Kaimusailing

New conduit was run from the pilothouse to the battery space under the dinette seat. Another conduit was run from the battery space to inside the stove counter. A third conduit was run from the stove counter to the forward bunk. An AC power cord was run from the battery compartment, where the inverter is located, down to the sole, across, and up inside a small cabinet. From there it was run along a path originally planned for a propane line. It then terminated at a GFI outlet within another cabinet where the new microwave oven will be located.

We had a cold snap and ice storm that made a two day break in the project, then unusually warmth came and it was in the 50's and it's the last week in January. A test of the microwave oven was disappointing, it wouldn't run properly on the inverter, which is modified sine wave type. We would have to get a pure sine wave inverter which is much more expensive.

I began the LED light installation and cut a hole in the stove's cabinet for the gang of four light switches. I found that some of the Capri light fixtures I had worked on last year had defects, but I tried out the glue gun and it was easy to repair the fixtures good as new.

I got distracted with a desire to do some carpentry. I matched some Brazilian Teak stock to the existing drawers. The Brazilian Teak ranges from gold to red, and the gold pieces matched the existing cabinet drawers very closely. I made a list of the pieces I needed and selected stock that would give me what I required. I marked each piece of stock what was to be cut out of it. The new cabinet hinges were very low price, no installation instructions with them, and I had to make a template for drilling proper holes in the cabinet door frames. Also, these hinges are for cabinets with no face frame. Guess what kind I have? Each hinge would require a 1 1/2 inch mounting block. No problem, a pile of mounting blocks were cut off and glued together to make up the 1 1/2 inch thickness. Two very nice pieces of teak were edge glued to make a blank for the 14 X 5 1/4 faux drawer face that will fill the space in front of the sink cabinet.

The faux drawer face was the first piece of the cabinet I made the next day. It had all the features of the existing drawer faces, except no drawer pull. The carpentry didn't go as well as I hoped and I was glad to find out some of the problems without ruining cabinet door frames. One problem was that the router bit to round off the edges didn't quite follow the edge of the wood, which had been rabetted halfway on the other side. This problem can be overcome by using an edge guide on the router. Another problem was the circular saw I was using as a table saw (inverted and clamped to a table) wasn't sturdy enough, so my expensive blade could wander quite a bit. I will be cutting rabbets with the router and not with the saw.

The hinge mounting blocks had their edges rounded with the 1/4 rounding off bit. The ergonomics of how the doors swing and the look of the door layout were changed. and that resulted in fewer hinges needed. The cabinet between the dinette and the ladder would have a single door instead of double, as well as the cabinet below the sink having a single door. Double doors on the ladder cabinet would be too narrow and access to the cabinet below the sink would be easier with a single door.

The hinge mounting blocks were glued in, along with some repairs on deck. We were having days in the 50's and 60's in February. There was an old aluminum oven vent on the side of the cabin that could slash the unwary's shin. It was drilled out and pried off. The bedding was chiseled off with the multitull and a scraper attachment. A wood block was cut that was larger than the vent's opening and the cabin side was relieved using the same old technique that the multitool enables. Holding the new piece in place, the multitool is used like a scribe, the outline is cut. Then continued work with the square cutting blade and then later the scraper, cut out the outline to the proper depth and shaved off the wood. Each time the new block was dry fitted and some artistic sculpting of the recess resulted in a perfect fit.

A pure sine wave inverter was ordered on eBay. These units are made in China and even the USA branded ones are made in China. It's hard to find out what is good and what will fail, and one of the favorite brands for boats is Xantrex. A little research on the internet and yes, this brand has some bad press. The one we bought was "Tiger Claw" brand. The main determinator was a video online that showed it waveform output, plus another that showed it actually powering up a load. Another brand considered was the units by Ramsond, a company in Detroit. They were out of stock.