Archive for the ‘Boat Electronics’ category

Harbour Chandlery

December 3rd, 2009

When I was in Wells-next-the-sea in Norfolk, earlier this year (that’s 2009 for people readig this in the future), I became good friends with the local Chandler. In fact, as I’ve mentioned in other posts, the experience I had at Wells was stunning. I left the little town with a handful of new friends, and have seen been back (by road) to see them all again.

When I was originally there with a broken boat and wallet, Rob, at Harbour Chandlery instantly jumped to the rescue. He didn’t expect a bean in return but ended up giving me all the help I needed, for free.

I felt I needed to replay that debt, and so I built him a website Harbour Chandlery.co.uk

It’s a basic site made to simply let the internet know that Harbour Chandlery exists and what they do, but I created it on the chart table of Kudu, which isn’t the best office space, I can tell you.

However, the debt still wasn’t paid in full, at least not to my mind, so when I got back on dry land, I set about building something a little more useful for him.

So, without further a do, I present the Harbour Chandlery online shop :)

Hopefully the friendly and truly honest approach to business I witnessed when I was in Wells will work well online, but without a doubt, it’s going to be a more personal experience than the other online chandlers.

Anyway, take a look. It is nearly Christmas, afterall :D

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Posted in Boat Electronics, Other adventures, Refitting the boat

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No Power

July 3rd, 2009

I’m in a bit of a pickle. I have no power on the boat.

The shore power in the yard has tripped out, and everybody with access to the breakers has gone home. Since my 12v system is in bits at the moment, I have absolutely no electricity onboard. This is a bit of an issue since my laptop has all of 20 minutes of battery time left, and my mobile phone is completely ran out.

On the bright side, I have cockles and whelks, and some lovely ingredients to make a super seafood dinner this evening.

Right, there’s only one thing for it. I’m going to find a pub, obviously just to charge my phone up, although it would probably be rude to do that without buying a courtesy pint or two. :p

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Posted in Around Britain, Boat Electronics

Take the power back

May 15th, 2009

Aptly, being just a quarter of a mile from Bradwells’ decommission nuclear power station, Kudu’s power problems have been resolved.

Firstly a chap called Alan, a stranger the moment before I stepped over his dinghy on the pontoon and said hello, offered me a lift into a not so nearby town where I bought a new battery, upping Kudu’s capacity to a more acceptable 170ah. He then went on to lend me a spare tiller pilot incase mine gave up on me, as did his when he sailed single handed to the Azores, and a drogue chute, which is like a small parachute and is trailed behind the boat to slow it down and keep it under controller in very strong winds. I hope I don’t need to take it out the bag, but it’s nice having it onboard.

Secondly, on the same day, I had a surprise visit from a chap I’d been speaking to on the internet. I had never met him before, but he had taken an interest in my journey, and been offering me help over Skype. He knew of my power problems, and the broken charge controller, and had taken the time to ring the manufacturer of the controller, obtain a schematic, diagnose the likely problem, order a new MOSFET from RS Components, and then drive here, from Surrey, which is no small distance. He then set to work with a soldering iron and a rather clever MOSTFET testing device, correctly identified the broken component, and replaced it with the 35 pence chip he’s brought with him. I now not only have a working charge controller, but a loan of charts to see me all the way up to scotland, an AIS receiver which will allow me to see nearby ships and their course on my chart plotter, and a spare VHF radio.

Yesterday evening, Alan popped along with a Rutland 503 wind generator, so I now have 40 watts of solar panels and a wind turbine. I’ll be selling power to the national grid at this rate!

I spent yesterday covered in fibre glass resin as I glassed in a piece of plywood I found in my stern locker, in order to create a base to fit the new battery. I then decided Kudu’s wiring was pretty poor, so ripped the lot out and rewired the switch panels and battery connections with proper terminal ends and fuses in the correct places. What surprised me was… everything still works :p

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Posted in Around Britain, Boat Electronics

And relax.. almost

April 30th, 2009

I calmed down after my little stress the other day. A good sleep sorted me out and I attacked the solar panel problem with a fresh head in the morning, which resulted in…

 

Solar Panel on my Corribee

Solar Panel on my Corribee

I’ve only fitted one of the two panels, but it’ll be enough to keep the nav gear running for a few days, and when I get to the River Crouch, fitting it’s brother will keep me occupied for an afternoon. I’ve tested it and it’s charging the battery well, or at least, it was yesterday before the cloud arrived :)

The outboard issue is still causing much concern though. I’ve spoken to the engineer this morning and he said he’s still working on it. Having bought a brand new engine and it still being broken 8 months later is a bit of a record I think. Mailspeed should win a prize!

I’ve got to ring the chap at lunch time to see if it’s done, and then get the train to Southend, in Essex, to pick it up. I’m worried about lugging the thing back on the train since it’s very, very heavy to walk distance with, and I’m not sure they’ll be too happy with me being on the train with a stinky outboard smelling of fuel. I have no choice though, so I’ll just have to deal with it. Of course, if it doesn’t get fixed I’m going to have to try and locate another engine from somewhere, which will be fun with a non existent budget and one day left. The joy!

Apart from that I’ve given the boat a tidy and stowed most of my liveaboard clutter, I’ve got some final tidying to do today, and then we’re all set for sea.

Nerves are kicking in now too.

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Posted in Around Britain, Boat Electronics, Corribee, Refitting the boat, boat cruising

I'm in a vile mood

April 28th, 2009

Problems problems everywhere, and not the patience to effing care.

Solar panels

Nothing on a boat is standard. There’s nothing you can go and buy and just fit, it all needs some sort of custom fabrication because nothing on a boat is standard.

Take my solar panels, for example, I’ve just spent ALL day looking for bits to fit them to the pushpit (the rails on the back of my boat). I finally came up with a plan and bought some aluminum strips from B&Q, I intended to bolt those to the existing mounting holes on the solar cell, and then through the middle of the ali strip, use two U bolts to clamp it to the pushpit. This will work, and almost did. I’ve spent the evening cutting and drilling, and messing about with very fiddley little screws and nuts. I had to cut down the U bolts, which cost me £14.50 each (!!!!). I cut the thread with the nuts on, then undid them to straighten out the thread. When I went to attach it all, I discovered that the nuts won’t go back on. No amount of trying will get them on since the thread is munged. That’s £29 down the toilet so far.

Engine

That’s not my only worry though. Yet again the diabolical service I’ve been getting from Mailspeed marine is prevailing. Having given them my engine in FEBRUARY for a warranty job after the big end bearings went within two days use (that was in september last year), they have yet to fix it. I have to constantly ring them since they never ever ring me, and the latest news is that it might be done by Thursday. I have to ring them up to find out if indeed it has been. If not. I’m absolutely screwed because I can’t move my boat and I’m booked ot lock out of St Kat’s on saturday.

On the bright side, I’ve adopted a suggestion from Dylan Winter to get my genoa sheets working. I’ve used a pulley system and cam cleat, in the temporary absence of winches. The boat can now sail… although I can’t get it out of the Thames without an engine.

I’m quite upset about those U bolts though. I can’t afford to throw away £30 like that, and I still have no idea how I’m going to get these bastard solar cells attached to the push pit. And Mailspeed!! God dammit, they have THE worst customer service I have ever encountered. They did the same to me with an order at the boat show. Took three weeks of phone calls with them not once returning a promised call to tell me where my order was. In the end they told me the order had been sent, only to ring me up a few days later to confirm the postal address!!!

Right, Ralph Vaughn Williams and a bottle of wine time, before I blow up.

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Posted in Around Britain, Boat Electronics, Corribee, Refitting the boat

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On board Kudu

March 2nd, 2009

I wanted to post a few pictures to show the inside of Kudu, although it feels a bit weird because it’s so small on board it feels quite intrusive to do so. Strange really. I’ll be posting naked Nathan pics next :D




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Posted in Boat Electronics, Corribee, On the boat

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Standard Horizon CP180i & Jeppesen

February 6th, 2009

I bought a Standard Horizon CP180i chart plotter from the London boat show a few weeks ago. I managed to get quite a good deal, and when I was into HAM radio a few years ago (yes, even I have a geeky side) I always had Yaesu radios. They were bomb proof, feature packed, and compared to the competition just a much better deal.

Standard Horizon CP180i

Standard Horizon CP180i

Standard Horizon is the marine brand name of Yaesu, also known as Vertex Standard, so I knew what I was buying was gong to be good quality kit.

The chart plotter is fantastic, and was fitted to the nav station of my boat within a few hours of getting it home. ll wired up and ready to go… almost. The CP180 (and 180i) have built in global cartography to a resulution of 2nm. Out of the box this makes the unit sort of useful for measuring the rough distance between two countries (which I spent a while playing with), but that’s about it. The plotter can’t really be used for anything useful – like navigation – until you add a proper chart package.

Now, the charting cartridges (C-MAP MAX) are quite expensive, almost half the price of the chart plotter itself, so a deciding factor in the deal was the fact that the CP180i came with a free cartridge of an area of your choice.

These things are never without a catch though, are they. It turns out you get a voucher for a chart of your choice and have to send it off to Jeppesen, the folks being C-MAP. You can’t post it to them and are given only two other choices, fax, or email. Now, I don’t have a scanner (nor does work) so I had to opt for the fax. Unfortunately the voucher is printed on card and wouldn’t fit through the fax machine, so after a few email exchanges with the Italian (head) office (aided by my Italian friend at work), I arranged to take a photo of the voucher and email that over.

Now, usually in these cases you have to wait an age to receive your claim, 28 days seems to be the default period, but to my great surprise Jeppesen had sent the C-map cart via airmail the very day I sent them the email. I sent the email yesterday, the map arrived this morning.

Now that is service for you!

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Posted in Boat Electronics, Refitting the boat

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Ships computer

July 16th, 2008

I’ve not posted for a while, mainly because not an awful lot worth mentioning has happened in that while, but I’ve conjured up a little sub project now the bulk of the work on the boat is complete and had to shout about it.

I’ve decided to build up a boat PC to run all the onboard navigation. I realise this is perhaps a bit of overkill for a 21ft Corribee but that’s the nature of the Nathan I’m afraid.  I design software for a living, computers are just what I’ve grown up with, so building a computer to run the entire boat seems like a cracking idea to me. Between the facts that I’m not too bad with a soldering iron and can also write software in a whole host of different languages, there’s a huge possibility to what I could do, but for now I’m keeping it simple. It will be a small laptop, probably an Asus EEE PC since they are tiny and consume little power. The laptop will be plugged into the handheld GPS I already have and run the chart plotting software.

So there we have it. This is going to be the most hightech and well equipped cruising Corribee ever built :)

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Posted in Boat Electronics

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