Friday the 19th of March, 2010
Susan & I went to the boat to continue working. My objective for today was to mount the starting and house batteries in new boxes and mount them to the deck in the bilge. I needed to extend the aft head electric wires that was connected directly to the house battery. The wires have always been too short. So, I took out several butt splices and got back to some decent wire and soldered an new positive and negative wire to the existing wire and shrink wrapped it up. I tried a few different ideas about the battery boxes and finally mounted them with the negative terminal toward the fuel tank. Things can just happen sometime and I envisioned a rouge wave situation breaking the battery strap loose; tossing the batteries into the side of the tank and having a positive terminal somehow come in contact with the tank and causing a big spark, fire and explosion. Not likely. But, with the negative battery terminals facing the tank it just seemed better. So, after getting all the wires on the starting battery and house batteries connected and neatened up with wire ties, I strapped the batteries into place. I bought better straps than come with battery boxes. These straps were longer and had a better buckle.
So, then Susan and I looked at each other and decided to take LIQUID THERAPY out for a brief run in the Piankatank River for out initial 2010 operation. I wanted to operate my engine pushing the boat after all the things I have changed on it. So, we took it out of the slip and putted on out Jackson Creek into the Piankatank. I ran the boat a several RPMs and didn't have the GPS hooked up on the fly bridge. I was keeping track of the boat below with my MacEnc software and would review the results later. The boat didn't seem too slow. The cold water it has been sitting in all winter had not fowled the bottom or running gear. No vibration nice ad smooth. I finally ran the engine up to 2500 RPM. That's the max for the Lehman 120. I found out after reviewing my track that we hit 8 KTs. The new exhaust was very quiet. All gauges were great 180º temperature. We slowed down and went back in. Now for the initial docking backing back into the slip. Susan took her position up on the stern and was ready with the boat hook. I threw the wheel hard over to starboard and began shifting and goosing the engine to rotate the 90º to back into the slip. I got it pretty close to 90º and backed in never touching the wheel again. I felt the tug on the forward spring line and I knew we had another successful docking. My definition of a successful docking maneuver is" ANY DOCKING THAT DOES NOT INCURR AN INSURANCE CLAIM" We actually looked like we knew what we were doing. We will have to wait until the next time to entertain the dock watchers with something to gasp about.