04/16/2009, North Palm Beach Marina
This afternoon we went out for a day sail in 10 to 15 knots of wind from the northeast. We wanted to see what our speed over the ground would be if some day we decide to go to Miami in these conditions. The difficulty in going to Miami from here (Palm Beach) is the north east wind against the north flowing Gulf Stream current. The wind against the current can whip up some nasty sea conditions. So for future reference we decided to go out for a day sail to check it out and it wasn't bad at all, definitely doable. After out two hour test sail we came back into the Port of Palm Beach to anchor for the night to test our anchor and chain since they are all new. Thus far all is going well with the anchoring. Additionally, this message is being sent to Sailmail and Sailblogs.com for the first time while we are at anchor. This is the first time we have sent a position report to Sailblogs while we are at anchor.
|
Comments [0]
02/04/2009, North Palm Beach, Florida
For those of you that have been following this blog, I'm sorry for the delay in this posting since the last one said we were getting underway. Last minute developments have forced us to delay our cruising departure indefinately. Right now, we are trying to get our life back under control. Once we have gotten ourselves back on course we will update the blog with more details.
|
01/27/2009, North Palm Beach Marina
With the engine's oil leak and mainsail's chafe repaired we plan to get underway tomorrow unless Herb (Southbound II) says the weather doesn't look good. We hope that we can at least get good enough weather to make it across the Gulf Stream to the Bahamas, but would prefer to continue on to Antigua. Whether we continue on or not depends on the forecasted intensity a cold front that is due to pass thru the area between 1/30/09 and 1/31/09. If it looks good for departure our next report should be while underway.
|
01/24/2009, North Palm Beach, Florida
On the morning of Sunday January 18th we got underway at 0740. During the week prior we had tentatively planned to leave on Monday the 19th, but after speaking with Herb Hilgenberg (call sign "Southbound II") we decided to leave on Sunday to avoid getting hit by an approaching cold front in the Gulf Stream. Herb runs a weather net on single side band (SSB) radio at 2000 UTC everyday. He has helped us with weather predictions for our prior ocean passages so we went back to him for our proposed passage to the Eastern Caribbean. Herb operates the net from the Toronto area and has been helping sailors in the Atlantic and Caribbean with weather routing for many years. After speaking with Herb our plan was to leave Sunday morning and power across the Gulf Stream ahead of the cold front which meant that the front would catch up with us that night or Monday morning in Bahamian waters. For the first hour or so things went well powering our way down the Intracoastal and out Lake Worth Inlet. Got the autopilot set up on course for a waypoint in Northwest Providence Channel and once settled in I sent Pam below to get some rest while I took the watch. Roughly one hour after leaving the inlet the engine's alarm went off. Pam had heard it starting to go off with an initial twitter and got up from where she was resting to see where the sound was coming from. By that time the alarm was at full steady volume, she looked at the indicator panel and reported that the oil light was on. Immediately I throttled back, took the transmission out of gear and asked Pam to shutdown the engine (engine shutdown is at the indicator panel). With the engine shutdown Pam came up on deck and I went below to investigate. After pulling up one of the bilge access panels just forward of the engine the problem was obvious. We had a large amount of oil in the engine's bilge area. Upon looking in the engine room I was unable to determine the source of the oil leak, but due to the hot engine it was unsafe to work on the less accessible areas on the other side of the engine since you basically have to lay on top of the engine to see them. I checked the engine's dipstick and found about an eighth inch of oil indicated in the oil pan. Not bone dry but not good either. With the escaped oil isolated to the bilge area under the engine, where there is no bilge pump, there was no danger of pumping the oil into the ocean so I closed things up and went back on deck. We decided to set the sails even though there was very little wind. With sails set we headed back towards the inlet initially moving at a whopping 1.7 knots. Pam went below to call our marina to let them know that we were on our way back with engine problems. Towboat U.S. picked up on the call and said that if we needed assistance they had boats in the area. Pam told them that we were going to try to sail as far as we can and if we needed help we would call them. We tried to sail for a little over an hour moving about two tenths of a mile closer to the inlet. During that time Pam managed to to get our cell phone service, that we had cancelled the day before, turned back on. After getting cell phones turned back on she notified our families and Ron and Barbara (our slip neighbors) of our plight. When it was obvious to us that the wind was not going to come up we decided to give up because the only thing we were accomplishing was flogging the sails to death with our incessant rocking and rolling with no wind. After getting the sails furled and secured I decided to put four quarts of oil in the engine and see if we could baby it to get closer to the inlet. After adding the oil I started the engine the oil pressure came right up to its normal 50 psi and I put the transmission in forward heading for the inlet. Could it be that all this oil could have been some sort of fluke??? Not likely! Pam took the helm and I went below with the intent to see if I could ascertain the source of the leak. Before I could gain access to the engine room the sickening sound of the oil alarm returned, Pam reported the pressure was down to 25 psi and I had her throttle back while I shutdown the engine. This little exercise proved that the oil leak was more likely to be from someplace where the oil was under pressure rather than simply leaking out of the engine. After this episode we decided to call Towboat U.S.. Towboat arrived about fifteen minutes after our call and in a very competent and professional manner towed us back to the marina assisting us right into our slip with additional help on the dock from Ron, Barbara and Milton (from the marina). No muss, no fuss and most importantly no damage (other than my ego). Thankfully, Ron and Barbara had been able to retrieve our old power cord and cable TV cable from the trash. Physically and mentally exhausted from this debacle we tried to relax and wait until Monday to investigate the cause of the oil leak. Monday morning with a cooled down engine I first removed the oil absorbers from under the engine to see if they held any clues to the leak source. The absorber under the bell housing of the engine had more oil on its underside than on the top which faced the engine. The only thing under the absorber at this point in the bilge is a hose that runs between the engine's oil gallery and its oil filter that is mounted on a bulkhead on the opposite side of the engine. Upon examining the hose with a flashlight I noticed a very slight bulge at one point. The top of the hose looked fine in spite of the bulge, but when I ran my fingers along under the hose I felt a hole. Next step was to remove the hose and find a replacement. The ends of the hose where threaded compression fittings that did not swivel when I tried to loosen them, so when I turned the fitting it in turn tried to turn the hose. Each time I removed the wrench to make the next turn the hose recoiled causing the fitting to return towards its original position. This problem necessitated my cutting the hose to remove it. After getting the hose off, albeit in pieces, I went to Tom (the captain of "Protocol") to ask him where I could get a replacement hose locally. Thankfully, Tom knew of a place and drove me over there to get a replacement made up. After returning to the boat I got a call from Syd, a friend with a lot of engine experience, and he suggested that after replacing the hose I may want to add enough oil to run the engine getting it up to temperature to get any metal particles in suspension in the oil and then do an oil change to get them out. Syd has a background in automobile racing so I decided to follow his advice. After doing all that we ran the engine again with no further problems. Since that Monday we have been looking for another weather window to Antigua. Our contract here at the marina is up on January 31st and right now it looks like the next weather window may be Thursday the 29th. After discussing the oil line failure with a number of friends the consensus is that we should also replace the other oil line to the oil filter since it is likely to be the same age as the failed one. So, I hope to do that on Monday, Jan. 26th, before we attempt to leave for Antigua again.
|
01/02/2009, North Palm Beach, Florida
Recently we took our Liferaft and a 406 EPIRB in for inspection/maintenance. The Liferaft, a Givens 6-person, passed inspection with flying colors. The EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon) was an orange bottomed ACR model. The inspection station said that ACR, the manufacturer, wouldn't allow them to replace the battery in the EPIRBs with orange bottoms so it had to be destroyed. This necessitated our purchase of a new EPIRB. But EPIRBs have changed a bit since we puchased our last one. Now they basically come in three different catagories. The most basic model is the same as our old one which outputs an emergency beacon signal to orbiting satellites that contains and identifying number that you have registered with the rescue organization in your home country. In the USA the administering organization is NOAA who in turn supplies this information to other rescue centers around the world. The weakness of this type of 406 EPIRB was that the rescue center knows who had the emergency but not exactly where you are located. This shortcoming prompted the development of EPIRBs that contained there own GPS receiver so that it could include its latitude and longitude along with the beacon ID. Now the rescue center would know who you are and where you are an obivous enhancement to the first version. But there was still one more potential weakness even in this design. What if the GPS in the EPIRB couldn't aquire enough satellite information for a fix or it malfunctioned? To address this issue the EPIRB manufacturers came up with EPIRBs that could receive GPS information from your vessel's onboard GPS. This way as long as you have a functioning GPS at the moment that you activate the EPIRB, it will receive and store your current location. This is the location that will be initially sent to the rescue center by the EPIRB. Later on when the EPIRB's GPS gets a fix that updated information will be sent to the rescue center. After we reviewed our options we decided to purchase the ACR iPRO which has its own GPS and an interface to our onboard GPS. In the photo you can see the interface on the top left with the green LED. The connection is optical eliminating the need for some form of waterproof connector, because the EPIRB must be waterproof. The directions for use are to tether the EPIRB to your liferaft and leave it floating in the water so that it has a clear view of the sky. If they had made an electrical connection for the GPS interface there would be an increased chance for water infiltration compromising the EPIRB's operation. One note the EPIRB pictured here is a Class II which requires manual operation, the Class I versions operate automatically. Both classes have the same thee versions: 1 - beacon only, 2 - beacon with self contained GPS and 3 - beacon with self contained GPS and external GPS interface. Who knows what the EPIRB manufacturers will come up with next to help expedite the rescue of those in distress?
|
11/11/2008, North Palm Beach, Florida
During our Caribbean cruise we found several areas on the boat that need a refit. One of the first things we replaced was our inflatable dinghy. The one that we used in the Caribbean had gotten holed by our Monitor windvane when we foolishly left it tied off the stern. The repair that we were able to make typically lasted for a few months and then began to leak. A repair guy in the U.S. Virgin Islands told us that the repairs last longer if they are done in an air conditioned environment. Since this wasn't possible on the deck of our boat we just did the best we could with what we had. When looking for a replacement we decided on AB inflatable with an aluminum bottom rather than the more common fiberglass. We picked it because the bow is higher than the typical fiberglass hulled inflatable. As we hoped the higher bow has turned out to provide a drier ride. The AB inflatable was capable of handling a 15 hp outboard, so we traded our old Honda 9.9 hp in on a new 15 hp. We went with the larger outboard because in the Caribbean we had some long dinghy rides that would have been reduced timewize with the larger engine.
The next area we decided to improve was the cover insulation of the refrigerator and freezer compartments. While in the Caribbean heat we had to resort to placing a blanket of insulation over the covers to keep the condensation down. This complicated removing items from either box while at sea. To fix this problem we had Glacier Bay make us two custom sized vacuum insulated panels which we epoxied to the underside of the covers. These units have eliminated the condensation and as a side benefit slightly reduced the daily runtimes of the refrigeration compressor. To further improve the refrigeration system we enlarged the cooling water plumbing to the condenser. This necessitated replacing the thru-hull, seacock, hoses and fittings in the condenser's raw water plumbing (raw water is the term used to descibe seawater). Enlarging the raw water plumbing has also reduced the daily runtimes of the refrigeration system. Since the compressor, motor and condenser are in a closed compartment where heat build up is obvious, we installed to small DC muffin fans to evacuate the heat while the system is running.
With the refrigeration system done we moved on to our individual comfort. We had Canvas Designers of Riviera Beach replace all of our interior cushions. We decided to go with a vinyl covering for improved water resistance during offshore passages. To deal with the inherent stickiness of vinyl cushions when it is hot we have cushion covers made out of interior grade Sunbrella. The only cushion that we didn't have Canvas Designers replace was the mattress in our stateroom. For this we decided to try a Tempurpedic foam mattress that was custom cut per our measurements by Tempur-Marine in Saginaw, Michigan. They provided a comprehensive measurement kit, cut the mattress and refitted its cover perfectly. The difference between our old mattress and the Tempurpedic has been well worth the investment.
Our exterior (white) canvas for the dodger, bimini, sailcover and dinghy cover was the next project for Canvas Designers. Since the old material was prown to showing mold/mildew and difficult to keep clean we decided to look for a better alternative. Canvas Designers suggested Stamoid for the dodger, bimini and dinghy cover. As for the sailcover we used Sunbrella. The Stamoid on the dodger and bimini has a double sided vinyl coating in white that has held up well to the Florida sun. The dinghy cover, which initially was made with only a single sided vinyl coating has since been replaced with double sided Stamoid. The double sided is the best because it is easy to clean and if you put the IMAR UV protective cream on it as recommended it will last a long time. Right now the dodger and bimini are going on 5 years and the dinghy cover was replaced this year. We also replaced the sailcover this year. This time we decided to replace the white Sunbrella with Captain Navy Sunbrella. Bob, of Canvas Designers, told us that Captain Navy Sunbrella wears like iron so we went with it. Based observations here at our marina he appears to be correct. As a general rule, Mike Ericson the owner of Canvas Designers told us that if your going with Sunbrella here in Florida the darker the color the better. If your going with a vinyl coated fabric the lighter the color the better. Also a final note, if your tired of having your canvas restitched every few years, make sure your canvas maker uses Gortex thread the next time you have your canvas done. Canvas Designers used Gortex thread on our canvas and we have had no need for restitching.
To help us in our quest to become more energy independent, Canvas Designers built us a stainless steel solar panel rack for our bimini. This gave us a location to start addressing our energy generation shortfall on Foggy Mountain. During our one year cruise in the Caribbean we typically had to run our engine at least one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening to keep our batteries charged. On our new solar rack we installed one 85 watt and two 80 watt Kyocera solar panels. Additionally, we replaced the two 63 watt panels that we had on the dodger with two 85 watt Kyoceras. With this configuration we have gone five plus days without before having to run the engine. This is without factoring in the potential contribution from our windgenerator. Which brings us to our next upgrade. Our Fourwinds II windgenerator served us faithfully both on passage and at anchor in the Caribbean. When we heard that Fourwinds now offers a brushless generator we decided to upgrade. Additionally, we decided to go to their three bladed Red Baron windgenerator since it had less of a tendency to shutter when the wind changes direction quickly.
To make sure that all the newly generated energy gets to where it is supposed to efficiently we replaced and upsized all the primary (battery cable) wiring for the house and engine start batteries. At the same time we installed fuses in the house battery output cables. Back when Foggy was built in 1982 if the battery switches were within a certain distance of the batteries fuses were not required. We installed the fuses for added safety. Still in the area of battery energy, we decided to upsize and improve our inverter. After doing some web research we discovered an inverter that had great reviews from the alternative energy folks. Based on these reviews we decided to buy a Trace 2500 Power Conversion Center with a true sinewave output. This unit provides us with all the AC power we need when we are living on the hook. Our 80's vintage ferroresonant battery charger died so we replaced it with an inexpensive modern one which also died and subsequently has been replaced with a more expensive one that will handle input from 120-240 volts at 50 or 60 Hz. Many times during our cruise we would wonder if we had enough battery power to watch a video. But we didn't have any way to monitor the DC input to the inverter. To address this problem we installed a Blue Sea Systems DMM (digital multimeter) that not only allows us to monitor the volts and amps being drawn by the inverter but it also has a low voltage alarm just incase the movie is too long.
We have found that as a cruiser living on 12 volts, you need to be able to monitor as many aspects of your 12 volt system as possible. The system that we used on our cruise was called a Quad-Cycle, produced by Cruising Equipment back in the 80's. With the Quad-Cycle we could monitor voltage from the house batteries and the engine start battery in addition to amps going to and from the house batteries. Addtionally, ours also had an optional alternator regulator and the ability to monitor the output current of the high output house battery alternator. As great as this system was we decided to replace it due to its age, we figure it had been installed since the mid 80s. For battery system monitoring we chose the Mastervolt BTM-III that has all the same monitoring features of the Quad-Cycle plus amphour and per cent of battery capacity remaining (basically a gas gauge for the house batteries). Between the readout from the Mastervolt and the display for the Blue Sky 3024i solar panel regulator we can tell exactly how much current is being pumped into the house batteries. We left the engine alternator setup as it has been for years, one small alternator to charge the engine start battery and a large frame alternator with external regulator to charge the house batteries. The Quad-Cycle's regulator controlled the large alternator in the old system. To replace it we chose Ample Power's SAR-V3 (Smart Alternator Regulator) which has the all important temperature compensation that the old regulator didn't have. This regulator also monitors the voltage in the house battery bank, if it meets certain criteria it has the ability thru a solenoid to send some charge to the engine start battery. This gives us some redundancy, that we didn't have with the old system, if the small automotive size alternator fails to charge the engine start battery. To monitor monitor the large alternator's output we installed another Blue Sea Systems DMM. Since batteries don't like heat, we installed cooling fans in the house battery box. The fans run when the engine is charging the batteries and/or when the solar regulator senses that the house batteries are almost at full charge. With the solar regulator the fans have tended to come on at the hottest point of the day, this is a good thing. We also installed temperature sensors in the house battery compartment to keep an eye on heat build up there. We think heat contributed greatly to the eventual death of our house batteries during our Caribbean cruise.
After taking care of energy supply we moved on to energy conservation. We replaced all of our running lights with LED units that require fraction of the of the current used by the old incandesent bulbs. For the lower lights we installed Hella units and for the masthead tri-color/anchor light we went with an Orca Green unit. All of these were easy to install and the energy consumption is truly negligable. For interior lighting we replaced most of the halogen lights with LED models. On our Alpenglow overhead lights we replaced the red fluoresant bulbs with a LED upgrade offered by Alpenglow. The Alpenglow lights are beautiful units, we have ones that are over 15 years old and they still look and work great, check them out.
In the engine room we replaced all the wiring to the large house battery alternator. After deciding to retire the ten year old 200 amp large fame alternator to spare status, we replaced it with Ample Power's 200 amp model. To improve engine cooling we replaced the old intake thru-hull with a scoop type and replaced the seacock attached to it. And while we were in the area we replaced all the raw water cooling hoses. On the fuel side of the engine we installed one of the best pieces of equipment that we have found to date, the Filter Boss check them out on the web. With the Filter Boss our fuel gets filtered thru one Racor filter, but if that filter starts to clog the Boss sets of an alarm. To keep the engine running you can switch out the clogged filter by flipping a couple valves on the Filter Boss and you are now running on the clean backup filter. This should allow you to replace the clogged filter at a more opportune time and place. As a further enhancement to the fuel system we incorporated fuel manifolds that allow us to polish our fuel using the electric fuel pump in the Filter Boss. Great piece of equipment!!!
We now come to the area of electronics and navigation. We replaced our 80's vintage B&G instruments with B&G's H1000 system. Removing the multiple cables that connected the old instuments together and replacing them with a single cable was a pure joy. We can setup the H1000's digital displays to show up to four different types of information. This gives us the capability to see information in the cockpit that we had to go below to the navstation to see with the old system. This will help during those rough times offshore when you want to limit your movement because of the difficulty involved. The latest piece of high tech equipment that we added is a SeaCas AIS receiver. With the SeaCas's LEDs we can see if there is a vessel transmitting within range of us, at which time we can bring up our laptop and track them using our MaxSea navigation software. This unit was very easy to install and the company is very customer oriented. Networking all of our navigational equipment together was a breeze with our utilization of a ShipModul's MiniPlex42BT (BT stands for Bluetooth). With this unit we have the B&Gs, Furuno radar, and three GPSs networked together. With the unit's Bluetooth output we can have navigation information sent to our IPAQ PDA in the cockpit. This isn't something that I think we will use very much because the IPAQ can only run Maptech Pocket Navigator which can only read Maptech charts. So if we're entering a harbor that we have a Maptech chart for it works great, otherwise your out of luck. As mentioned earlier we are using MaxSea navigational software and have found it very easy to use and integrate. One of the things that it integrates well with is the displaying of GRIB weather files that we receive from Sailmail. We decided to install Sailmail so that we could send and receive emails from the boat. During our Caribbean cruise we relied on local internet cafes to access our email. We installed a Pactor modem to connect our our laptop to the ICOM 710 SSB radio. This setup has worked well in testing for the last three years. News from our friends in the Caribbean told us that there is more and more WiFi available in Caribbean anchorages. So to further enhance our communications we installed a Syrens Lite WiFi system which has an external antenna to increase its range. Our sole connection to the internet here at the marina for the last two years has been thru this unit. It was simple to install and setup on our laptop.
The next area that we tackled was the rigging. We had Florida Rigging replace our 80's vintage Harken roller furling system with a new Furlex roller reefing system. Florida Rigging also built us an upsized headstay to install the Furlex system on. Then we had them add a much needed turnbuckle to our backstay. For whatever reason the original backstay didn't have a turnbuckle possibly because of the hydraulic backstay adjuster. This arrangement would have prevented us from properly tensioning the rigging if the backstay adjuster failed. Now with the new turnbuckle we have eliminated that possibility.
On our cruise we had a PUR 160E watermaker that performed well providing us with plenty of that tasty desalinated water. During the refit the plan was to pickle the unit and use it on our next cruise. Prior to installing the PUR we had also looked at the Spectra watermaker but didn't buy it because of its cost. There smallest unit at the time was somewhere around $7000. So we decided to go for the $3000 PUR unit. After talking to some firends that had had a Spectra for several years we decided to give them another look. When we found that their Ventura 150 model was more in our price range we decided to get one. The beauty of the Spectra is that it has half the energy consumption of our old system. Twice the amount of water for the same amount of energy, sounded good to us. Also gone are the chemicals as long as you do a freshwater flush of the system every five days.
Safety at sea and at anchor is the next area that we addressed. It's always a good idea to know a what is going on below your waterline. To do this properly at an advanced age, holding your breath and diving down is probably becoming less inviting. So you probably put off doing it unitl the next port or next month or hire someone to do it for you. Since we like to do as much of our own maintenance and can't hold our breath as long as we could in our teens we decided to buy a SurfaceDive unit. It's basically a compressor run by a 12 volt motor connected via hose to a dive regulator. The SurfaceDive comes in its own dive bag and is a sweet unit. Whiel sailing unexpected jibes of the boom are going to happen if you sail long enough. They are dangerous to anyone that is in the way of that boom screaming across the deck. To help combat this danger we installed a Dutchman Boombrake. So far it has worked as advertised and I fellow Valiant 40 sailor swears by it. To make reefing the mainsail faster and easier we replaced the non-selftailing winch with a an Andersen selftailer. It should make reefing at 3:00 AM much easier to accomplish. The next entry in this catagory is the modification of our emegency tiller to allow its connection to our Monitor windvane. We decided to do this because we were concerned with having to use our emergency tiller during an offshore passage. The original configuration would have required us to either handsteer, with the tiller, or use the autopilot. We decided to change the Monitor's control line configuration to allow the Monitor steer via the emergency tiller. Our old life harnesses had been retrofitted with inflatable lifevests. At the time the vests were not US Coast Guard approved. When we learned that there are now approved inflatable life vests we decided to upgrade. We purchased two Mustang Survival vests with an incorporated safety harness. These are more comfortable than our old ones and in addition they have an improved automatic inflating mechanism that is supposed to eliminate unexpected inflations. To complement our new life harnesses we decided to upgrade our jacklines from the old nylon webbing to a stronger more UV resistent polyester webbing. The jacklines were custom fitted to our measurements by Halsey Sailmakers, they did an awesome job.
Finally we have the area of entertainment. Pam and I like to watch movies. When we went on our last cruise we had a collection of movies on VHS tape. Some were pre-recorded and some were recorded off of TV. VHS tapes don't hold up very well in the hot humid marine environment found in the tropics. Additionally, VHS tapes take up a lot of room. After we returned to the states in 2002 we found that DVD recorders were becoming popular. We bought a DVD recorder and recorded what movies that we could from our VHS library. Unfortunately, some of the tapes were unuseable having fallen prey to the environment. Now we have rebuilt a decent video library on DVD. DVDs are great because of their minimal space requirement (compared to VHS) and their better tolerance of the tropical marine environment. In the Caribbean we watched our videos on a 9" SONY TV that was bolted to our salon table. The SONY served us well but widescreen movies with the black bars on the top and bottom made the 9" screen really small. When the flat screen LCD TVs came out we took the plunge. LCD TVs are great for sailboats because they can be mounted on a bulkhead where they basically take the place of a picture.
Well that's a summary of our refit. We have made a lot of changes, we are anxious to find out if they were good ones. We hope you are interested to find out too. In January we will be looking for a weather window for our return to the Eastern Caribbean. We hope you will follow our travels.....
|
