There have been a couple of persistent headaches in getting the boat ready to sail. One of the most stubborn has been getting a rigger to come repair my back stay I don't understand why I cant get anyone to come, but I just cant. Unexpectedly they did come today, but by the time I walked to the office and back, they had left without explanation?
The second is the documentation. I sent the paperwork to the Coast Guard months ago, and still no response.
Over the weekend I did manage to get a few things done such as changing the engine oil, and getting the auto pilot working. So some progress anyway.
Monday, April 22, 2013
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
Time is flying by, and the departure date is coming up quickly. The boat is coming together nicely and all the essential systems are up and running. I replaced the starter and now the engine starts up effortlessly which is good. The roller furling line and the control lines for the windpilot were worn so they have been replaced.
The whole "alternative energy" program with the solar panels and the wind generator never really cranked out any power, largely (as I came to find out) because one of the panels was wired backwards. Now she puts out steady amperage all day which seems to meet my electric needs. I also purchased a portable Yamaha generator that will power the battery charger and the AC receptacles. The side benefit of this is I get to keep the microwave which is pretty handy. It also has a DC outlet for charging the batteries directly if ever needed. I thought about 'going green' and installing larger solar panels and wind generator, but the ones I have now are sufficient for normal sunny days, and there is just no substitute for AC power when you need it. I have friends that have spent thousands of dollars on panels with mixed results. Having the generator adds a lot of redundancy to the overall system. Loosing power offshore is probably not the end of the world, but it could be dangerous, and definitely uncomfortable.
A note on Navigation. While I've never gotten lost on the water, I don't consider myself to be a very experienced navigator. I've had plenty of exposure in practice, I'm just not sure how much actually sunk in. Fortunately modern satellite navigation has dumbed things down enough that even I feel fairly confident in finding the place I'm looking for without too much embarrassment. To start, I purchased the three chart sets from NV charts that cover the area between Puerto Rico and Trinidad. They are very nice charts and well worth the money. Next, the boat came equipped with a Furuno GPS unit that looks like a relic from the 90's but works fine. Technically these two items are all I would need to get to Trinidad regardless of where I stop on the way. However out of an abundance of caution, I have also purchased a Garmin chartplotter and a chip for the eastern Caribbean. I hope to integrate this with an AIS transponder to track ship traffic and let others know I'm out there. I also have a Garmin Gecko hand held GPS unit, which I love, and have used extensively. On the iphone, i downloaded the Navionics app for all of the Caribbean and South America. For only $15 it looks as good as any of the chartplotters I have seen, and always shows my exact position and speed, at least around St. Thomas. So all in all, I hope I'm covered on the Nav front.
The whole "alternative energy" program with the solar panels and the wind generator never really cranked out any power, largely (as I came to find out) because one of the panels was wired backwards. Now she puts out steady amperage all day which seems to meet my electric needs. I also purchased a portable Yamaha generator that will power the battery charger and the AC receptacles. The side benefit of this is I get to keep the microwave which is pretty handy. It also has a DC outlet for charging the batteries directly if ever needed. I thought about 'going green' and installing larger solar panels and wind generator, but the ones I have now are sufficient for normal sunny days, and there is just no substitute for AC power when you need it. I have friends that have spent thousands of dollars on panels with mixed results. Having the generator adds a lot of redundancy to the overall system. Loosing power offshore is probably not the end of the world, but it could be dangerous, and definitely uncomfortable.
A note on Navigation. While I've never gotten lost on the water, I don't consider myself to be a very experienced navigator. I've had plenty of exposure in practice, I'm just not sure how much actually sunk in. Fortunately modern satellite navigation has dumbed things down enough that even I feel fairly confident in finding the place I'm looking for without too much embarrassment. To start, I purchased the three chart sets from NV charts that cover the area between Puerto Rico and Trinidad. They are very nice charts and well worth the money. Next, the boat came equipped with a Furuno GPS unit that looks like a relic from the 90's but works fine. Technically these two items are all I would need to get to Trinidad regardless of where I stop on the way. However out of an abundance of caution, I have also purchased a Garmin chartplotter and a chip for the eastern Caribbean. I hope to integrate this with an AIS transponder to track ship traffic and let others know I'm out there. I also have a Garmin Gecko hand held GPS unit, which I love, and have used extensively. On the iphone, i downloaded the Navionics app for all of the Caribbean and South America. For only $15 it looks as good as any of the chartplotters I have seen, and always shows my exact position and speed, at least around St. Thomas. So all in all, I hope I'm covered on the Nav front.
Monday, March 4, 2013
Refrigeration, Starter
Having spent a few nights on the boat, I'm happy to say it is really very comfortable. This weekend the main tasks were getting the refrigeration running, and repairing the starter.
The 12 volt Danfoss refer unit refused to run, so Pauly jumped the starter relay and hard wired it to the switch which made it run and cool the icebox, but it doesn't seem to respond to the parameters set in the electronic control so I'll have to play with it some more to see how it works.
We also took the starter off and tore it apart. The insides were pretty dirty, so we cleaned it up and re-installed it. Unfortunately it isn't working any better so I ordered a new one from a company in Maryland. The upside is, now I'll have a spare starter since the one I have on there still works if you keep switching the key on and off.
The 12 volt Danfoss refer unit refused to run, so Pauly jumped the starter relay and hard wired it to the switch which made it run and cool the icebox, but it doesn't seem to respond to the parameters set in the electronic control so I'll have to play with it some more to see how it works.
We also took the starter off and tore it apart. The insides were pretty dirty, so we cleaned it up and re-installed it. Unfortunately it isn't working any better so I ordered a new one from a company in Maryland. The upside is, now I'll have a spare starter since the one I have on there still works if you keep switching the key on and off.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Moving aboard
The boat is back in the water with fresh bottom paint looking good. Now it is time to start the painful process of moving aboard. I say painful not because I'm not looking forward to living on the boat, but because moving is always a pain, and when you try an shoehorn all the trappings of life ashore into a space roughly the size of your closet you need to make some tough choices about what you need and don't need. i'm finding that I am continually asking myself, "how did I end up with all this shit?". Fortunately I have a storage unit to handle some of the overflow, but that has a bunch of crap in it already. I think the plan is, since I have to be out of the apartment by the end of the day tomorrow, to put everything from the apartment into my Chevy trailblazer and gradually move what I need onto the boat over the weekend. This should work since most of the furniture and large items came with the apartment and I've already done several rounds of tossing out/giving away stuff I really don't need. After a few weeks on the boat, I should have a good idea of what I want to keep, and what takes up more space than its worth.
In reality, the Westsail has a tremendous amount of storage space for a 32 foot boat, and the previous owner lived aboard with his wife and 2 kids. I cant imagine where they kept everything, but I guess you learn to live with less stuff, a skill I will be trying to acquire over the next few months.........
In reality, the Westsail has a tremendous amount of storage space for a 32 foot boat, and the previous owner lived aboard with his wife and 2 kids. I cant imagine where they kept everything, but I guess you learn to live with less stuff, a skill I will be trying to acquire over the next few months.........
Monday, February 18, 2013
Boatyard time
Friday morning around Dawn, I brought the boat over to the boat yard for Haul out with my friend Pauly. We had a nice ride over watching the sunrise and tied up at the work dock at Independent Boatyard at about quarter to eight (we had to be there by 8:30). After signing in, the yard hauled Valkyrie first thing which was nice because sometimes you have to wait for hours if there are other boats. Really I had planned on the whole process taking longer so I ended up taking it easy for the rest of the day and getting everything together for Saturday morning.
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Well, Friday is the day. The boat is finally coming out of the water for paint. I haven't gotten a lot done the last week because I was busy with work, and sailing on the weekends, but the time has come. Friday morning I have to bring the boat around to Independent Boatyard, about an hour trip, and hopefully they'll haul the boat first thing. Today I let the engine run for a while and checked to see how much fuel was in the tanks, about half full. The one somewhat disturbing thing is that the engine doesn't seem to want to start with the starting battery alone, in fact it doesn't even begin to turn over.. When I parallel it with the house bank, it starts right up without any trouble. I have a strong suspicion that the starting battery is nearing the end of its useful life.
Friday, January 18, 2013
Well this has been a good week for work on the boat. Sunday I removed the old shifter in the cockpit This was no easy task as corrosion had pretty much frozen it in place. About 10 minutes of hacking with a heavy duty Milwaukee sawzall with a 12 inch metal cutting blade finally did it in. with the old one out, I realized the hole was too big for the new shifter. Not good. Fortunately I had a few small hunks of teak in storage and shaped one of them into a plate that fit over the old hole, and drilled a smaller hole through the middle for the new shifter/throttle assembly. I epoxied this directly over the old hole and then it was ready for installation.
Monday, Lou came down to the boat and installed my used Icom 710 SSB radio and tuner. Lou is an old HAM radio operator who kind of reminds me of my grandfather. he's really knowledgeable about radios and ran all new cables for the power, tuner and antenna(back stay). With this I should be able to communicate and get weather within around a 4000 mile range. Someday I will get a modem so that I can send emails as well.
Tuesday, Kevin came and began work replacing the forward bulkhead. The new bulkhead will be around an inch thick and should do the job. really all it does is keep the chain in the chain locker and support the two sampson posts on either side of the bowsprit. As of today, he is close to done. which means the boat is nearly back together.
Also this week, I received the TV/'DVD I ordered from amazon that will mount on the main bulkhead in the salon. Its only about 16'', but it will be nice to watch a movie on the boat, and it runs off 12 volts.
The next step is bring the boat to the boatyard for a haul out and bottom job. I think the transducer may need replacing as well. She has virtually no bottom paint left at the moment, and has grown a pretty impressive beard in the last month since she was sling-hauled for the survey.
There's still the rigging and refrigeration that need a little attention, but I'm happy with the progress so far. I've been try to get help from some of the tradesman I know not only because they're skilled guys, but because I'm working full time and if I try and do it all myself, I'll either screw it up, never finish or both, and I really want to keep the momentum up.
Monday, Lou came down to the boat and installed my used Icom 710 SSB radio and tuner. Lou is an old HAM radio operator who kind of reminds me of my grandfather. he's really knowledgeable about radios and ran all new cables for the power, tuner and antenna(back stay). With this I should be able to communicate and get weather within around a 4000 mile range. Someday I will get a modem so that I can send emails as well.
Tuesday, Kevin came and began work replacing the forward bulkhead. The new bulkhead will be around an inch thick and should do the job. really all it does is keep the chain in the chain locker and support the two sampson posts on either side of the bowsprit. As of today, he is close to done. which means the boat is nearly back together.
Also this week, I received the TV/'DVD I ordered from amazon that will mount on the main bulkhead in the salon. Its only about 16'', but it will be nice to watch a movie on the boat, and it runs off 12 volts.
The next step is bring the boat to the boatyard for a haul out and bottom job. I think the transducer may need replacing as well. She has virtually no bottom paint left at the moment, and has grown a pretty impressive beard in the last month since she was sling-hauled for the survey.
There's still the rigging and refrigeration that need a little attention, but I'm happy with the progress so far. I've been try to get help from some of the tradesman I know not only because they're skilled guys, but because I'm working full time and if I try and do it all myself, I'll either screw it up, never finish or both, and I really want to keep the momentum up.
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