Well I didn't win the lottery... lol.
But I have started to go back to school. This past month has had my nose crammed in a math textbook looking at equations that I haven't seen in 25 years. Its been interesting to say the least. Of course, this has had a profound effect on projects onboard Liberty Call. I'm starting to get a hand on the schedule, so hopefully I'll be able to start working on projects in a more timewise manner.
Speaking of time, the people that run the Atomic Clock are officially adding a leap second at the end of the day today. Should be interesting to read the tech blogs tomorrow and see what bugs pop up in all the electronic devices.
For instance, I love my iPad and all of the related marine and navigational apps that are available for it. It's my chartplotter, celestial navigation calculator, heck, it even chimes a ship's bell every half hour in case I feel like my old Navy self. BUT, I do not depend on it by itself. I've always believed in the old saying "2 is 1, and 1 is none". Meaning, have backups, because something WILL break. It always does. My backup GPS is a very old Garmin unit that my Father gave to me as a birthday present back in the 90s. It still works and is very accurate, but it does not provide all the bells and whistles of today's units. And I have all the nautical almanacs I need to perform celestial navigation by hand if I have to. Its not fun, buts its not hard. Sometimes, simple is better.
Anyhow, before I started rambling, for people who depend on these new devices for their navigation purposes, I hope they have a backup. Who knows what sort of bugs are going to appear tomorrow?
<<cue dramatic music>>
On another note, I finally got around to ordering a slew of new parts for my Universal Atomic 4, so hopefully I'll have her started here in a week or two. Fingers Crossed!!!
Tuesday, June 30, 2015
Monday, June 1, 2015
Another amazing find
I'm thinking, and someone mentioned it already on the dock, to go buy a lottery ticket because my luck lately has been pretty outstanding. Just last week I scored a sweet deal on an electrical panel, and just yesterday, I picked up a 2010 Honda 2hp outboard for an amazingly cheap price... less than half of what it is worth new..
Normally, this would seem like just an ok deal with the amount of abuse that most outboards receive, but this engine has a total of less that 10 hours of run time on it! Its practically brand new! Imagine running your car for only 10 hours in 5 years. How far could you have gone? Where would you have gone? Not anywhere practically.
A little about the Honda - its an air-cooled, 2hp 4-stroke outboard that weighs 27lbs. It can propel a small dinghy (like my Walker Bay 8) at up to 6-8 knots. Also, being a 4-stroke engine means I don't have to make any special gasoline mixtures like you do with a 2-stroke engine. Remember mixing oil with your gas to feed a chainsaw? Yeah, that wasn't annoying or anything...
And its a Honda. If I keep the oil properly changed and keep running clean fuel through it, it'll last forever.
Yeah... I'm gonna buy lottery ticket :D
Normally, this would seem like just an ok deal with the amount of abuse that most outboards receive, but this engine has a total of less that 10 hours of run time on it! Its practically brand new! Imagine running your car for only 10 hours in 5 years. How far could you have gone? Where would you have gone? Not anywhere practically.
A little about the Honda - its an air-cooled, 2hp 4-stroke outboard that weighs 27lbs. It can propel a small dinghy (like my Walker Bay 8) at up to 6-8 knots. Also, being a 4-stroke engine means I don't have to make any special gasoline mixtures like you do with a 2-stroke engine. Remember mixing oil with your gas to feed a chainsaw? Yeah, that wasn't annoying or anything...
And its a Honda. If I keep the oil properly changed and keep running clean fuel through it, it'll last forever.
Yeah... I'm gonna buy lottery ticket :D
Thursday, May 28, 2015
Electrical Connections pt3
Today has been a good day for Liberty Call. For a while now, I have been wanting to change out the old, dated electrical distribution panels with something a bit more modern and that has all working bits.
This "works". But its a freaking nightmare behind that panel. Whoever wired it up didnt know, or obviously care, about what they were doing. The DC Meter as well as the old battery select switch don't work, So obviously, these need replacing.
I've always liked Blue Sea Systems. Their products are top notch and are well designed. Its for this reason I was drawn to their traditional metal panels. They are REALLY nice. Unfortunately, they are also REALLY expensive. A simple 8 breaker panel runs around $200. If you need two of these and an AC panel as well as a guage or two. Things begin to skyrocket pretty quick.
A couple of months back, I priced my ideal setup for my new Electrical Distribution System and it was close to a $1000. Nope... So I put that away in my "nice to have, but keep dreaming" column of my project book.
Fast forward to today as I walk into a Marine consignment store and what do I see sitting in the bottom of a rubbermaid bin? Almost exactly what I have been looking for. Holy Cow!
Now of course, I try to remain calm, and ask the store manager what they want for it. He doesn't know as it just came in, so he gives a call to his partner. They come back with a price for $200. That is a steal in and of itself, but I tried talking them down. After a little bit of haggling. I walked out with this sweet piece of tech for $150. When I got back to the boat, I checked West Marine and they're website has this exact same panel listed at over $700!!! Talk about bargain of the year. I couldn't be happier.
Now the panel does have some cosmetic issues that I will try to address. It also has a couple spots of corrosion on the back and sides of the panel that need to be cleaned up as well. But all in all, its in excellent shape.
Here's the backside of the panel.
It may look imposing, but its actually quite simple and logical once you inderstand what you're looking at. I can't wait to get this installed, but first, I will remove every item from the panel and clean the panel the best I can. I'm also going to call Blue Sea Systems and see if they refurbish old panels. That might be the way to go.
UPDATE: Blue Sea Systems cant refurbish the panel unfortunately. It appears that they get the parts offsite and build the panels at their factory. The Customer Service Rep was shocked when I told her how much I paid for it though. :)
This "works". But its a freaking nightmare behind that panel. Whoever wired it up didnt know, or obviously care, about what they were doing. The DC Meter as well as the old battery select switch don't work, So obviously, these need replacing.
I've always liked Blue Sea Systems. Their products are top notch and are well designed. Its for this reason I was drawn to their traditional metal panels. They are REALLY nice. Unfortunately, they are also REALLY expensive. A simple 8 breaker panel runs around $200. If you need two of these and an AC panel as well as a guage or two. Things begin to skyrocket pretty quick.
A couple of months back, I priced my ideal setup for my new Electrical Distribution System and it was close to a $1000. Nope... So I put that away in my "nice to have, but keep dreaming" column of my project book.
Fast forward to today as I walk into a Marine consignment store and what do I see sitting in the bottom of a rubbermaid bin? Almost exactly what I have been looking for. Holy Cow!
Now of course, I try to remain calm, and ask the store manager what they want for it. He doesn't know as it just came in, so he gives a call to his partner. They come back with a price for $200. That is a steal in and of itself, but I tried talking them down. After a little bit of haggling. I walked out with this sweet piece of tech for $150. When I got back to the boat, I checked West Marine and they're website has this exact same panel listed at over $700!!! Talk about bargain of the year. I couldn't be happier.
Now the panel does have some cosmetic issues that I will try to address. It also has a couple spots of corrosion on the back and sides of the panel that need to be cleaned up as well. But all in all, its in excellent shape.
Here's the backside of the panel.
It may look imposing, but its actually quite simple and logical once you inderstand what you're looking at. I can't wait to get this installed, but first, I will remove every item from the panel and clean the panel the best I can. I'm also going to call Blue Sea Systems and see if they refurbish old panels. That might be the way to go.
UPDATE: Blue Sea Systems cant refurbish the panel unfortunately. It appears that they get the parts offsite and build the panels at their factory. The Customer Service Rep was shocked when I told her how much I paid for it though. :)
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