s/v Silhouette: November 2008

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Tops in Quality

This is a special photo for our friend Jerry at Tops in Quality. He has nursed us through many stainless steel projects. He has built our new chain plates, mast guards, radar mount and (pictured here) a table stand which attaches to the hull instead of the floor. (Let me know if I forgot anything important Jerry.) This allows easy access to the bilge below. During a recent phone conversation he mentioned that he checked out our blog and was disappointed that a picture of this work of art was not included.

Here is a photo of the table attached to the hull.

(Here is a plug Jerry – Tops in Quality Rocks! We recommend this company to anyone who needs custom Stainless Steel.)

Engine Room Air Conditioner

One by-product of all this work is that the other old air-conditioner has been left in the engine room (where it was originally installed) and now it becomes an air conditioner for the ENGINE ROOM! This will be a big help when it is hotter than hell and…Mark needs to work on something in this even hotter spot. It is kind of hard to see in this photo but the silver duct toward the right side of the photo is where the cold air comes from.

Engine room cold tower

This is what I call the ‘cold’ tower as it has two air conditioner compressors on the bottom shelf and two refrigeration units on the top shelf (which can barely be seen in this photo). Refrigeration is our next big project – scheduled to begin 2 weeks from yesterday…so that would be…November 21….let’s see if we meet that target date…

Engine room instead of hanging locker

Mark put all of the compressors in the engine room this one is just to the left of the clothes washer.

Air Conditioning bilge work

The electrical wiring, 2 copper pipes, (one small one a bit larger) foam insulation, thermostat and control box wire all has to go through the bilges. Holes are drilled and epoxied through all the stringers and bulkheads. Oh, and all the 3, 4 and 5 inch ducts had to run from to blower units to the vents. We are close to being almost done with this project.

Though this photo shows Mark in the bilge removing an old bilge hose as I did not have the strength.

Most of the work below the floor was done by me as I fit better in the small spaces – drat!

Foward Air Conditioiner is completed in time for cold weather

We are now working on the air conditioning installations and have been for some time but should soon be done. Mark has put all the blowers in very inconvenient places (for us) but in the long run they will be totally out of the way. For instance, we have a total of 3 hanging lockers (closets) on this boat and one was in use when we bought it as an air conditioner locker. Since that unit was on it’s last legs, we took it out an purchased 3 new units. The blower is taking up about a foot at the top and back of the now empty hanging locker.

New Thru-hulls

New thru-hulls; easy huh? Well, first you cutout 8 4” round circles, epoxy them all together on top of a Ziploc bag which has a 4” round of wood inside. Screw the whole mess to the hull where you want to place the thru-hull. Wait one day. Drill the hole through the center, drill out the wood sandwiched between the fiberglass and fill with epoxy. Wait one day. Sand, dry fit and pre-drill all the screw holes. Apply the Groco thru-hull using 3M 5200 (one person flat on his/her stomach on the dock with the mushroom thingy that fits the outside part of the thru-hull) and screw it in. Then, you guessed it wait 5 days till the 5200 totally dries and now the thru-hull is ready to use. I did most of the work on these thru-hulls but am sure I forgot about 10 steps….

Groco Rocks

The hanging locker in the aft cabin had only one thru-hull (of the plastic variety) but we needed two more so added them and fixed the plastic one by removing it and making them all Groco (Groco Rocks!).

New Instruments installed

We mounted some of our more important (much used) instruments on the hood over the companionway where they are visible from anywhere in the cockpit.

Mark added warning lights to the left, the top two are for bilge pumps and the bottom one is for the fresh water pump. If we spring a leek (sailor joke, what veggie is not allowed on a sailboat? A leek!) the person on watch will notice the light and investigate. The light to the right is tied to our ‘boat’ alarm system.

Aft head countertop is DONE

During the big move effort, Mark was furiously trying to finish all parts needed on the boat. The aft head countertop was made and installed and looks wonderful, but I did not get a picture of it till the other day.

Below the counter is a new door into the cabinet, (the door needs to be varnished) which provides access to three new thru-hull outlets. This and a few other projects are awaiting varnish queen (that would be me). A varnish brush has not been touched since July….ahhh, heaven.

Chris does laundry

Since the boat came furnished with a washer (no dryer) I decided to give it a tryout in the last several weeks and have done laundry. I haven’t hung laundry out to dry since…hmmm…the early sixties.

So far things don’t seem too wrinklie but to pays to be an anal-retentive folder. Maybe I won’t have to be a slave to an iron but time will tell if having just a washer will work. Since the lake is not salt water the results on the ‘big pond’ may be different.

Time out for play

We took a day off during the fine weather of September to anchor out with Marks’ longtime friend Mike Crossland and his daughter Kathleen (not pictured here). They brought two kites with them. We had a fine time flying them from the stern of the boat, this one is a crazy looking octopus. It was wonderful weather and a much needed break from ‘boat work’.

Electricians with the old panel

Should the photo caption be ‘Old Engineers with the old panel’? Oh no wait, I seem to remember that they are both younger than me so I better just keep still about the age of things.

Support Group CEO

I nominate MARK LIGNOUL as Electricians Support Group CEO. Here he is with a spool of 250 feet of 12-3 AC wire which he purchased thinking that we would have leftovers. As of today (11/05/2008) this last bit was used in the starboard bilge to re-wire the outlet in the V-Berth.

Support group for Electricians needed

This is the wiring ‘nest’ at the back of the new panels. Hmmm, and I don’t think we are done just yet. Perhaps we need an Electricians Support Group?

Wire exceeds Panduit capacity

Naturally, as we are redoing the panels we are also wiring the new air conditioners, instruments and replacing the old wiring to electrical outlets. All of these new wires have to go through the boat to the panels. Mark bought a butt-load of Panduit (similar to ‘conduit’ but flat vs. round) and most of it has been put to good use in the engine room. But, in some cases it looks like the wiring has exceeded expectations and our Panduit runnith over.

s/v Silhouette