Kaimusailing

I was excited about the new car stereo coming in and also the NY Jets first game of the season. The Jets fizzled. The radio is installed in Cornelia Marie's old Honda CRV. It isn't as impressive as it was in the Shanty connected to the internet, but it does what I want, and the stereo is quite good.
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An installation kit arrived as well as a wire harness adapter. The installation kit also included a harness adapter, similar to the other, and some plastic parts like ears for mounting the radio. The only plastic part I wanted was the bezel that fills the gap between the radio and the car's cowling, but it is not perfect. Most of my time was spent trying to get the bezel shaped so that it fit the cowling and the radio.
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I did the wiring with crimp connectors, not the best way to do it, the best might be solder and shrink tubing, but solder makes an immobile junction that causes individual wires to snap off after vibration, which is inevitable. I have a very good connector crimper, but the crimps are mostly from Harbor Freight. I had just enough to hook up the speaker wires and the others.
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The other debacle was feeding the GPS antenna and the two USB cables somewhere. Modern cars are pretty much sealed up, they don't want gaps, etc. The CRV has a rectangular plug in the dashboard cowling in the center right near the windshield. Perfect place for a GPS antenna. It was not easy to remove it, but out it came and the antenna was put in place.
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Some YouTube videos show USB cables installed into the glove box or into a little storage space below the radio and A/C controls. I thought about doing it that way, but I was able to get one of the cables down inside the dash and dangle near the gas pedal. I tried the 2nd and it wouldn't go, plus I couldn't pull it back out. A trick when feeding wires is to rotate the wire a couple of revolutions and maybe it will find a route, it did, and I had both USB cables available down near the gas pedal. A USBA/USBC adapter cable was plugged into the one labeled for wired Android Auto, and that cable plugs into the Galaxy smartphone, powers it, and enables Android Auto. Android Auto is also connected by bluetooth with this unit. The other USB cable is suggested for use with external storage, such as a thumbdrive with music.
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Mechanically the mounting ears were removed from the old radio and attached to the provided brackets from the new kit. The wiring was stuffed behind the radio and it was mounted in place. The separate kit that included the plastic bezel and ears and wiring harness adapter is Best Kits HON-K8610DD HWH806. The other wiring harness adapter is Metra 70-1721. The Metra adapter has one less connecting wire. I believe it is for the steering wheel audio remote control, which I couldn't get to connect.
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The gap between the radio and the cowling needed the plastic bezel, but it didn't fit. The bezel fit inside the cowling but didn't fit around the radio. It required a lot of trimming. I used the angle grinder with cut off wheel to remove some tabs on the bezel that were in the way. The bezel then needed to be opened up a bit to fit the radio. It took a long time to do this, but it finally fit. I retained the two tabs on the sides of the bezel, they hold the bezel in place. One corner is going to need a dab of glue to keep it from lifting up.
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Of course I couldn't wait to operate the radio and it worked as advertised. When I powered it up, stand alone, in the Red Shell Shanty, it had internet and apps like Marine Navigator ran smoothly with downloaded real time charts and maps. In the car the downloads have to come from the phone unless I park near available wifi. It looks like when Android Auto is running internet connection via the phone isn't working. It is a USB function. I will be learning more about how to get connected. It's amazing that this radio is only a hundred bucks.
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I did laundry and had to go all the way across the marina to C Dock. The service building there has laundry and rest room facilities just as my local building at L Dock, but now we have power issues and the L Dock building is out of commission. I took a shower in the C Dock men's room and it was OK. The drain was slow and I worried about waste water. I spent time learning about the radio while the laundry was being done.
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It took about 5 minutes to get the radio hooked up to the internet using the phone. I was wrong about the Android Auto, it doesn't preclude you from having a wired USB connection for something else, Android Auto on this radio can connect via bluetooth. All I had to do was select in the Settings menu Connections, then get into the tethering menu, I think the tab is called Hotspot and Tethering, in there you select USB Tethering. The other options are like Charge Only, or WiFi Hotspot.
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I could go to my Marine Navigator app and it was centered at my new location on the other side of the marina. I had a downloaded chart, came through the phone. Other apps, like Google News, were functioning and not at a slow rate. I had solved the internet problem with the radio, now what? The laundry was chugging along. I was stuck here till the dryer stopped. I played with the radio as a radio. The radio function on this android head unit is very sensitive and loads up with so many stations that the automatically loaded preset list only covers a small portion of the band. There is probably a way to overcome this, but I have to learn. I listened to 107.3, the local low power radio station right outside the marina, I listened to NPR radio, the audio quality was good. The radio has features relating to audio performance and I used them to isolate each of the car's speakers, they are all working, and I centered the sound. There is also a feature that adjusts the timing of the audio between the available channels. A test of the hands free phone function resulted in a call to Cuddily who sounded like she was booming, way louder than the radio programming. Got to fix that.
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I didn't want to leave the radio to finish up the laundry. I took it all back to the boat and hung my "Hawaiian" shirts, actually from St. Maarten, to dry. I turned on the VHF radio and set the squelch and set it to SCAN, my neighbor wanted to test his radio. But not now, time was running out to go to the Legion, eat something now or you will have to eat at the Legion. I made a little ½ sized ham, cheese, and tomato sandwich on sourdough bread. The ham was from the Food Lion deli, called Taste of Inspirations Black Forest Ham, the cheese was Provolone, the tomatoes were small Romas, add some fresh black pepper and mayonnaise, consume quickly.
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I drove to the Legion but Cuddily and Teri weren't there. It seemed like the usual crowd, older Legion men, veterans, was now populated by attractive women, who turned out to be biker's broads. The bikes were outside. Not a rowdy crowd. It seemed like they were too well manicured, you know, stylish bikers. Tan, denim, sculpted beards, no, not the women, they had beautiful hair, is someone making a movie near here? I played Steppenwolf on the jukebox, and then something like Beach Boys "Little Deuce Coupe". Cuddily was talking but I couldn't hear very well with my jukebox music playing. Teri wasn't coming, in fact, she hadn't been out to the Legion 3 days in a row. I got the idea to call Teri on speakerphone which she answered. She was glad we called. I had played an old song by Cream that included a drum solo by Ginger Baker.
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Cuddily ordered a meatloaf burger sandwich and offered me some. I made a sunset photo. The bikers all left, then came back. Well, they are migratory people. Certainly a different chemistry with them around.
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Everyone is talking about the presidential debate, and it was a deusie. Not a doozy, I spelled it right, it comes from the nickname of the Deusenberg car, Deusie, I spelled it right.
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I could drive back to the marina and fall asleep, but the VHF radio was scanning, and the squelch was low, there was nothing until the Coast Guard alerted me about a kayaker who was being searched for. The coast guard reports changed into crabbers talking between each other without using proper radio protocol. The scanner was picking them up on channel 9. They were talking about bait, water temperatures, and such with their Smith Island accents. I had to sleep though.
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Oh, the debate. There was a marked difference between the two candidates. But they are tied for the election. Think about it. Just tied. Who do you want your CEO to be? America is undecided.
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My OBD2 bluetooth adapter came in and I went to pick it up and also get ham and half and half cream to make some soup. Back at the marina I perused documents, manuals, and watched YouTube videos. How to get the OBD2 working. Just search it on Bluetooth2 and pair it. The amazing car radio already has an app called Torque Pro installed and it takes a few seconds to sync up with the adapter. I've got all of the engine data running real time. There is an error code function and I find my recent engine code is "0139", something to do with the O2 sensor on the catalytic converter. I can't clear the fault, means I have to, or have someone, replace the sensor.
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The soup was a one pot deal. I diced the semi-frozen chicken and put it in the pot with a good sized dollop of Irish butter, like 3-4 oz. I began slicing mushrooms and put them into the pot as I went along. The mix in the pot was impressive as it boiled in the Irish butter. By the time I got the last of the mushroom into the pot I thought it was time to start the roux. But the roux is the butter in the pot, also some chicken fat, so I dropped a couple of tablespoons of four into the mix and began mixing, get that flour cooked a bit. There is a flavor change at some point, maybe just a couple of minutes. I didn't let it get that far, I thought it had cooked enough, I began pouring some water into the mix and mixed it with a spoon. Add some 12 year old chicken base, just joking, maybe it's only 8 years old. Also some garlic salt. It's good to let it coalesce before you taste it, then add some of the salty stuff.
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But Teri calls, Cuddily's not feeling well, am I going to show up at the Legion? I'm cooking soup I tell her. I had turned off the heat but there is till something going on while I'm on the phone. Fire. Fire. Try to blow it out, just a little fire in the galley. It smokes, smoke fills the cabin, the soup is sitting covered while the flavors get acquainted. I tell Teri all this and say I will show up at the Legion.
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I had 3 bowls of soup, not big bowls, it was good. I had to brush my teeth in the L Dock men's room that had no power and was dark except for a couple of skylights. Jump in the car and head to the Legion.
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I was able to take 3 photos that were excellent, not because of me but because of nature presenting great vistas in the late afternoon sunlight.
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The bikers and their chicks were showing up, next week is biker week in Ocean City. Just make sure your colors fit. The biker guys were showing a lot of beer belly, the chicks had their stuff coiffed and secure. A trio of "Harley Davidson' devotee's got on electric bicycles and left.
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The image is one of the photos taken in the late afternoon sun.