Tag: Blue Opal
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Configuring the AIS unit
I finally decided to acquire an AIS transceiver for Blue Opal, and went with one that talks both NMEA 0183 and NMEA 2000; an Alltek Marine B600s. It should happily chat with the Miniplex3, which will deal with sending the received AIS transmissions to something like my iPad (as there is no chartplotter or MFD…
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Sunday Sailing
The forecast for today was sunny, moderately warm (on land at least), and sufficient breeze for sailing. So I did. Getting back on the mooring was a bit interesting, because the pickup was upwind of the main buoy, right in the stern of another boat!
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Slip maintenance
I put Blue Opal on the slip this Friday gone, with the intent of cleaning off the worst of the growth on her, replacing the shaft anode, and replacing the main anode. Spares had already been acquired, so it should have been easy. Problem number one – I didn’t slip her quite right. I failed…
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Lighting up the wiring locker
A bit of LED strip light, IP65 rated, makes it really easy to see everything in the wiring locker without resorting to beams of light that get blocked by hands, require your third hand etc. The wiring still needs some more tidying and labeling, but it’s getting better.
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Upgrading the alternator cable
Another observation during all of this wiring work is that there was a drop in the voltage from the alternator terminal to the splitter input – up to 0.5V. A drop at the batteries is expected as the relationship between amps and volts changes during charging, but in the ~4 metres from the alternator to…
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Re-wiring the battery locker
Given the voltage drop at the water pump, the next wiring upgrade was to take the battery locker to wiring locker wire up to 16mm sq. This was completed today, and while it’s made things a bit better at the water pump, the voltage drop is still 2 volts. Along the way, the main battery…