into our second season with the Espar diesel heater.  We have the parts needed to service it (glow plug and diffuser screen) but I'm letting it go to see how long she'll run.  Last year it ran 24/7 from mid-December until mid-March, something like 2100 hours, non-stop.  We didn't get any data on fuel consumption last season so I'm paying closer attention to it this year.  We've been having a milder Winter this time so we didn't start it up until January 5th but it's been running 24/7 since then.  We started with a full tank, hand carried 80 gallons with 5 jerry cans.  Ugh.  After fifteen days we topped off the tank again and found that we had used 35 gallons of fuel.  I was a little alarmed at this until I did the math.  15 days x 24 = 360 hours.  We're using 1/10 gallon per hour, exactly what the book says.  We paid $3.50/gal (grrr) so we're paying about $250/month for heat.  We keep it comfortable, 71 degrees during the day and turn it down to 68 at night.  Considering the situation, zero insulation in a fiberglass box immersed in 34 degree water, I think this is acceptable.

Forced hot air is a good way to heat your boat.  It keeps it dry inside, for the most part.  Places that don't get warmed up tend to sweat, inside some cabinets and the inner surface of the hull for instance.  The system is quiet and reliable.  Our exhaust is kinda noisy but that might be because of the configuration and a little time spent on it could bring it down to a better level.  Besides, the noise is mostly outside and at this time of year we don't have any neighbors to annoy.  We've used the heater while out sailing (full cockpit enclosure) and on the hook.  It has little drain on the batteries and extends the sailing season to year-round.  Let me tell you, sailing on the Chesapeake Bay with no other boats around is pretty sweet.

I've made some good progress on installing our new electronics.  I contracted with a local company, Atlantic Spars and Rigging, to modify the grab bar on our steering pedestal.  I got it back last week and it came out almost exactly as I had drawn it up.  They made the bracket for the display larger than I had planned but it turned out to be better the way they did it.  I had to modify the supports that it mounts to and once I got them cut down the whole thing went together perfectly.  It's super strong too so it'll still act as a good place to grab onto when you're moving around the cockpit.

Once the bracket was in place I mounted the multi-function display (MFD) to it and admired my handiwork.  In most cockpits the display faces the dude at the helm and if you want to take a look at it you have to go around behind the wheel to see it.  In a boat with an autopilot you won't be spending much time behind the wheel and will most likely be sitting up in the front of the cockpit for most of your watch.  I wanted the display set up so you could turn it around and see it from anywhere in the cockpit.  The mount I chose is a ball mount, like on a camera tripod, only bigger.

Once I got the display mounted I had to figure out the wiring.  Our system is pretty simple.  We have three gauges showing depth, boat speed and wind speed/direction.  These tie into the MFD using a data system called SeaTalk that uses a three conductor cable.  It's pretty much plug and play.  The gauges are powered through the DC breaker panel which was pre-wired from the factory with a 10 amp breaker and #14 two conductor wire.  By sheer coincidence this is exactly what's called for to power the new display.  I figured I could just tie into where these gauges are connected and it'd be a simple thing.  Uh huh.  Sure.

I found the cable supplying power to the gauges inside the steering pedestal.  It was a black SeaTalk three conductor cable.  I went to the breaker panel to see if maybe they had run it all the way up to the breaker but that had a blue two conductor wire.  I looked in the wiring diagram for the boat and sure enough, it called out wires 84 + 85, 14-2 wire.  I found a note from the factory that said this wire was run into the starboard side cockpit locker and coiled up, to be used for electronics.  OK, let's look in the starboard locker.

So next I emptied out the starboard locker.  This is no simple feat because the locker is big and deep.  You could sleep in there with three dogs and two sheep, if you were so inclined.  In the two years we've had this boat I've never had the guts to empty out this locker.  It's packed full.  I found two full sets of dock lines that I didn't know we had.  I also found a dinghy bridle, a two gallon tank of gas and an extra set of paddles for the dinghy.  There was a buncha other stuff that I won't even go into here.  Anyway, I finally got the locker emptied out.  Now I could get back to my project.

I crawled down into the abyss and discovered that this is where they hid the two compressors for our fridge and freezer.  Actually, I had heard a rumour they were down there, just hadn't seen them face to face before.  I could see the bundle of wires coming from the steering pedestal but when I cut the wire ties I couldn't find the black SeaTalk cable.  I did see a blue 14-2 wire though.  Hey!

My next step was to climb out of the cockpit locker and go down below into the aft cabin.  At the back of the cabin is an access panel that opens up to the genset compartment under the cockpit.  Of course, you have to take everything off the bunk to get to it.  This cabin is what we call the garage.  Everything we don't have room for anywhere else on the boat eventually ends up back here.  Right now all the stuff for our new electronics package is taking up space back here.  This includes the radome (huge!), all the wiring I'll be using (also huge!) and the box full of stuff for the autopilot (medium huge).  Also back there are two tool boxes and a storage box full of electrical connectors, all of Cheri's quilting stuff, two sewing machines and a storage box with all our extra linens and towels.  Once all this was transferred out to the Main Salon I pulled up the bunk cushion and moved that out too.  Now the aft cabin was emptied out but the rest of the boat was trashed.  Life on a boat.

With access to the genset compartment I could see the wiring bundle coming through the floor from the steering pedestal.  I didn't see my blue 14-2 wire though.  I proceeded to cut off all 47 wire ties to expose the innards of the bundle.  There it was!  The 14-2 blue wire was connected directly to the black SeaTalk wire using butt connectors.  This is OK as long as you know it's there.  It would have been really helpful if someone had updated the drawing to show this.  Note to self:  Do unto others.....update those drawings.  I run into this all the time at work.  The equipment I work with was built back in the '50s and '60s.  Everything has been modified numerous times but no one has taken the time to update the drawings.  So much time is wasted just trying to figure out what someone changed 30 years ago.  Grrrrr.  No wonder I'm all grey and look like I'm 60 years old when I'm only.....uhm, never mind.

My solution for the wiring was to mount a terminal strip on the bulkhead and label it "Instruments".  The blue 14-2 wire leading in is labeled on the prints as wire #'s 84 and 85 so I marked that here too.  The wire leading to the MFD already has an in-line fuse but I needed to add a 7 amp fuse to the one going to the gauges.  With this done I headed back topside to try it out.  I flipped on the "Instruments" breaker and by the time I got to the cockpit the MFD was already powered up and progressing through it's initialization.  Cool!

After it got through the initialization it settled into a display of some harbor in Florida.  Uhm, that's not right.  I started punching buttons and found my way through the program to the part where you turn on the GPS.  It took about 30 seconds to figure out where it was and finally showed our position in Traceys Creek.  So far, so good.

So now we need to spend some time out on the Bay.  I'm pretty excited about having a chartplotter and look forward to seeing what all we can do with it.  It'd be especially nice to go places without running aground all the time, although I have gotten really good at that.  The manual for the MFD is on a disc and I'm slowly working my way through a PDF file with 114 pages of instructions.  I also ordered the upgraded charts (Navionics Platinum +) for the Chesapeake Bay that'll give us 3D display and satellite shots that overlay the charts.  Sweet!

Speaking of running aground......this past weekend (2/11/12) winter finally hit.  Around 1530 on Saturday the temperature dropped about 20 degrees in 15 minutes, the wind increased to 25 knots with 45 knot gusts and it started snowing, sideways.  The wind was blowing out of the NW and continued non-stop for two days.  By noon on Sunday the water depth at our slip was 3'8", which is pretty low.  Our boat draws 4'10".  Our deck was 32" below the dock which made getting on and off a bit of a challenge.  The boat next to us draws 6'6" and they were really sticking out of the water.  They haven't hauled their boat in over three years and the exposed crud quickly dried out in the wind.  They've got quite a garden under there.  The NW wind is pretty common here in the winter but in the two years we've been here this is the lowest we've seen the water at our slip so far.

...And This Is My Other Brother Darryl

Some people never grow up.  Take me for instance. 

Saturday we went into Silver Spring and visited with some friends, got home around 2000.  The next morning we got ready for church and walked out to the car.  I climbed in and was surprised to find that I had to adjust the mirror on my side because it was facing down towards the rear tire.  That's weird.  Maybe some klutz bumped into it.  Had to manually force it back into position.  Then I looked over at the passenger side and saw that the glass was missing from that mirror.  On closer inspection I saw that someone had tried to rip both mirrors off the car, trying so hard that they scraped them against the windows and left scratch marks.  I looked around at the other cars and found that no one else had any damage.  Man, I musta really  pissed somebody off.  I just couldn't think of anything I mighta done that would deserve this kind of action.  I mean, this is high school retribution kinda stuff.

I reported it to the marina office and they said there had been a drunk that was picked up Saturday night and escorted off marina property.  They didn't give me a name but maybe this was the dude who went nuts on my car.  Still, I couldn't figure why anyone would do such a thing.

I shoulda realized.  I grew up in Cockeysville, Maryland.  Back in the days before it was overrun by big-city commuters Cockeysville was a nice little farming community in upper Baltimore County.  It was also the home to a group of rednecks who called themselves the Cockeysville Wrecking Crew.  Cute huh?  These guys figured they lived in a small town and could get away with pretty much anything.  They were known for street racing and fights but they were also good at intimidating younger kids and ramming people's cars with their pickup trucks.  Rednecks.  Just another part of "The Great American Experience".

Last week I was coming home from work around 1900 and stopped off at the post office to pick up our mail.  I was driving back to the marina, going about 35mph (5mph over the limit), when this car comes flying up behind me and practically drives up my tailpipe.  This dude was really close, so close I couldn't see his headlights.  I really hate it when people try to intimidate me with their driving and I could feel my blood pressure going up.  I pulled off to the side of the road to let him go by and he just stops and waits to see what I'm gonna do.  He finally goes around and I pull out behind him.  I'm perhaps a little overenthusiastic and, uhm, smoked the tires coming out.  He floors it and, like the idiot that I am, I floor it too.  Going across the bridge out of town we're going 60mph and the dude is way out in front.  He flies past the entrance to the marina and just before he goes around the next turn I slowed down and turned in.  I laughed the whole way to the parking lot.  I figured we both acted like idiots, had some fun playing race cars and nobody got hurt.  Pretty dumb but that's what us rednecks do, we play stupid.

Apparently that redneck plays by different rules.

Being all growed up now I had forgotten what it was like to live in a small country town.  Deale is even smaller than Cockeysville was and I'm pretty sure the redneck coefficient is inversely proportional to the size of the town.

I figure I musta embarrassed this poor guy the week before.  He probably got around that corner and realized how stupid he looked by running away from one of those moronic boat people.  He saw me turn into the marina so he knew where I hide out.  That weekend he was probably sitting in the bar down the road, drinking his fourteenth Bud Lite and decided it was time to set things right.  Imagine his delight when he found my car parked among the boats out there.  He flew into a skunked-beer rage and thought those mirrors were my ears and he was gonna tear them off.  I'll bet it really pissed him off when he couldn't get em to come loose.  Built Ford tough!

I don't know why I let myself get in these situations.  If Cheri knew about this I'd be sleeping in the dinghy tonight.

In my other life, where I play an adult, things are progressing nicely.  I came up with a design for mounting the Raymarine display at the helm.  I drew it up and talked to the folks at Atlantic Spars about modifying the grab bar on the steering pedestal and adding a bracket.  I actually tried taking the pedestal apart and wasted several hours on that before I realized I only had to remove the compass from the top.  That gave me a huge hole to work through and I had access to all the wiring and gauges.

When we bought the boat it had gauges for wind speed and direction, boat speed and depth.  These are Raymarine ST-60 gauges and they're about 11 years old now and showing their age.  I sent out the boat speed display to be rebuilt because the face was fried from the sun and you could barely read it.  The bezels for all three are looking kinda fried too so I also ordered new bezels.  The gauges will work with the new Multi Function Display (MFD) and they'll all tie into it by one cable, providing both power and data. The circuit breaker and wiring for these gauges is sized right for the MFD so I'll just move it over to that and then it'll supply power to the three gauges over the single data cable.  Perfect!  There's a data cable and separate power for the radar that'll have to be run also.

I was looking into an autopilot for the boat but the price of a new system is kinda prohibitive for right now.  But then I ran across an ad for a used system that had everything except the linear drive.  I think I mentioned this the last time around.  Anyway, I just closed the deal on that so we'll have autopilot for when we do the DelMarVa run in May.  This will also tie into the MFD and provide compass and heading information.  It will need it's own power and circuit breaker though so I'll hafta run a line for that also.  Next month we should be able to get the linear drive and I'll need to have a bracket made to mount that near the rudder shaft under the cockpit.

OK, so now I've got plenty of projects to keep me busy over the Winter.  We have four months to prepare for our trip.  That's 15 weekends from now.  I'll need at least 2 weekends just to pull wire.  Probably 2 more to mount the radar on the mast.  Figure another 2 or 3 to get the autopilot mounted.  Then at least 2 more weekends to get everything working together and tested out.  I usually take twice as long as I plan to get anything accomplished so I need to double all that.  Let's see, 2 + 2 + 2 (or 3) + 2.....that comes out to 8 or so.  Then double that and I get.....16 weekends.  Guess I'd better stop playing games with the local boys and get to work.

Happy New Year!

It's now the first week of the new year and we're settled in for the season.  The water temperature is warmer (47 degrees F) than it was this time last year (solid ice 4" thick).  I'm kinda hoping this is a sign that global warming has advanced to the point where we won't have to use our Espar heater anymore but I guess that's probably not the right thing to wish for.  Actually, as long as we're comfortable we really enjoy the winter here at the marina.  We practically have the place to ourselves, just us and the ducks.  We decorated the boat for Christmas this year.  Put up purple berry LED lights in the rigging and a three foot tall Christmas tree out in the cockpit.  Looks pretty sweet!

This past month has been interesting/frustrating in our attempts to find another boat.  We've narrowed our search down to a handful of boats so we talked to a loan company that specializes in boat loans and got the paperwork started.  We were dumbfounded when they came back and rejected the loan because we were "live aboards".  What?  With a credit score of over 800 and our only debt being the boat we live on they think we're a bad risk because we might sail away without paying off our loan.  Gee whiz guys, there's nothing in our record that indicates this might happen.  Maybe they overheard me at the bar the other night when I was talking like a pirate.  I don't know.  So now we have our boat up for sale but we won't be able to buy another one if we sell it.  Then what do we do?  The bank suggested that we buy a house and then they'd consider giving us a boat loan.  Am I alone in thinking this sounds insane?  We're trying to free ourselves from financial commitment and they want us to replant ourselves in the dirt and be buried in debt.  Didja hear that?  It was the sound of our dreams being laid down to die.  What a system.

So, I don't think we'll be buying another boat anytime soon.  The one we have right now is plenty good and if we make a few adjustments she'll do just fine.  Besides, we've got three years to go until retirement and a lot can happen between now and then.

In the meantime we're gonna go ahead with our plans for adding some gear to La Vida Dulce and preparing ourselves for blue water sailing.  We had originally planned to invest in Furuno electronics but that's changed and we're looking at Raymarine equipment now.  We used Cheri's bling money and bought a really nice multi function display (MFD, C120W).  Working with the local supplier (MTS) we got a killer price and timed it right to also get $500 back from Raymarine.  We wanted to go with a local dude so we'd have technical help if we needed it, which you won't get if you buy off the internet.  We ended up with a better price in the long run too.  Ryan at MTS drew me up a schematic and made suggestions to help me plan the system.  We'll be able to use the boat's existing ST-60 instruments (which are about ten years old now) which will work fine with the new gear.  To replace them with up-to-date stuff would have cost about $1600 so that's quite a savings.  Our boat speed display needs some help but Ryan says we can send it into the factory and have it rebuilt for half the price of a new unit.  Good plan.  So we have the display and that gives us GPS and a chartplotter (with 3D charts!).  I chose a housing with a ball and socket foot to mount it at the helm.  I plan to modify the steering pedestal so the display can be turned around and face in any direction.  That way you can engage the autopilot and then go sit up by the cabin out of the weather and read a book or something and just glance up now and then at the display to make sure everything is going OK.  Cool!  Of course we don't have the autopilot yet but that is in the plans.  We also just placed an order for a 4kw radar which will be mounted about halfway up the mast.  That gets displayed on the MFD and overlays on the chart or can be shown in split screen.  The mount for that is self-leveling so the radar is always in line with the horizon and won't be affected by the boat heeling over.  At least for the first 35 degrees of heel.  Beyond that it probably doesn't much matter.  Once we have that gear up and running we'll install AIS which will automatically communicate with other boats (all commercial ships have it) letting them know where and who we are and also showing us their position and heading.

This is the minimum I want to have up and running by this Spring so we can head out into the Atlantic for our first offshore sail.  We'll be taking two weeks in May to do what's called the DelMarVa circumnavigation, sailing around the Delaware/Maryland/Virginia peninsula.  We plan to take our time and enjoy the trip so we'll be making stops along the way. Heading north we'll anchor in the Chester and Sassafras Rivers.  Leaving the Sassafras we'll enter the C+D Canal and cruise into Chesapeake City for a day.  From there it's out to the Atlantic, then down to the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.  This will be a three to four day non-stop run.  Our first anchorage in the Chesapeake would be at Mobjack Bay.  From there we'll work our way up to Fleets Bay  We should be able to make an easy one day run to Solomons Island on the Patuxent River for another overnighter and then a one day run back to Herrington Harbour.  This schedule leaves us three or four days open to hang out and explore when we find a particularly nice anchorage.

That's the plan.  The overnight runs would be a lot easier if we had an autopilot installed.  We're looking into a used one that includes a course computer, fluxgate compass, rudder reference and control head.  We'd have to ante up for a new linear drive which is the part that actually pushes the rudder back and forth under command of the course computer.  If we went this way we'd be able to have an autopilot for less than half the cost of a new one.  We'd always be able to replace the used parts with new ones at a later date.  With four days of non-stop sailing planned for this Spring this might be our best bet.

This'll be our big vacation for 2012.  The following year we're planning to take three weeks and go to Bermuda.  Then the year after that we'll take off and go wherever we want because we won't be coming back.  No more commuting, no more working for da man, no more having to wait to take some time off.  It'll all be time off from there on out.  Woohooo!  I'm gonna be a pirate and steal back all the time they stole from me over the last 40 years.  Bastards!  I'm gonna bury treasure in the sand and say "lardy dar" all the time.  Might drink some rum too.  I'll probably skip the pillage and plunder thing though because I pretty much covered that one when I was in high school.

Three years.  The time goes by pretty fast although we have accomplished quite a bit since we bought the boat.  We made a list of things we felt were important (life raft, whiskey, cigars) and we've been checking things off as we go.  So far we're about half way through the list.  Still, I'm feeling pressed for time.  Might have to quit working so I can spend more time on these projects.  That should go over big with the wife.