Today we are all lazy and just hanging about doing not much of anything. Michele is cat-napping.... The kids are playing in the v-berth and I abandoned plans to dinghy over to town because the harbor is a bit rough with the wind blowing as it is. We plan to hike to the top of monument hill later this afternoon with some friends and I figure that feat alone should make the day a success. We will of course go swimming because the water temp is such a pleasure.

We had yet another great day at the beach yesterday with a whole gang of people and last night we had drinks over on "Avalon" with John and Sarah and their kids Madison and Malia. They keep 3 rats as pets aboard which Taylor found really cool. Me? Uhhhhhhh I think its great that they keep rats. We will not. J

Given that not much is going on, I figured it's the perfect time to bore everyone with details on how life is aboard the Lillie Mae. Living on a boat is definitely different but so far most of our goals for all of the huge refit work we did have been met. For those who hate technical boat talk.... Quit now! (that means you Lori and Christy)

When we purchased the Lillie Mae, she was very basic in systems. The only means of charging the batteries was the engine driven alternator and the main engine also drove the compressor that operated both the refrigerator and freezer. The battery bank was only 240 amp hours and the insulation on the fridge and freezer were a very bad joke so the big diesel engine had to be run 1.5 hours every morning and every evening. Not only did the noise and heat from this drive us crazy and burn up diesel fuel but running a 75hp diesel engine using only 5hp at 1200rpm or so is HORRIBLE for the engine.

(In fact, I am positive that this is ultimately what killed our old engine. The old Yanmar had 4000 hours on it and probably 3500 of those was ticking over at 1200rpm charging batteries and running the fridge compressor. Running your diesel in that manner causes it to build up carbon deposits and sludge that ultimately can lead to all sorts of serious problems including broken rings which is what probably happened to ours. )

Lillie Mae also came with no navigational equipment to speak of, no A/C, a broken down old hot water heater, no working showers and almost all of her systems were original meaning they were over 25 years old.

Below is an outline of all the refit work I did to her since the purchase and most of this was done over the past 6 months.

- Complete re-engineering and replacement of all pressure water lines, fittings, fixtures, filters and manifolds. This was a huge job where I re-routed all of the lines, used a higher quality line material than original and better fittings and built in better filtration and means for maintenance. I installed a new Raritan 12 gallon hot water heater that works from a heat exchanger with the engine or electrically from the main AC panel. We often run the Honda generator for 45 minutes or so in the evening and this makes enough hot water for us to take a nice shower. I installed a 3M filtration system for drinking water with its own faucet at the galley sink, this is basically designed to remove any tank taste from the water we drink. All of this is stuff unseen and rarely thought of but the entire system now works perfectly and should for many years.

- Replacement of all head and sanitation hoses. I replaced all of the original plumbing associated with both heads on the boat including all of the sanitation hoses and deck drain hoses using super-duper $10 per foot non-permeable hose. This guarantees no odors. That is a VERY good thing. I also rebuilt the Lectra-San. What is that I hear? A Lectra-San is an on board sewage treatment plant that emulsifies and then electrocutes your poo. That's right folks, we ELECTROCUTE our crap and then we pump it overboard. Ahhhh what a fun topic! I also restored the holding tank, replaced all the Y-valves, rebuild the Lavac toilet pumps and replaced the raw water feed lines for the Lavac heads.

- Rebuilding and Repairing of ROT. An old boat gets rot. Remember in the movie "Captain Ron" when Ron leans on the hatch opening and it breaks off and he says "Its just dry rot Boss.... All boats got it. At least yours is above the water line, errrr at least most it" Well, Captain Ron was right again. All older boats got it. On Lillie Mae I found, removed and replaced/rebuilt extensive areas that had experienced various degrees of rot. I used large amounts of Starboard on much of this, 3 full sheets of ¾ teak plywood (some of this on various new cabinets) and I also went through 3 full gallons of West System epoxy.

- Fun in the bilge..... I had lots of this. I rebuilt both our Whale 10 and Whale 30 manual bilge pumps and re-engineered how they were mounted to ensure proper operation. I also replaced the primary hoses and all hose clamps used on these. I installed a new Rule 4000gph automatic bilge pump along with all the associated wiring, plumbing, thru-hull and vented loop and a secondary 500gph automatic electric bilge pump that can be switched between draining the main bilge or the separate bilge area under the engine. I installed a new electric shower sump and plumbed our forward head shower to drain to this along with the sinks in both heads. I fabricated a new PVC drain manifold and plumbed it so the secondary electric bilge pump, shower sump and watermaker brine discharge all shared it to use a single thru-hull. I also repainted the entire bilge, organized all plumbing hoses and electrical wiring and ensured everything was mounted and routed in a seaworthy manner. HUGE amounts of work..... none of it visible to the naked eye when you step on board.

- I broke down in wimpyness and installed air conditioning. Now that we are living on the hook with no shore power we cannot use it, but while in Jacksonville doing refit work and during the super cold winter while we were stuck in refit hell this was a life saver. I installed two units, both from Flagship Marine: an 18K btu unit forward and a 12K btu unit aft, both with electric heating elements and both BIG projects to get fully installed, plumbed and wired up

- New refrigerator and freezer units. Ahhhh such a simple 5 word explanation. That just does not do justice to the $9K + and literally hundreds of hours of work this entailed. I ripped out the entire system that was installed when we purchased the boat. By "ripped out" I mean that when I was done there was a giant hole in the galley where a massive section of the naked fiberglass hull was bared. I built new custom boxes constructed of ¾" foam insulation board, alloy foil duct tape, contact cement, 10 mil thick plastic sheeting and foil lined plastic bubble wrap insulation materials. I then made templates to fit all sides of the boxes and sent them to Glacier Bay in California who constructed custom fitted Vacuum Insulation Panels for my boxes. These 1" thick VIPs provide insulation rated at R-50.... Equal to over 8" of regular Styrofoam insulation material and thus allowing much larger food storage space within the same overall box footprint. When the VIP's had been glued in, I lined them with ¼" thick marine plywood that had been painted with epoxy on all sides and the seams were sealed with spray foam insulation followed by thickened epoxy. When the insides were thus all sealed up and faired, I coated them with 6 coats of epoxy and then painted them gloss white. I used two separate Frigoboat keel-cooled compressor systems using the Danfoss BD50 compressor and evaporator plates along with the Smart Speed Controller systems, one system for the fridge and another for the freezer. There was lots of work installing all of this including having to have the boat hauled out for the keel cooler installations. I fabricated new cabinets and countertops, installed R-Parts VIP doors with double sealing strips and when it was all done had marble countertops done throughout the entire galley and both heads. The end result of all this is a 5 cubic foot freezer that stays between 0 and 5 degrees and a 12 cubic foot fridge that runs 35-38 degrees, both running off the battery bank and using amazingly little power. Again, something you really do not see when you come aboard but something that has really made our cruising much easier.

- Increased battery bank and all new batteries. After removing the ancient engine driven refrigerator compressor and all its mounts and plumbing from the front of the engine room, I glassed in new mounting pads and installed a large removable platform on which to mount additional batteries. I then built a sturdy plywood battery box and installed it on the platform. This holds 4 Group 31 Lifeline AGM batteries wired in a single bank with 3 additional Lifeline Group 31s in the factory battery box. Together this gives us 730 amp hours of battery capacity. I also installed a new AGM windlass battery forward near the windlass unit and a new AGM starter battery and a pair of Xantrex echo charger units for both the windlass and starter battery. All of the battery cables were also replaced as everything was custom wired for all of the new applications.

- Magnum Energy 2kw inverter and 100 amp battery charger with remote smart controller and battery monitoring system. This setup has been fantastic, it generates all the 110V power we need and it does a perfect job keeping the batteries charged at the dock OR whenever we plug in our Honda Eu 2000i gas generator. When we run the little Honda generator on the back deck, we simply plug it directly into the shore power receptacle. I can quickly program the Magnum charger to set maximum shore power to 15 amps and it thus will distribute power to the panel and/or charger without over stressing the Honda. The Magnum battery monitor tells us exactly how many amps of power we are using or how many are being put back into the batteries and it gives us at the touch of a button the overall charge state of the batteries. It does tons of other stuff too.... Lots of it I have not even figured out yet. (What? ME read a manual?)

- Aluminum rear arch with deck storage boxes. This has been a really great setup. The guys at Morgan Metals in Jacksonville, FL designed and custom built an arch that not only provides the perfect mount for our solar panels but gives us rod holders and a large platform off the back of the boat that holds a pair of 160 quart Igloo coolers that we use as deck boxes. We store the Honda generator there... gasoline, tons of spare running rigging and lines, blocks and tackle, 2 outboard engines, snorkeling gear.... All sorts of stuff we used to have to dig out of storage below but now is quickly and easily available. At sea we using ratcheting straps to secure these boxes and this has worked out great. I also store the sailing rig to my paddle board lashed under the arch along with dinghy paddles and other stuff.

- Solar Panels and Controller. We installed 4 Kyocera 130 watt solar panels on top of our arch where they get excellent sunlight and no shading from the mast or rig. These are wired with two pair in series for 24 volts into the charge controller which is programmed for 12 volt output. We use a Blue Sky Energy 50 amp MPPT smart charge controller with a remote display at the Nav station. While this setup was difficult to install and get it all setup and working correctly and it used a great deal of very heavy gauge and expensive marine battery cable the payoff is a boat that pretty much powers itself. With 520 watts of solar, as long as the weather is nice we have excess power. On most days, the battery bank is fully charged by 2pm with us frequently seeing 35 amps input and sometimes as high as 40. Even on days when we run the watermaker the solar panels keep the batteries topped off. When its overcast, we run the Honda for a couple of hours in the evening. We are admitted power hogs watching movies on a large flat panel, playing the Wii, running fans and in general not making much effort to conserve power and so far the panels are for the most part running the boat.

- Entertainment Systems. This is worthless stuff to some... but with 2 kids on board and plus my own needs for some fun I splurged a bit here. We have a 27" flat panel on a heavy duty articulating mount in the main salon along with a surround sound speaker system with sub-woofer. We like movies... this setup lets us all watch them in style. We also have a Wii gaming system than is mounted to plug into this same setup and the kids love playing on it (so do I ). We have a nice JVC stereo with ipod and iphone plugins built in that feeds a distribution system for the speakers. We have 2 speakers in the main salon, 2 in the aft cabin, 2 in the cockpit and 2 on the rear arch. You can select via buttons at the Nav station any combination of speakers you want. I also built a new cabinet out of teak plywood and trim in the aft cabin between the berths that gives us a great deal more storage space and let me mount another 21" flat panel with speakers such that Michele and I can watch movies while lying in bed. We have really enjoyed this setup.

- Chartplotter and Navigation / Radio gear. We mounted a Standard Horizon CPF300i 8" display chart plotter and fish finder in the cockpit and we purchased C-Map Max Pro charts for the entire continental US and Caribbean for it. So far it has performed flawlessly. We also have a pair of Lowrance H2Oc hand help GPS chart plotters with Navionics charts for backup AND I have the Navionics chart plotter program for my iPhone which has been really great to use. I actually find the iPhone app to be far easier to use than any of our other plotters. We have a puck type GPS that links into our laptop computer where we have full electronic charts that also overlay on google earth on the big screen and another hand help GPS that is very basic giving us a total of 6 on board. We have an Acer AIS B automatic identification system linked into the Standard Horizon so all commercial vessels show up as an icon on the chart plotter and give us their name, course, speed and other data. The Acer system also broadcasts to all AIS equipped vessels (all commercial vessels are required to have this) all of the same information for us so I can have more assurance that commercial shipping will see us on their screens. We have a VHF at the Nav station below plus 2 hand helds and we have an ICOM M700Pro SSB Marine radio. We also have a Furuno radar system good to 24 miles that is older but still works very well. We carry extensive paper charts covering the entire Caribbean and US East Coast in detail along with dividers and rulers, hand bearing compass, spotting and range scope with compass and 3 sets of binoculars including the Fujinon stabilized version.

- Shower! I installed a shower track and curtain with custom snaps that very quickly slides and snaps into place in the forward head. This gives us a large shower stall and prevents the entire head from getting wet. The shower drains to the sump with electric pump. I also installed a nice shower mixer setup with sliding rail mounted removable nozzle. We went from having no showering ability on board at all when we bought the boat to a very nice setup complete with shower massage ability.

- Watermaker. I installed a Cape Horn Extreme 14 gallon per hour reverse osmosis system that is battery powered and very energy efficient. It is a fairly simple system and it is without a doubt one of the very best upgrades to the boat we made. It is fantastic to not have to worry that much about water use nor have to move the boat around always planning on where and when we will next need a marina for tanking water. In the Bahamas a watermaker is VERY nice and really gives the cruiser freedom.

- Full Cockpit Enclosure. We had a full enclosure built for our cockpit that not only keeps the wind out but is just about completely water tight. The cockpit is now an all weather hang out place and when at sea keeping watch is now a pleasure despite sea spray or rainy weather. Along with the watermaker this has been one of the most obviously successful upgrades. A full enclosure is like adding a whole new cabin or salon to the boat.

The refit lists goes on... rebuilding of the Force 10 propane stove with new burners, rebuilt the propane locker and solenoid system, rebedded a number or hatches and ports, built a mast step drain system that drains to the shower sump, re-wired most of the main electrical panel to clean up the overall wiring and remove lots of old and unused wires, replaced 90% of the electric lights with LED bulbs, installed new light fixtures, new microwave oven....

Then there was of course the nightmare that was the installation of the brand new Yanmar 4JH4-TE engine and transmission. I still lose sleep over that mess.

Now that it is all done, we are very happy with the Lillie Mae. It was just shy of 5 full months of pretty much full time liveaboard 12 hours per day work, it was crazy expensive (far more than my worst case budgeting attempts) and it just about drove us all to abandon the entire endeavor more than once. I would NEVER advise anyone to attempt the change to a cruising lifestyle like we did. Do the projects one at a time over a longer period of time while out cruising and having fun. DO NOT attempt to tear everything apart and rebuild the boat in one giant project. This was a mistake that just about killed our cruising before it even got started.

Lille Mae is now a great floating home. We have everything we need to live comfortably off the grid for extended periods of time. She is not only sea kindly and sea worthy but she is downright comfortable and fun.

I may add a wind generator down the road at some point and for sure we are going to get a small icemaker plus there are always more projects to be tackled but at least we are now out having fun!

The photo is a shot of the main salon during the refit mess and this really doesn't even begin to portray how monumental the destruction and mess was aboard Lillie Mae at the height of the rebuilding efforts.