Hauled Out for the Winter

ECHO is now hauled out at a marina on the Connecticut River.  This location is close to my cabinet maker friend.  I like this place. Their prices are cheap and they are friendly.  Not the typical marina where the whole staff treats you like dirt and never responds. These people are nice!

ECHO is hauled out next to Ada Belle II and Ron and I built a platform between the two boats, a staircase up to the platform.  I use a saw horse and a box for steps up to my boat.  Under the platform is a workbench and an electrical distribution box, below that is another shelf off the ground.  I may shrink wrap around this area to keep it somewhat protected.  I also plan to put in a small flood lamp over the workbench.

Much of ECHO is unloaded and stored at home.  A few more things need to come off the boat.  Both boats will be shrunk wrapped this year and I'll need a zipper doorway to load things inside.

This is an update to this post showing the frame put together to provide some headroom inside.  

That is Echo behind the maroon Mercedes.  Marco is working on Ada Belle.  Three of us worked on the two boats.  We spent part of a day building frames and installing strapping to support the shrink wrap, and a day (4-5 hours) on each boat.

 Inside view.  I used a boom from another boat--the smaller one on the right.  It was not needed as I was given some PVC which made a nicer arc.  I will probably remove that and take it home.

Here is ECHO looking pretty dry and tight.  There are a few small gaps at that I will try to tape up, but I don't expect much water to be able to get in.

I have a nice piece of marine plywood for the aft bulkhead I'm installing.  I'll need to measure carefully before installing it, to be sure I can fit it in the boat and secure it to the boat and steering supports.  That will be the next major project on ECHO.  Once complete I can order a 100 gallon fuel tank and install it.

Thoughts on Aft Fuel Tanks

I like range.  And I know installing my main fuel tank will be a tight fit though the main hatch.  So as I reported earlier, I installed a temporary tank.  While crawling around inside the lazarette working on the binnacle, and scoping out a future auto-pilot installation, I found myself in the usual situation of sliding down into the bilge.  I have always wanted a flat platform in there but did not want to waste the space.  It suddenly occurred to me this would be an idea location for two fuel tanks. 

In the past there were two triangular boards to contain all the items stored in the lazarette.  While I still want to contain things, a flat platform makes sense, so why not use the space underneath for fuel storage.  It would not be difficult to build two tanks on port and starboard for this purpose.  And since these would be the first tanks, I'd use motoring, once empty they would provide some floatation if this compartment flooded.

I recently received a marine plywood shipment.  This piece of plywood will be a bulkhead cofferdam to isolate the steering compartment from the middle of the boat.  If my steering fails or another boat crashes into the back of my boat, I will be able to survive.

I also plan to install a watertight compartment forward above the waterline, which will be my forward collision bulkhead, with some of this scrap material.

The only question would be the dimensions.  I need enough space to work in there, so two smaller tanks might be appropriate.  I also have to leave space for an autopilot ram on the port side.  I also want to build these so they can be removed easily.

The last question would be how to plumb them in?  I could gravity feed them into my main tank as it gets depleted, or burn off the fuel straight from these tanks.  The issue is complicated by the fact that I must consider what to do with the return fuel lines. It would be too easy to mess this up and have fuel pumping out of the breath hoses and making a mess.  I'd like to make this as idiot proof as possible. 

Finally, I'd like to reuse my temporary 23 gallon tank for either gasoline when in the islands, or diesel when on a longer voyage.  If I had a bladder tank in the cockpit, I could carry 413 gallons of fuel on ocean voyages.  That would give me a range under power of nearly 2500 miles.  That 23 gallon tank could fit nicely on top of one of the aft saddle tanks, be accessible on top of it, and serve dual purposes.

Did you know that a gallon of fuel will make way more than a gallon of fresh water?  It is less weight to carry diesel fuel than water.

Why would I need that much fuel? It is about 5160 miles from the Virgin Islands to the Greek Islands.  Figuring an average of 150 miles a day, I'd need to maintain an average speed of around 6 knots to travel that far in at least 34 days of sailing time--it will be more than that plus time for layovers and side trips.  And it is at least 34 days sail back the other way.  It is important to keep my speed up to cover that distance in a reasonable amount of sailing time.  The longest leg, Bermuda to the Azores could also have a fair amount of light winds and against the wind sailing.  Lots of people run out of fuel making that passage.  I could motor that whole way, and in fact I could motor the entire trip if I refueled along the way.  So there would be no worries about running out of fuel. I could also refuel in places where fuel was cheap like Morroco.

Another reason to carry that much fuel is to run generators--I don't plan to, I like wind and photovoltaic.  I am very interested in heat.  I like colder weather sailing, and this amount of fuel would keep me warm an entire winter.  I like that very much.

At some point I want to sail to the South Pacific.  The longest leg between the Galapagos Islands and the Marquesas is nearly 2900 miles.  Many people complain that they should have brought more light air sails and should not have started the motor until their speeds were under 3 knots.  If I could motor most of this trip, I could do it in 20 days instead of the typical 40 days. Chances are I could motor sail also and have fuel left over when I got there. 

The theme of all this is you can't have too much fuel.  You will eventually use it, it can save you many days of voyaging, help you avoid storms, keep  you warm in cold climate, make power, and make water out of sea water.  While I love to sail.  I also love to get where I want to go in a timely manner with comfort.

Cabin Sole, Forward Hatch and Binnacle

Cabin Sole:  I have Marco busy tearing up the cabin sole to repair a couple of spots where there is core de-lamination.  It should take a few days to do that, and all this is on hold because of the hurricane coming towards us.

Forward Hatch:  Instead we are focusing on finishing the forward hatch. I have new plexiglass to pick up tomorrow.  The old wood will need to be epoxied, new angle brackets attached, and all gaps filled with filler.  I also want to add a rubber strip on the back edge to prevent water intrusion.  Right now with the back of the boat stripped out, ECHO is bow heavy and water has been pooling behind this hatch.  That area had been repaired once, and poorly. I had Marco fix that, so my decks are even uglier which after all the other work on the deck, of course they will have to be completely repainted in the spring to bring them back to perfect.

Binnacle:  Well some things seem to come together well.  I was lucky enough to get the new Pedestal Guard in.  This one is 1.25" in diameter instead of the original 1"--leaving more room for wires.  I have a beautiful stainless steel Edson Top Plate.  I rushed out to buy some more epoxy primer so he could get started on priming the binnacle, so it can be painted tomorrow.  Still to do is replace the plywood backing under the cockpit sole.  These are more in the nature of alignment shims for the quadrant cables. That should be easy enough to do.  My only hangup to getting this work finished are the four flathead bolts used to secure the binnacle to the cockpit sole and quadrant sheaves.  I have them on order, and it will be a few days.  If I'm lucky I can get it installed the day before the hurricane hits--that will seal up that hole--which is the last area on ECHO that needs to be sealed up!

And this will be one of the few things needed to be completed before moving ECHO to Portland, CT for the winter where it gets it's new interior.

New Bow Pulpit

My friend Carlton, helped me out by coming over and repairing my bow pulpit and fashioning new mounts for my running lights.  I still need to attach pig tail wires, fish them though the stainless tubing, drill holes in the deck for them, and run the wire from the main panel.  That should be easy.

 

Instead of hardware eyelets, the lifelines will be attached to welded on eyelets.  The two forward supports are new, as are the stanchion bases.  On the left side is HOOT repositioned to provide a work platform.  Unfortunately, Marco managed to get epoxy spray paint on one of HOOT's new compass lenses.  I hope I can clean that off.  I will have to replace the lens otherwise.

Temporary Fuel Tank & Thoughts on Range Under Power

I installed a temporary 23 gallon  fuel tank yesterday and added some fuel and primed the lines.  The motor started up fine and ran without a bump or stumble.

I drawn plans and have an estimate to build a permanent 110 gallon aluminum tank from a New Jersey fuel tank builder.  First, I'd like to make a mockup of the tank to be sure it fits, to locate flanges for mounting it, and also to be sure I can get it through the front hatch and hallway.  I will need three bilge pump bulkhead fittings  and one exhaust hose fittings to pass these hosed though the cofferdam I am building.

I hope to get the cofferdam installed next week. The marine plywood I ordered should be in on Monday.  Once that goes in I can build and test fit the fuel tank mockup and then order that tank. It will be close to 110 gallons and give me a range of around 660 miles at 3/4 throttle.  That is enough to motor to Halifax and almost as far as Bermuda.  These numbers are just estimate.  I'll have a better idea of how it does after I motor around an burn off a tank.

I still need to decide if I want to put two more fuel tanks in where the old tanks were.  That would give in an additional 60 gallons per side, for a total of 230 gallons and a serious range of about 1380 miles--enough to motor through the doldrums, and nearly enough to motor to the Caribbean.

I plan to be sailing not motoring, but if I find myself short handed, it would be nice to be able to motor to make better time. Fuel can be used to make power, fresh water, or heat as well as propulsion.

What to do about the 23 gallon temporary tank I just installed after the primary tank is installed?  I'm wondering if I can mount it in aft in the transom area to use as additional diesel storage for long trips and as a gasoline supply for an outboard when inshore.  23 gallons would last a long time if only used for an outboard.  For an ocean voyage, the extra 23 gallons if used for diesel would boost my range 136 miles up to a total range of 1518 miles.  Bermuda to the Azores is 1900 miles. The Azores to Lisbon is another 835 miles.  So an Atlantic crossing following this path is 3240 miles.  It starts to seem more interesting to have extra fuel when talking about very long passages.  Now consider going the rest of the way to Greece?  I'll guess that is another 2000 miles.  So round trip that would be well over 10,000 miles plus time spent sailing around the Greek Islands.  Yes, I want as much range as I can, and I'd like to be able to carry a bladder tank in the cockpit holding another 100 gallons and be able to carry 353 gallons.  Even that would only give me a range of 2118 miles.  It is much better to build this in easily than it is to hang a  dozen jerry cans off the back of the boat, like many cruisers do. 

Compare these numbers to the typical 40 gallons tank on a sailboat that has a range of 240 miles. If your boat never leaves home waters, you will top up once a year.  But if you plan on ocean voyaging and want to keep to a schedule and cover much longer distances with little or no wind, a big tank is a nice thing to have.  It means you can boost your speed by motor-sailing, and get ahead of a storm, or maneuver into the safe quadrant, or get out of the worse of it.  If dis-masted a boat with plenty of fuel could motor to the nearest port of continue on.  For a boat the size of ECHO, the extra weight in small compared to the size of the boat.  One ton, 2000 lbs will drop the waterline just under an inch.

Coffee Grinder Rebuild

My huge Barient two speed coffee grinder has been primed for some time.  I tasked Marco with disassembling it and gave him a bucket of diesel fuel to clean the chain gears and assorted parts.  He put much of it together today.  One of the bearing in the top part was frozen up.  I took this part to the parts store to order a pair of new bearings, races, and seals.  When I got back I took a close look at the bearing that Marco didn't pull and decided I did not like the way it looked, although it might hold together a while, the ball bearings looked pitted.  I don't think this is a high load bearing, but I'm going to replace it anyway.  A few  spots on the ring and pinion gears have chips missing on the edges, but nothing significant enough to warrant making new gears. 

Here are some pictures of the bottom part of the Coffee Grinder.  It cleaned up well and I'm especially pleased with how well the chain cleaned up. 

Road Blocks

One thing is clear. Working on boats is a series of setbacks.  Take two steps backwards to take one step forwards.  Space is limited so often one step backwards, is just cleaning up. Today I plan to remove lots of stuff off of ECHO and to do that I need to clean out my garage some, and make a trip to the dump.  There are three steps backwards.  Here is the forth.  My motor gearbox is not working.  While I bench tested it, it is not working.  Either there is some interference on the inside or else, their is an electrical problem in the motor gearbox.  I have to remove it to test it and find out.  I hope I don't have to replace it.  The motor is a sealed unit and it could mean buying another one.  I did a quick check online, and the prices seem to be around $900.

What else?  My bilge pumps do not seem to be working on automatic.  I may have to pull both of these again.  At least I now have a system to pull them in less than an hour of work.  They are still working manually.  And one of the two might be working on automatic.  I need to do some testing to be sure.  I will run the hose into the bilge to fill it up and test it out.

Leak Patrol!

Leak Patrol:  I am catching up on some older events.  We had a lot of rain about a week ago, and Marco and I found a few more leaks.  Noteworthy is a leak in the main cabin where a second of deck was cut out and not repaired properly.  I expect to revisit that in the future.

The Forward Hatch.  Found a drain hole clogged with debris, causing water to back up and flow into the V-berth.  The hatch needs to be rebuilt completely.  While the teak is good, it still seems like a good idea to make some changes to the hatch.  More on that later.

Bow Access Plate: There is an access plate in the bow that was leaking--the seal has shrunk and water was getting in and collection under the V-berth in a spot with no limber holes.  He has already sealed that up.  I plan to glass in a water tight collision bulkhead up there with an anchor locker above the waterline.  For now I just want the leaks fixed.  Later on I'll probably remove this and build a nice anchor locker and windlass mount.

The Cockpit:  With the back of the boat opened up in preparation of glassing a bulkhead cofferdam--for increased safety, we spotted several leaks around the binnacle, emergency steering port, and the binnacle guard rail. 

Marco has been busy fixing the area around the emergency steering.  It has to be done in stages because it meets the rudderhead, and I don't want to fight to get those screws back in. He has also done some work to fix the area just aft of the forward hatch.  I have him sealing that up, but I plan to cut it away and fix it properly  And that will depend on the forward hatch replacement/rebuilding.  I want that area to keep water out.

Just in front of the companionway hatch was a depression that would collect water and overflow into the boat.  Marco suggested filling that with epoxy and filler, and I asked him to angle this so that water would go forward and flow out the limber holes under the winches.

Binnacle:  Sometime ago, my binnacle mounting bolts failed and I replaced them.  I'd like to revisit that area and replace the plywood reinforcing with some new marine plywood.  I expect to have some left over from the aft bulkhead project.  I have orders a new stainless top plate from Edson, and need to check a few measurements of the binnacle before ordering a new larger double bend NavPod 1.25" guardrail, and some sort of quad-pod housing.  I'd like to install a 15" chart display, and I'm leaving room for that, but for the short term, I'm very happy with my iPad for on deck navigation, and I plan to use a Mac Mini down below for navigating.  I will need to wire in the instruments I have, fix my compass light wiring.  There will be space for a Raymarine autopilot control in the Quad housing.  While many people don't like Raymarine, I like their interface, and I plan to put a heavy duty hydraulic auto pilot in the boat next year.  It would be great if I could afford to buy all new instruments, that is neither practical nor necessary.  I would like radar also, but I can wait on that too.

The bottom line is ECHO is almost all the leak sources fixed.  There is a very small leak on one of the cockpit hatches.  I think the wind has to be blowing hard for any water to get in there, and not enough gets in to form a drop.

The mast leaks very slightly.  I think a bit of shrink wrap tape would stop it.

Hatches:  The two remaining problems are the companionway hatch and the forward hatch.  Both need to be replaced.  I need to job that out.  These hatches are made out of wood and acrylic.  My idea is to make a frame for each out of aluminum and wood or starboard with Lexan laminated in between, and corner reinforcing.  I have two pieces of acrylic I could use for the companionway, I'd rather use on piece.  In any case, I need to move this onto a higher priority.  What I'd like to do is job it out, perhaps in two phases, welding and woodwork.

Installing and Wiring in the Powered Winch

The winch body is installed here. I had to lop off the ends of two bolts for clearance on the flange.

Next the shaft coupler is installed.  You can see one stud temporarily installed in the top of the picture. The blue and red wires are for the control circuit.  I still have to run those wire.  It occurred to me that I can pull power from the heavy cable and likewise ground and put a 5 amp fuse in this circuit. I wonder if I'll need a choke to avoid power surges.  I may run the wire back to the panel but that seems unnecessary.  

I used locktite on the eight studs.  I was missing four flat washers with notches cut out.  I will have to get four more tomorrow and grind the edges to clear the flange.  I don't suppose flat washers are necessary, but I might as well be consistent.   The white thing at the top is a relay (Solinoid) to control the heavy current going into the motor gearbox.  The control wires are not yet wired in.  The motor gearbox has a pair of wires also--a thermal protection circuit which is wired in series with the switch.  There is a spacer in there too.  I could move the whole motor gearbox up 1/8" if I wanted to go to the trouble, but it does not seem to be worth my time.  I also like the idea of a little space between the motor and the deck.

Another view looking forward.  I will need to fabricate a fiberglass cover for this to keep things pretty.  I mounted the powered winch on this side to avoid head bump.  It is right over the sink and not in the way.

This shows the view from the bottom.   Those are red cables from the battery and 100 amp breaker supplying juice to the motor gearbox.  This is a windlass motor gearbox, so, of the three studs on the motor, only two are used, lift and ground.  I need to figure out which is which. 

This will make a number of jobs easier.

1.  Measurements:  Taking Measurements for replacement rigging.

2.  My Backstay:  I want to pull my backstay to fix a very poor job done Tom Anderson of Hathaway Riggers.  I hope I can re-terminate it myself. I will probably bring it back to Tom Anderson even though the job was done many years ago.  While it is true I waited too long to return it, it remains a very poor job and I may have to do a lot of rework to make it right.

3.  My Forestay:  I want to build a new forestay and install an already purchased, Harken furler.  Once that is done, I can think about a new headsail.  I will probably modify my current Genoa, but I'd also like a new Yankee for better visibility.  The option of hoisting both while sailing downwind has a certain about of appeal. Much less work and I'd only need another spinnaker pole for a tidy, non-chafing rig that would keep ECHO pointed downwind without a lot of work.

4.  Inner Forestay:  I want to replace my inner forestay and install a Harken furler on that.  I have a used furling drum and only need new extrusions and the small piece parts to install that.  I want a small self tending staysail, so once this furler is installed and I determine where and how to mount a track for this.  A self tending staysail will make tacking upwind a breeze for one person. 

5.  Jumper Stay:  I seem to have lost the small wire cable that connects my Highfield Lever to the bow of my boat.  It is a short cable, and I might as well practice on that before working on the other stays.

Power Winch

This shows some detail on the power winch modification.  I am using what turned out to be a windlass motor/gearbox.  To mate it up, I needed this coupler (dark piece at bottom), a spacer, not shown, and the light gray flange (between the bronze mount and the coupler) had to be drilled and tapped on a wider spacing.  That is all done and ready to mount.  The winch is installed but some fiberglass work needs to be done to seal off the mounting area. After that I can install the motor-gearbox, contactor relay, deck switch, 100 A breaker, and run the heavy cables to serve it.

Bilge Pumps Complete

I am back from a trip to the west coast.

After completely removing and re-wiring my bilge pumps I was stunned to find them not working properly.  Well, I've fixed everything. It turned out there were two bad circuit breakers, and I also discovered that when power is applied, to the automatic circuits, the pumps run for 6-8 seconds.  I was scratching my head wondering why they came on in an empty bilge.

So--both pumps are mounted, set on automatic, and I have two independent circuits for manual operation.  I can trust my pumps are working--for the time being.  I still would like to update these in the future to a smaller lower pump to remove more water, and a higher volume non-submersible pump, and a also an engine driven high volume pump. 

@@#$% Bilge Pumps

I have a leak somewhere and the water level rose high enough to short out my automatic circuit on one bilge pump and something is wrong on the other.  I might have mis-wired it. 

As I am going out of town, I need to get at least one automatic pump working.  I've also shut all my though hulls.  I need to check my cockpit drains.  Water could be coming in through there also.

So much for bad news, and it's really not bad news.  I need to find every problem and fix it now, not later when I'm offshore or someplace inconvenient.

On other fronts, two of the chain plates have been re-bedded, Marco pulled two more and has started repairing the decks in those areas.

Most of the stanchion basses have been re-attached.  The gate stanchions are Y shaped with two bases.  They need to be bent for a better fit.

I have not had much luck with getting my welder friend to repair my bow pulpit.  This is causing all sort of delays.  I can't operate the boat without this replaced, and now I have decided to pull the pushpit for repairs--perhaps this will work out better, he can come out for one trip only, and do everything I need done.

I've added two more sub-panels on ECHO to break up some of the wiring and reduce wiring to the main panel.  One sub-panel is in the galley area and will serve that side of the boat, the other is above the engine bay to serve the aft cabins.  I am debating adding one more for the port side, while that is close to the main panel, I would like to move the main panel to a more protected area aft at some point. 

I purchased more parts to make the plumbing system more reliable. I will defer that work for the short term.  First I need to ID the leaks.

I am talking to cabinet makers about finishing off the salon.  If I can't find someone local to do the work then I will need to take ECHO south.

At this point, moving ECHO south seems less likely this year.  I will be traveling for the next ten days, so things will slow down a bit.  Much depends on what I can get done in the following six weeks.

Bilge Pumps

I spent a bit of time on the last few days trying to improve my bilge pumps by replacing the electronic float switches and rewiring them.  I have the wire run to terminal blocks above the bilge and purchased new wire to make the connection to the main panel  This wire will be run below the ceiling inside of through the engine bay, or increase reliability.

Below is my lower bilge pump.  Note is it attached to a stainless steel piece of angle iron welded to a flat plate.  This "Laddle" type arrangement allows me to remove it for maintenance.  I originally had smooth hose for this bilge line, but swapped it for this type as the other type was too stiff to remove the bilge pumps easily.  Also this type of hose separates from the check valves located a few feet above these pumps.  The check valves are to stop cycling where the pump stops, water flows backwards starts the pump again which pushes the water up the hose but not out of the boat, and then the level drops, water flows back, etc, etc.  

The new non-floating type switch has not been installed.  It will go on the plate in front of the pump and below the hose.  I spent a lot of time cleaning this and the bilge, part of a never ending battle to keep the boat clean and the bilge as dry as possible.


The old capacitive water level switches did not hold up.  I am hoping this new type will prove more reliable.  I do not recommend this type. 


I also cleaned out the bilge as much as possible and retrieved some debris and a 1/2" wrench that fell down there this week.


Most of the deck fittings areas have been repaired and the lifeline stanchions, highfield lever and spinnaker pole shoes will be reinstalled this week.  The coaming around the companionway, got it's second coating of epoxy and it looking better and better.  I chose to make this bright instead of a matte Cetol look so that it will hold up in the long term better.  The matte Cetol doesn';t not last very long, perhaps a season or two.

Below ECHO bald of lifelines.

I purchased some new stanchion bases, and need to buy four more, or order them.  Some were in bad shape and it was easier to replace them than repair them.  Also, I want all of these to be stainless steel and not chromed bronze.  A few others were easily banged into shape.  The bow pulpit will be repaired in place this week, so I can work back to the pushpit.

I will need shade from the sun, and I'm debating building a hard Bimini and Dodge for the cockpit.  I also need a small dodger for the companionway area.  For now I will focus on the bow and stanchions and follow up with the pushpit and then ladders for the cockpit and companionway.

More Photos

My main sheet blocks.  The bearing do not look so good.  Time to replace them.

Some deck track removed. These holes were drilled out extra large and filled with epoxy and re-drilled for a more solid foundation.

Some new track installed.

Laying out some track to check the length.  Also shown is a pad for a spinnaker shoe.

 

 The plexiglass cover was a cheezy patch job for an old fuel tank fill or something.  This was recently removed and filled.  The messy looking thing underneath the plexiglass was an old stanchion base that had a wooden pad that was glassed over.  The pad was rotten and the extra holes were drilled to remove the wet core.  Here it is shown with some epoxy thickened with West Systems 403 filler.

A stanchion on the starboard side before removal and re-bedding.

This was the old diesel fill.  I am not sure if I will be using this, so it will remain filled for the moment.

This is a close up of the pad base for a spinnaker deck shoe.

A pair of chain plates wer removed.  This is one side, after being scooped out and filled.  The tape is to keep the filler for leaking out on the low side.

A chain plate which the cheezy caulk job removed, and taped up to prevent water from getting in.

These are two deck fills that were not being used, so they were filled.  I may reuse this location if I decide to add another water tank to the boat.  

Forward deck spinnaker shoe pad mount.

My Highfield Lever deck mount.  I removed to re-weld it, and that is complete.  I need to decide if I want to polish the aluminum or put it back as it was.

Bow pulpit removed.  I still need to modify the bow pulpit and reinstall it.

More pictures of stanchion base.

More pictures of stanchion base.  Note the new waste pumpout deck fitting.

Chainplate.

Bald bow.

Still More Plumbing

I have not taken many pictures because I've been working non stop, running around trying to find parts, making some progress, discovering the part I bought don't fit.  I have several odd ball plumbing fittings I still cannot find. 

So what have I gotten done?

I have the hot and cold water manifolds plumbed with PEX and crimped down.  These manifolds need to be secured to some study wood backing to make it 100% reliable, but for the time being I want to get the plumbing working and that can follow later.

While I have the head out-take plumbed, the intake as been a problem.  The inlet I want to use is 5/16. I have 3/8 and 1/2" parts and reduction fittings, but I don't have 5/16" and I may have to plug this and T off of the sink drain.  I finally have all the parts needed for the sink drain.  I had to buy a complete sink drain fitting and steal the bottom half to mate up to the Stainless Steel drain I alreayd have.  So it is a matter of 5 minutes work to install this drain, perhaps 10 minutes if I chose to T off of this to the head.  With some luck the head will be plumbed tomorrow.  I plan to use fresh water through the sink to flush the head, or what I more typically do is use the shower fixture to charge the head to flush it with fresh water when in shore, and switch to clean salt water when offshore.

All of the hot and cold water plumbing is done except for:

1) Cold water hook up in the galley--I have the part in hand for that.  5 minutes work.
2) Connection between the pressurized water side and the hot and cold water manifolds.  I have the parts in hand for this also.  10-15 minutes work.
3)  Aft head and sink is deferred until I can do some fiberglass work back there.
4)  The cockpit shower needs some sort of oddball fitting to mate up with the PEX serving that area.  I may have to remove the whole shower fixture to take it with me to a plumbing supply house.  Before I do that I need to inspect it and see what brand it is and look it up in the West Marine Catalog.  I think it is 1/2' British thread of some sort.  I will probably need to go to a plumbing supply house for the unions to mate that up to a standard size sink hoses for flexibility while securing the PEX under the deck to that area.  Time Reuired?  Hours for sure.

In any event, I will have the forward head and sink working tomorrow.  And I need to think about bedding the sink into the counter.  I'm leaning towards leaving it loose for now so I can remove it to work in that area.  I still need to build a holding tank and plumb that. 

Next I need to think about plumbing in the shower sump, or at least running a temporary drain to the bilge.  The sump would need some wiring, and I want to add a second sub-panel in the closet nearby--needed for some fan circuits in the forward part of the boat.

More Plumbing

I secured the cold water lines to the ceiling with cable ties.  The PEX hose is not flexible so it took more ties than I wanted.  I will need two more packages to finish off the hot water lines.

I picked up adapters to mate up the head discharge hoses.  I am modifying the head intake fittings to eliminate a 90 degree bend--That needs a torch and a vise to remove the old part.

The two manifolds for hot and cold water are installed.  I still need to shorten and connect the various lines.  This should go fast, but I'll need to secure the hoses to the hull first.

I have an adapter to mate up to the deck shower, but have not yet tested it to see if it will fit.  Once that is done, I can add pigtails to feed it and connect to the PEX serving that area. 

While I am getting close, step by step, it is a tedious process finding the parts I need.  For example I need to connect the sink drain and I can't find a part to connect to the large diameter sink drain.  I found a replacement part, but it is all plastic and I know it will fail or get scratched up quickly.  I'd rather make my stainless part mate up to something.

Chain Plates

Chain Plates:

These are a mess and look like hell.  I was planning on putting cover plates on top and getting rid of this huge mess.

 

I have three of these on each side supporting the shrouds. On the starboard side they measure roughly 5' x 7".  A simple matter to make a stainless steel plate and secure it eh?  Well not so fast.  First lets have a look under that mess. 

I cleaned off most of one of these.  It is awful.  First the holes were not filled properly.  Next this particular one has play fore and aft.  I may have to pull the whole chain plate to get access to the deck here to fill it after scooping out what will surely be rotten core material.  My helper Marco has done that several times already.  That is not so hard to do.  The real problem is what to do about the deck to make it look good.  After seeing this, I'm thinking I will need to repaint the deck.  I was planning on doing that next year, but I may do it this year instead.   You will read more about this later.  I will have Marco start on pulling the chain-plates one by one, and filling the depression in the deck here which would tend to collect water, and then remounting these chain plates and rebedding them.  I don't want to remove too many of these at once, so I will probably have Marco do them in mirror pairs, two at a time.  So it will be a few hours a day for the next week or so to sort this out.  When finished I can put four pan head screws in the top holes for a finished look.  If they are screwed in to solid fiberglass there will be no leaks.  Last will be painting.  I think a Dremel tool can make a nice flat round corner rectangle with a template for shape, and this will clean up ok.  Perhaps we won't have to paint the decks just yet.  I have one other modification I want to do before painting the decks.

Electric Halyard Winch

Electric Halyard Winch:

I carefully measured before drilling this hole.  There is also a slight radius increase near the top of the flange, so I had to bevel the top of this hole to get the power winch, a Lewmar 44 Ocean Series winch, to lay flat.  I was able to find two of the needed bolts to secure it, but there is no rush as I may need to modify the winch drive shaft to mate up to the gearbox.  Note the thickness of the fiberglass.  There is over an inch of solid fiberglass, a layer of wood and then more fiberglass.  The later two layers could have been skipped as the top layer is very strong.

Here it is in place but not bedded in and mounted.  Of course we had a fe major rain storms and it leaked.  I was originally going to put this on the port side, but changed my mind as this puts it over the gally sink and away from a head butting location.  Believe it or not, this winch required 110 Amp breaker and 1/0 wire to feed it.  I bought a 100 Amp breaker and will need 19' of wire to serve it.  List price on the wire is $7.20 per foot.  I am hoping I get a good discount on that price--it is a bit steep.  My cost will be about $200, I'm guessing for the wire alone.  I also have a relay and a deck button to control it.

Here is my snag.  I can mount the winch to the top of this winch (top side of the gear box opposite the flange, but then I could only access it from the top. I don't want to cut a big hole in the deck.  The flange on the bottom has a whole pattern 3.5" across which does not match the winches 3.25" hole pattern.  My friend Karl is drilling new holes and tapping them with 3/8-16 threads.  Also I will need a 7/8" spacer to drop the gear box down to avoid cutting into the underside of the deck.  I will have to make a fiberglass cover to hide this ugly thing too. 

The wires shown are for a thermal shut down switch, which is wired in series with the relay control switch.  There are three contact poles, I will only use two of these as this winch will only operate in one direction.

I am looking forward to putting someone up the mast is 75 seconds.  It will be an easy two man job to send someone to the top of the mast, instead of an ordeal using normal winches, or a slow climbing procedure with prussic knots.  This is important, as previously mentioned because I have several tasks to do requiring going up the mast in the near future.

Plumbing Work

Forward Head: 

I have been wanting to reinstall the forward head in ECHO but painting the shower pan needed to be done first.  Well that is complete so I started working on the forward head and other plumping work.

I started by putting things where they belonged and then added hoses.  I am no longer amazed by how longs things take working on boats.  They just do and no amount of planning is enough.  I find it best to focus on one or two things at a time, while also assembling other parts and materials.

Finding the right size toilet seat was an issue.  18.5" is too big, and 16.5" is too small.  I tried three different seats before I found a 16 5/8" seat that was actually a little bigger than that.  It fits fairly well so I need to pick up another one for the other head. 

I could not find screws the right length for the anti-siphon on the waste line, so I used over-sized nuts as spacers.  It worked out rather well.

I lucked out, guess what parts I needed to mate up the sink lines to the supply hoses.  I noticed there did not seem to be any rubber washers inside the sink so I grabbed an assortment and hope those will work OK.  The faucet went in a few days ago.  My only regret is that I did not order a second one for the aft head.  I like it a lot.

I pulled PEX hose, in blue for cold and red for hot water lines, to the forward head and aft to the cockpit shower.  Tomorrow I will use the last of what I have to supply the aft head, even though that is not going in yet, I'll have the hose run and ready to hook up.  Actually hooking up the PEX is second work.  Just slip the hose on the barb, with a clamp on it, and crimp it down. 

I still need to secure the hose to the under side of the deck with straps--that should go fast, and drill a few holes to route the hose through a few bulkheads with a hole saw.

I have two manifold for water distribution.  I planned to put those under the sink, but changed my mind and plan to put these near the water heater as I think that will be easier to hook up.  I want to add a set of valves for water tank selection under the sink instead of at the tanks--the lower tanks are a pain to reach.  I'd like to be able to switch tanks easily without lifting floor boards.  My idea is to build a small manifold out of copper parts and use either PEX or barbed fittings depending on what I'm hooking up to.

Here is the sink and faucet.  The sink is not bedded in yet.  The faucet is bolted down tight and just needs a simple crimp to connect the PEX tubing that that end.

I will still need to install some teak trim around the shower pan and cabinet faces.  I may leave that to a cabinet maker, or else defer that for a while.  For the short term I will apply some caulk and glue on a cover plate on the unused port in the shower pan.

I was glad to find a Kohler seat to fit my Groco head.  It was slightly larger than the other brands and fit fairly well.  The head is all rebuilt and clean except for a bit of dust in the bowl.

Water Heater:

The water heater has had one leg sawed off for clearance purposes and the other three and screwed down.  It is firmly attached to it's permanent location.  I also used two pairs of adapters and 3/4" PEX barbs to the water heater inlet and outlet.  I want to use 3/4" hose on the feed from the water tanks to the cold water manifold and hot water heater, and from the hot water heater to the hot water manifold.  All hose from the manifolds is 1/2" and color coded.  I have an assortment of T's and Elbows to connect the two manifolds and water heater.

I connected the wire to the heater and just need to measure and cut it and wire it to the AC panel--an easy job.

A bit more work is running hoses from the Yanmar engine to the water tank.  I deferred that work, but I'm starting to think about connecting that now, so I'll pull off the engine cover and figure out where to run these hoses, and what sizes to use.  It should be easy to do once I determine the specfics of this tanks.

I am close to completing Phase II which is what I can Partial Mission Capability.  ECHO will be functional on a limited basis.  I can use it, with ice instead of refrigeration, with one head working, and basic navigational equipment.

Phase I was completing various deck upgrades--new boom and reefing system, fairing and painting the hull, however, I've back slid on these and until I bolt in new track and some deck hardware that I removed, I have deck leaks.  I also need to install new running lights, which is a minor amount of re-work.  So, I am hoping to report Phase I and II will be complete by the end of next week, somewhat dependent on my friend Carlton the welder.