June 27, 2011

It was a hot and sultry day at Lake Wobeg....I mean Hidden Harbor. But it was still nice to be there after a week focused on clearing out the house and making runs to my new storage unit. Not to mention work in the office.

As a consequence of clearing out the house, I had a whole truckload of gear to unload and stow on Circadian. Since it was a hot day, the first item on the day's agenda was to see if I could make the awning I had made for my previous boat work on Circadian. It did, but seemed to have shrunk significantly when in place on the much larger Circadian. Once the awning was up, I did the pack animal thing, and carried hundreds of pounds of gear down the rickety docks onto Circadian. I managed to get everything on board, but it's clear a lot of weight is going to end up in the wrong places until I complete more of the restoration.

I had also brought along a hunk of 3/4" plywood to use to extend one of the two single v-berths so that it can be used as a double. The previous owners had simply put a filler piece between the two berths. While it's simple and makes for a roomy berth, it makes access to the drawers and lockers below the berths extremely difficult. I measured and cut the filler piece, and removed the teak side board from an old extension that no longer fit the v-berth. Later, I'll recut and refinish the sideboard at home, and install it on the new extension. Once the new fill piece was cut to size, I put it in place both to check the fit and to assess access to the drawers and lockers below. Access to those under the remaining single berth was pretty good. To get to the drawer under the extended berth, the extension will need to swing up. I expected that, and plan to make the new mattress in two pieces to allow it.

The afternoon was devoted to finishing up and securing the wiring for the instruments I had mounted on the new ceiling panel last week. It turned out to be one of those "up hill" projects in which nothing fits or works the first time. For example, the power supply wires for the VHF turned out to be literally one inch too short, necessitating splicing in a new section. While I was cutting the wiring to the old ABI dome light so that I could reconnect it to the supply wire now routed under the ceiling panel, one of the switches simply fell apart in my hand. It was so flimsy, that reassembling it was impossible. Nonetheless, I eventually got all the wiring routed, secured, and hidden behind a new cable cover on the pillar between the doghouse windows. In addition to looking better and preventing problems caused by loose wiring, the neat wiring also makes removing and reinstalling the instruments much easier. It was a lot of hot, sweaty work, but with the help of some cold beer, I eventually got it done. After I've mounted all the instrumentation I plan to have on the ceiling panel, I'll cover the wiring with a panel covered in the same black marine vinyl as the ceiling panel. I also added a supply wire for a new cockpit light. The wiring inside the cabin is still loose and unsecured, and that too will be need to be taken care of before I cast off.