Up, down, up down, once more for good measure

One of the issues we've had is water collecting in the bilge. This meant a trip up the mast for Mark to suss out the reason since we've checked out all the possible deck leaks. Yup, there are 2 mounting holes at the top of the mast that are open. So down Mark came to purchase the necessary stuff to close it up. Up he went again to install the plugs, down again once he realized he needed a different size. Up once more for good measure with the proper sized plugs and now hopefully we've stopped the water ingress. We really appreciate our ugly mast steps just now. they might not be pretty but they certainly made this job a whole lot easier than it would have been without them.

While he was up the mast, Mark did a bit of investigation to determine why our steaming light comes on when we power up the anchor light. Seems we have a short circuit in the wiring. The question is- is it at the fixture or deep within the mast? We are hoping its at the fixture and the installation of our LED tricolor will cure it. Of course, with our luck it will be the wiring which is toast. The good news is we have an unused wire for a strobe within the mast we can swap out for the wire currently in use. The bad news is this will still be a pain in the butt when we were hoping we just had to have a new tricolor mounting fabricated. We've got to get this sorted as we have a quickly approaching deadline...

While Mark slaved away at the top of the mast, Maura had her favorite cousin over for a sleepover. What do 12 year old girls want to do on perfectly warm, sunny Spring days? Join the madness that is the Kemah boardwalk in Spring. $20 for a ride the roller coaster and spinny rides until you puke wrist band makes for some seriously happy kids. They returned giggling and breathless and full of giddy exuberance. We have to put up with traffic, crowds and noise at the marina but sometimes having a mini amusement park right next to the boat is a pretty sweet deal. If we didn't have a tween it would be something less than awesome but since we do, it works.

While the big girls ran around the boardwalk, Kitty and I stopped by to check on the progress of the wiring. Kitty likes to answer her own questions. "Where Daddy? Daddy on he boat". Kitty looks forward to these little visits through out the day. I do worry about her coming up with some weird associations though.

Currently, her favorite video is the Backyardigans Pirate Adventure and she has used this to form her own association boat=pirate. While we were driving, Kitty piped up from her seat with important information for me- "Daddy on he boat. Daddy a pirate. Daddy say 'arrrgh'". I suppose if you are almost 2 it makes sense, pirates have boats and say 'argh'. Daddy is always on his boat so that must mean he is a pirate although he indulges in far more colorful terms while dealing with the boat than 'argh'. I should probably take this opportunity to tell her that pirates are actually the bad guys and explain the socio-economic and political reasons piracy exists but she is not yet 2 and its just too cute when she says "arrgh" so we will just  skip this opportunity to educate her. I'm sure there are saltier than thou types who will feel I am allowing her to glorify piracy but they can deride me as they please. I promise I won't buy her a little plastic AK 47, at least until she is 3. ;-)

Meanwhile, back on the boat

While we thoroughly enjoyed our vacation, there has been no rest for the weary- or wicked. Or something. The day after we returned from the UK it was back to business.

Mark started to sort out the wiring from the mast. Either the builder or a previous owner thought it would be a good idea to run all the wires from the mast under the sole of the boat. Good in theory but perhaps lacking a bit in execution. What do you do with a drunken sailor? Let him route wiring apparently. Instead of running the wiring through conduit neatly in as direct a manner as possible, the unnamed person responsible for wiring just put them any old place. This meant our bilge and under sole area looked like this:

Not only did this mean tracking down any problems would take three times as long as it should but it meant that we could not use the area for storage and with 4 peeps aboard we need every inch of storage we can squeak out. The chaos and disorder also caused Capt. Perfecto's left eye to twtich funny.

Mark has been painstakingly repairing crappy splicing (if you find your wires are too short, just take a stab at splicing with an exacto knife and duct tape. Still too short? Do it again! Measuring cable is for girlie men!) and routing the wiring neatly under the sole. Thanks to a combo of expandable braid and cable conduit it now looks like this:

All the cabling now is decently spliced, labeled and running through conduit which is neatly tucked away. Now we have a place for storage (we are designing a sliding tray system to hold canned goods) once we move on to the plumbing which has been routed in a similar haphazard manner. Oh and now that I can actually SEE the bilges I think I will be painting them in the very near future. Fantastic! Another project. Whee.

And now that the wiring is nearly done and the plans for the plumbing refit are being finalized we are getting to the fun part. I'm figuring out exactly what I want to do with the galley while Mark and Kitty continue to research our options for electronics. ELECTRONICS! Once we start installing them it means we are really on the down hill side and getting to the bottom of the refit list and I for one will be really, really glad to take that list with every little box ticked and set it on FIYAH! I may or may not dance nekkid around the burning refit list. If I do, I sure as heck won't be posting photos of that on the blog. Somethings are better left to the imagination.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

 In 2 short weeks Texas went from its winter state of dead and brown to full on, sprouting, blooming springtime madness. Weeds have been reproducing with wild abandon in the garden, the grass spouted well past ankle height to the dismay of our HOA and the roses have utterly taken over. I spent 3 days just trying to tidy up the grass, weed the beds, trim the crepe myrtles that have arisen from their slumber with a jolt and cut back the roses which have formed a hedge worthy of Maleficient. I did have some pretty cute helpers, although Kitty prefers to pluck roses and throw the petals like confetti at a parade more than anything else. Maura is an ace weeder though- with a bit of prodding that is. Our reward at the end of the gardening marathons were beautiful, big as saucer blooms through out the house. Nice.

Progess

All of the upgrade/project wiring is now complete. There is no longer any need for hours to be spent on schematics, wiring looms and installation because all of it is finito! To be sure, there is still a bit of straight forward rewiring to be done such as wiring in the nav lights etc, but all of the new additions are complete.

 Mark thought it would be a good idea to post his schematics in case there are other  Captain Perfecto's lurking about and I don't think that is a bad idea at all I just need to figure out how to post a PDF to blogger....I suppose if there is someone out there desperate to have a finished wiring schematic in hand sooner than later (we're doing a bit of traveling it will be a few weeks) just drop us an email and we'll send it on to you. Ceol underscore Mor at yahoo but it IS a boat wiring schematic and will not have appeal to anyone unless they are up to their eye balls in boat wiring.

Mark asked my which winch I felt was a better choice for us- Andersen or Lewmar. I hadn't done any research and don't have enough practical experience to have an opinion but I was pretty excited that Mark was now thinking about deck hardware. We are now discussing blocks and winches and cleats. I find this all terribly exciting because it means we are moving forward and getting just a wee bit closer...

We are getting somewhere....

Mark estimates that the wiring is now 85% complete. I am thinking it is more likely that we are somewhere around 70% done but only because we seem to be receiving a new control panel every 2 weeks or so. Control panels that are allowing us to put useful functionality into Ceol Mor but that require components to be ordered, schematics to be redrawn and of course all those shiny bits to be wired in. Mark is a man obsessed with beautiful, functional control panels. Our new panel installation number is now at 3- 2 auxilliary panels and the main panel. No more panels please Mark, we are running out of exposed teak.

Some folks say that you need to solder all your connections, while others say crimping is the way to go. Mark is doing both soldering and crimping as its the "proper way to do it". We will never ever purport to have expert opinion on sail trim. Lord knows we won't point to Ceol Mor as an example of the right way to anchor. Electrical stuff though IS Mark's forte, speciality and area of expertise. Seriously. Trust me on this one. To my friend who said that soldering was a bad idea because wiring moves, well if your wiring is moving "you are doing it wrong". ;) So go ahead and look at the beautifully soldered, crimped wiring with every circuit labeled and the tidy installation of it all. Now you understand why it is taking forever...

Mark made a wiring loom to keep everything neat and tidy. You can't see the carefully drawn wiring map leading to nails which allow us to work in a tidy manner without tangles. I'll try to get a detailed  photo up of the loom because it has made the wiring of the control panels so much easier, I don't know how people work without them.

                                                                                                                                                                            

Mark had an idea for a feature on the blog. He wants me to share his "tool of the month. I said so along as this wasn't a ploy to add the latest and greatest shiny gadget to his arsenal that we could do that. So here is 'Captain Perfecto's Tool of the Month'. A 12 ton manual hydraulic crimper. In Capt. Perfecto's estimation, this is the bees knees. You got ours on Ebay. You can too: 12 Ton Manual Hydraulic Cable Crimper

While we- and by we I mean Mark works on wiring the components in indoors while the temperatures are so cold, the girls busy themselves near by. Maura is keeping busy by beading on her bead loom or by trying her hand at string art. As Maura worked to hammer in nails to create her design, Kitty has to get in on the action because tools are involved and Kitty loves tools. She loves tools almost as much as she loves helping Mark go over wiring schematics.

Meanwhile, I'm working on a few beautification projects for Ceol Mor that will hopefully be installed in the next 2 months at which point we should be sailing again. I can't tell you how much I am looking forward to getting this boat away from the dock, if even for only a few hours.

A home for the batteries

Batter compartment under the girls berth- Before

We now have a safe, secure and tidy home for the battery bank. Mark built and installed the ribs in order to get the batteries up off the curved bottom of the hull. He then built trays out of hardwood, painted them and installed them with stainless steel brackets. He's made a hardwood frame with  stainless steel brackets to fit on top so the batteries will be well secured.

This being a Captain Perfecto project, it has of course spawned two additional projects. The water heater in the forward left of the photo is according to Mark "looking tired" so of course he is now going to replace it. That wasn't on the list but if I comment on that fact I will only be stealing his joy. There is nothing worse than stealing another person's joy so I will just say "okay", hide my fear of never leaving the docks because the boat is never finished and start researching water heaters.

Ribs for hold in progress- this will hold the battery trays level

The other project was on the list but it has moved to the front of Mark's mind. The hose on the right of the photos is the rear head discharge line. It will be replumbed to discharge to a through hull right behind the head eliminating the run of hose through the battery compartment.

Ribs installed, ready for painting and installation of battery trays

Meanwhile, old copper wiring is being replaced by tinned wiring. So what camp are we in- solder or crimp? Both. Mark is adamant that all wires must be crimped and soldered. I had a good friend who disagrees with this as "you don't want to solder anything that moves". Mark's take is that if the wiring is moving he's done it wrong. Since electrical stuff is Mark's forte, we'll just go with it.

Painted, installed, secured and ready for new batteries and the top frame

'Electrical Banana Is Bound To Be The Very Next Phase'

Five points to me for being able to use an obscure psychedelic era lyric from a Scottish singer as a title. The boat is somewhat banana shaped and we are definitely on a electrical phase so the title works. The photo above is what currently lies all over the salon floor of Ceol Mor- ripped out wiring.

With the major repairs finished, its time to move on to the woefully scattered wiring system. I use the term "system" very loosely because what we are actually confronted with might technically be wiring, but so far as Mark can tell there was no system in place. Wires were routed not to prevent loss of voltage or to protect from chafe or anything sensible like that, but to enable the boat yard workers to get to lunch quickly and to knock off work on Friday by 2pm.

I suppose its not entirely fair to castigate Ceol Mor alone for truthfully, any boat would have failed to meet Mark's specifications of what constitutes a "properly wired boat". See, Mark is not just an engineer (Boffin cred +1). He is an electrical engineer (Boffin cred +2). Not only an electrical engineer, but sub seaelectrical engineer (Boffin cred +3). He takes to schematics and transmission line equations like the proverbial duck to water. I tease him to bits about his OCD like precision but truthfully its really kind of great to see him in his element.

After he ripped out the old wiring, he spent a couple of days planning his attack. Above you see his first schematic for the new wiring at the rear of the boat. Each of the dashed subgroups will be getting its own schematic and each individual item a further schematic. Every wire will be properly sized, numbered and documented and all of this information will be handily recorded in the ships log which will make fault finding and wiring in new equipment as straight forward as possible.

I told Mark he should do a schematic of the wiring that came on the boat as a "before" point of reference. He replied that I must be joking because did I realize that not only was there no order to the wiring or the way in which equipment was added and wired in but the time it would take to do this would be a big, big waste of time. I told him that I would rework his present schematic to accurately illustrate what our starting point was. He didn't think I could do it, but I have. Seems he's not the only smarty pants in the family. Go me.