The Old Electrical System

I went to the boat today to do some work. One of the things I did was to see what was left of the electrical system. The last owner did not have a battery in the boat so he pretty much told me that it had no electrical system to speak of. When I took over ownership, I noticed that there are a few parts that maybe salvageable to build my new electrical system. So today I went and stripped everything that was still on there including all of the wiring so I can start fresh.this is a picture of what I was able to salvage.

1. Breaker Panel
2. Distribution Panel
3. 12-volt Cabin light
4. Toggle Switch
5. 2-way pull switch
6. Misc. wiring

Looks like I will be reusing the breaker panel and the distribution panel. Everything else is either too old, broken or inexpensive to buy new.

This is how the old parts look on the boat before I stripped them out:

Here they are removed and organized in my house:

Here is a close up view of the front of the electrical breaker panel:

And here is the back of it:

Took the day off and went sailing

Last Thursday I decided to take the day off and go charter a boat for the day. Quite a bit of change of pace from the treachery of boat restoration. I chartered a 32 ft Catalina out of Santa Barbara and went up to coast for the day. Here are some videos we took while sailing:

Close reaching shot from the foredeck

Sailing Wing-On-Wing from the helm in light air

Come around the open water buoy checking out seals

Couple of small projects completed with bigger ones to come

I had about 30 minutes today to go to the boatyard to finish a couple of small projects on the boat. One is simply pumping the water out of the bilge with my newly acquired manual bilge pump. That was pretty uneventful. The pump worked great. It pumps much faster than I expected without much effort. It will come in handy in the future. The second project is a bit more involved. I wanted to strengthen the chainplates before rigging the boat. Especially the port sidestay. This photo will show you the condition it was in prior to the modification:

It was just bolted the the deck and not on the bulkhead whatsoever. I wonder if this was adequate for the previous owners use or if it had come undone since he last sailed this boat. Even the stock chainplate itself seems kind anemic but I’m sure it is strong enough for the job. I wanted to add some more security to it so I started looking for chainplates. What I ended up using is actually metal bracing from Lowes. I know its not marine grade stainless steel but it will be inside the cabin and would not get a lot of moisture and they are significantly cheaper. I got 4 metal strip bracing for about 2 bucks each and 3 inch bolts, washers and nuts for about 15 bucks to secure them. The original holes on the braces were too small so I drilled them out to 3/8 inch to accommodate the bolts. During installation, I had to drill out the original chainplate holes to attach them to the new chainplate extension. You can see from this photo below that it is significantly stronger than below:

I used some silicon sealant in the drilled out holes just in case there was any moisture that may get in to the bulkhead in the future to cause any rot. It is probably a huge overkill but I figured its better to be safe than sorry. Obviously the same treatment was done to the starboard side just be balance out the rig.

Now whats left are the headstay and backstay chainplates. I’m not sure what to do with them. They seem to be ok as they are but the headstay does not have an over the bow stem fitting as larger boats do. It is just bolted to the deck with backing plates. The backstay is the same way. I’m considering a conversion to a split backstay and use the existing backstay chainplate as the mounting point for the mainsheet. We’ll see how these issues get resolve in the weeks to come…

This is the backing plate of the headstay fittings below deck.

This is the backing plate of the backstay (smaller ones on top)

Got the rest of the standing rigging today from D&R Marine

Finally the standing rigging is here and I can begin the work. I took some photos of the old versus the new and will post it up a little later. I am close to having all the necessary parts to get my boat into the water. Yet I still don’t have a name for her. What the heck was that name anyways?

Manual Bilge Pump

There is about 2 inches of water gathered in the bilge. I could either use a length of tube and try siphoning the water out and risk accidentally drinking stale-old-bacteria-infested water or I can get a manual bilge pump to pump it out and keep it later onboard to possibly save me and the boat from an offshore sinking catastrophe. I opted for the latter. It set me back $31.24 from West Marine but I’d say it was a good investment.

Grand total so far: $ 5153.52

Gooseneck from D&R Marine

While I’m still waiting on getting the rest of my standing rigging from them, I went ahead and ordered the gooseneck. I showed my boat to my friend Elie the other day and he mentioned that his Aquarius 21 has a similar gooseneck setup. From his description of his gooseneck, the D&R Marine seems to be exactly what I need to connect the boom to the mast. This is what the item looks like:



This item sets me back another $59.99. Makes the ongoing tally to: $5122.28

Another O’Day 22 at the Santa Barbara Harbor

Saw this on yesterday. An O’Day 22 near the same age as mine. Same rigging setup so I took some photos for visual notes on when I need to rig mine. Looks like the mainsheet is connected to the boat via the triangular plate on the backstay. Makes me want to beef up the stern chainplate just to be safe. I wish he had his sail cover off so I can see the goose neck…

I promise this is the last one

At least until tomorrow:)

Yet another design

Ok, I’m wasting too much of my time designing shirts that make me no money. But here is one last design for this site:

By the way, I am not marking anything up in my store so they are as cheap as they can possibly be from CafePress. I suppose if there was enough demand in the future I can just screen print these for them to be even cheaper yet. Once I have a name for my boat I will also be making some new designs with the name in it.

New t-shirt design in CafePress store

Check out a new t-shirt design I made for my cafe press store. Let me know what you think in the comments.

The hugest anchor ever

CIMG1019

Originally uploaded by udannlin.

I just got the north star claw anchor. This thing is huge! My boat is not going anywhere….

Got my safety harness and tether

CIMG1017

Originally uploaded by udannlin.

Just got this in the mail today. 2 of my ebay purchases for the boat. It is a new West Marine Safety Harness and a used tether with 2 attachment points.

New CafePress.com Merchandise Store

I set up a new Cafe Press store for this site. Right now there is just one item in it and it is a black t-shirt with ‘Born to Sail’ printed on it. Take a look:

Click on the image above to visit my store. More items are coming later! Feel free to send me any ideas of other designs.

Latest cost tally: $5062.29

The last tally was $3465.13 but that includes the backordered mainsail. For the time being I will just keep that in the total since they are planning on shipping it to me once they get them. I have since bought these additional items:

1. $50.69 – Hitch accessories
2. $96 – 26 lb claw anchor
3. $65 – 200 ft of 1/2 inch twisted nylon for the new bruce anchor
4. $23.47 – safety nylon safety tether
5. $47 – safety harness
6. $37 – 42″ drift sock/ocean anchor
7. $124 – Headstay and backstay
8. $1278 – Tohatsu 6 HP 4-stroke longshaft motor

That brings the total to $5062.29. Ouch. Luckly this will be nearly the end of the large ticket items besides a jib furler (~$500). The rest will come as needed. Of course I will be keeping track of it right here.

Ordered a 6 HP 4-stroke outboard

I broke down and decided to order a new outboard instead of buying a used one. It is just too much of a nightmare to mess with outboard to get them to work. I ordered from a place called Boats Unlimited in NY so I didnt have to pay taxes. Shipping is only 28 bucks. The total came out to be $1278. Add that on to the ongoing tally. Starting to be expensive…

Update (April 4th 2006): I canceled the order from them and decided to get one from OnlineOutboards.com. They price matched and have it in stock. BoatsUnlimitedNY.com has very poort customer service and was not a good place to deal with. View details