S/V Deep Playa - Pearson 424

I've been updating the drawing so it's more detailed than the original version. I'm getting to the point of needing to determine the number and size of things like terminal blocks, ring terminals, heat shrink tubing, etc.. Along with this I'm also getting ready to dry fit everything to the spars down at the yard before the final prep and then painting of the spars. I'm spending a lot of money having these things painted and I'd rather bounce the drill off the unpainted sand blasted spars than the newly painted spars.

I was going a little crazy trying to remember all of the things we’re wiring into the mast and what kind of wire they needed so I drew it up.

Included in this simple not to scale drawing (my spreaders are not mid-mast) are the wires for the NMEA 2000 instrument, all 2 wire and 3 wire pulls for lights and the PA horn as well as the COAX which is going to be run in the mast. These were run in the mast hanging free and wrapped in foam. As part of the refit we will run PVC conduit inside the mast for the wiring.

Click on the picture for a larger version you can actually see.

I plan to put a Maretron NMEA 2000 weather station on my masthead and replace my incandescent bulb nav lights with this ORCA Green Machine LED nav\anchor light. Everything seems great but now I’m thinking how am I going to get these two on the masthead and not have them interfere with each other.

The OGM is 2.7” in diameter and 2.7” tall.

The Maretron WSO100 is 4.25” in diameter and 3.45” tall.

Ideally you could stack them, but I’m not sure how you’d route the wire around or thru so it didn't interfere with the functionality of the weather station or the visibility of the light.

I’m sure someone else has done this, another research project…

OK, we’re not in a submarine about to be imploded by a depth charge, we just need to have new zincs put on our prop shaft. Phil checked and verified we had no zincs remaining and then cleaned the shaft while snorkeling over the 4th of July weekend. He has also offered to put the zincs on, but he’s out of town and I was getting a bit freaked by the whole thing so I called Marina Dive Services of Puget Sound (AKA Morgan) based solely on his sign on the bulletin board at the Marina.

He should up promptly, suited up, dove in, scrubbed the shaft and put on the zincs. He also scrubbed the waterline to remove the chin beard Deep Playa had been growing on her bow. I would definitely recommend him, let me know if you want his number or email.

Here’s a video of Morgan cleaning the shaft and prop that I made with my Flip camcorder and waterproof case. I was just laying on the dock with my hand in the water. It was a sunny day, low tide and there was a minimum of crap floating in the water.

Still shots will come later when I process them.

This weekend I finished installing the starter. Along the way I decided to replace the bonding wire on the starter to the v-drive with tinned wire because the existing wire was corroded. As I was doing this, I also decided to replace the bonding wire from the v-drive to the raw water strainer because it had broken a few months back. Removing the nut on the raw water strainer lead to the strainer breaking.  The strainer (bronze) was bolted to an aluminum bracket with stainless steel screws and it had started to bend at the hanger points. I was planning to replace this fall when I haul out, but turns out I needed to do it today. I put a board on that aluminum bracket and put in a new raw water strainer. All in all it was pretty simple, the new fittings lined up a bit differently, but the new strainer looks great and will provide years of reliable service! I have one more bonding wire to put in, just need a 8 AWG to #10 screw ring terminal to check that one off the list.

I also finished installing the starter this weekend after I painted it and let it dry. It pretty much popped right in, I fastened in all the bolts to the block, put the new bonding wires on and then hooked up the battery cables and starter switch. She started up on the first try and water ran well through the exhaust. Everything is look good!

Finally, I finished our plumbing upgrade as well by putting in a new shower mixer valve and handheld \ wall mount sprayer. The original faucet was a 4” on center individual knobs for hot and cold and had a fitting for the shower nozzle right on the faucet. When I pulled this off the wall I was left with two holes in the whole. I put a Shurflo mixer \ volume control in the bottom hole and a wall mount for the shower nozzle in the top hole. This completes a project I started last summer!