I made my own water filtration system that I use when filling my holding tanks. I take the approach that, no matter where it is from, the water is dangerous due to flukes, cysts, parasites, bacteria, and so forth. Many of the health problems in third-world countries are due to contaminated water. My “system” is pretty… [Read More]
Electrical System 101
There are a lot of electrical system questions on the various forums and messages boards. I certainly do not have any new information but I thought perhaps stating what I know might help some folks. I’ve certainly listened to two people say the same thing and only understood one them. Let’s limit our discussion to… [Read More]
LED Lights #4
I’ve been playing with inexpensive LED lights for the sailboat for a while now. Specifically, the Festoon style bulbs. For the history; view post #1, post #2, post #3, and post #4. I think I have made progress this time. The current batch of LED lights are 18 SMD LED’s and are very bright. I took this… [Read More]
Power Inverter Planning
At first glance, selecting an inverter to convert 12 Volt electricity in your battery bank to 110-115 volt “house” electricity is easy, right? Well, as with most things, nothing is easy. There are a lot of options and a lot of things to consider in your decision making/product selection. I certainly do not have all… [Read More]
Port Light Seals
The port light seals (gasket) on my sailboat were becoming dried out and would stick when I opened the window. I do not have any leaks (that I know of) though. I had read that the best way to freshen/recondition these seals is to work some white Vaseline into them. This past week, I took… [Read More]
Fuel Pickup
I removed the pickup line from the diesel fuel tank of my Hunter 34 sailboat. I was hoping to find an obvious problem that would explain my recent “out of fuel” problem documented here. The fitting/assembly came out of the tank easily and I didn’t break or lose anything!! Yeah! Sadly, the “obvious” was missing. Even under… [Read More]
To be cold or not to be cold
I arrived back home after a week long trip to find my kitchen freezer working just fine but the refrigerator not very cool. This is the side-by-side type of appliance. A little research revealed that most kitchen refrigerator-freezer units send cold air from the freezer side to the refrigerator side. So, that was good news. I… [Read More]
LED Cabin Light Testing
This is very un-scientific but is yet another data point for me. I installed the festoon LED cabin lights mentioned here and waiting til it was dark outside. The results were ok but not what I was hoping for. The cabin was not well lit. Rather, very dungeon like. From this test, it is clear… [Read More]
Naked
I hated to do it but it seemed like the right thing to do. I removed the canvas from my boat. The Bimini and Dodger both came down and are safely stowed below. I happen to be at the boat in Florida this week and saw the storms building in the Atlantic. I figure if… [Read More]
Bilge Fuel
Many boat captains are not aware of the need for Bilge Fuel. This is kind of frightening when you consider that nothing works without some kind of fuel, right?!? After having been away from my boat for awhile, I checked the bilge in my sailboat today. I was very pleased to find a good supply… [Read More]