String theory

In the beginning God created the heaven and earth. And the earth was without form, or void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep. "Um Dad? can I ask you a question?" "Make it quick son, can't you see I'm busy?" "I know, but are you going to leave all of those quantum strings you're using just laying around for the inhabitants to find?" "Don't worry son, when they find them, and figure out how to use them, I will just get really far away. I don't need the tan." Now go back, and keep practicing on Pluto, it looks like a potato for gosh sakes. Let me be. I barely have a week to get the job done, and this photon stuff is very tricky, but if you're good, we can play Asteroids when I'm done." "Thanks dad."

The attorney's boat

Limited Liability Waiver

for travel on the M/V Sosueme

1. In consideration for receiving permission to travel on the M/V Sosueme, I hereby RELEASE, WAIVE, DISCHARGE, AND COVENANT NOT TO SUE the owner, his family, agents, marina staff, boat manufacturer, (hereinafter referred to as RELEASEES) from any and all liability, claims, demands, actions, and causes of action whatsoever arising out of or related to any loss, damage, or injury, including death or injury, or loss caused by drowning, electrocution, food poisoning, drunkenness, bad hair, heat stroke, shark bites, fire, jellyfish stings, sunburn, angry boaters, lighting strikes, sinking, carbon monoxide asphyxiation, collisions, Coast Guard citations, lost hats, sea sickness, allergic reactions, marital arguments, windburn, dehydration, pregnancy, blood loss, groundings, or any other life threatening, and or any other deleterious event that may be sustained by me, or to any property belonging to me, while participating in such activity, while in, on, upon or near the vessel, or even anywhere where the activities, related or not are being conducted, REGARDLESS OF WHETHER SUCH LOSS IS CAUSED BY THE NEGLIGENCE OF THE RELEASEES, or otherwise and regardless of whether such liability arises in tort, contract, strict liability, or otherwise, to the fullest extent allowed by law.

The pilot's boat

Walk around check list
Fuel fill secured..........CKD
Waste fill secured..........CKD
Water fill secured..........CKD
Anchor secured..........CKD
Bilge status..........CKD
Bilge pump test..........CKD
Visual check of engines..........CKD
Battery water levels..........CKD
Fuselage damage..........CKD
Communication antennas..........CKD 


External Power
Ground power available..........ON/CKD 
Voltage checked..........110VAC/220VAC
Pedestal buss breaker..........ON/CKD
Battery switch..........BOTH/CKD

Aluminum animus

Bronze has been around, well at least since the start of the bronze age, about 3000 BCE. As a matter of fact, the first use of metals starts with gold around 6000 BCE, and by the time Jesus appears, there are only seven known metals in the world. Their appearance in history starts with gold, then copper, silver, lead, tin, iron, and mercury. Aluminum however was first made in a crude form in 1825, and really wasn't a viable commercial metal until the late 1800's. It's a marvelous material when used in the right place for the right reasons. But I would opine that dash panels are not a good long term use for this material, especially when exposed to the salt water environment. 

In the real world, or at least in my version of it, I know why it's used, and that's because you can make it pretty, much to the delight of the marketing departments. From this installers viewpoint, the stuff is a real pain in the ass to deal with.

Ships log, the North Channel

July 29th

Pulled into the Bad River anchorage last evening, and this morning was eventful. Little Johnny said there was water on the floor of his cabin, and there was. The seawater hose for the toilet had cracked. I used a piece from the garden hose to fix it, and pumped the water out. The only causality was all of the canned goods were stored below, and all of the labels came off. A couple of those sailbote guys came rowing over, and complained about the Coleman generator on the swim platform running all night. What was I supposed to do? The kids wanted to watch movies, and Joan wanted the AC on. What a whiny lot. The place is nice, but you can't get a TV signal at all. Sent the kids ashore to dump the garbage some place, pumped the holding tank out, and we headed for Killarney.

It's one thing after another, it's a boat.

A friend of mine recently bought a late model outboard motor that was attached to a free older center console boat. On the whole it was a very good buy, but the previous owner was somewhat cack handed at repairs, if they were made at all. The boat hull was buffed back into shape, and out it goes for an inaugural trip which results in a near sinking in some rowdy water. As the vessels stern compartment was filling with water it was observed that the bilge pump was not functional, but with some luck they made it back to the boat ramp. After waiting for half an hour for the water to drain out, home they went. I came over to look, and to listen to the story. Everything was fine in the beginning, but it was getting rough by the time they noticed the lowered back end and returned

Johnson bilge pump wiring, "Splained to Lucy."

Lets start with the fact that Johnson bilge pumps are excellent pumps. Good, now that's out of the way. My issue is only with some less than crystalline wiring documentation. Let me take that back, it's not that the wiring diagram is incorrect, it's just poorly labeled. When you have two wires, and one is labeled brown #1, and the second is labeled brown #2, some inherent confusion will result. In reality there are not two brown wires, there is a brown wire, and then there is a brown/red wire. Why the wonky nomenclature? Just call one brown, and the other brown/red?

Hole of the week, and "Name that bad boat, the new prime time game show"

It's sweltering. The fan is roaring next to me, and I'm soaked to the bone in my own sweat. My arms are black and blue from the continual impacts against the sharp edges of a tiny access hole as I pull a cable. I think to myself, I shouldn't have enrolled in that marine installer's training school I saw advertised on that pack of matches. They promised me a glamorous and exciting career in marine technology. I should have drawn the picture of Blinky the clown, and gone to the "Famous Artist" school instead.


I'm just not happy. It's bad enough the working conditions are at times most odious, but the quality of the vessels I work on runs the gamut from fairly good, (never perfect) to lousy examples of design engineering, and implementation with the later predominating. Hearkening back to my very first posting, I made some rules, and set some journalistic standards, which I have maintained so far. 

The point of this blog is to relate my every day frustrations with trying to install a wide variety of marine electronics on boats of all sizes and types. It is hoped that boat builders will read these postings, have an epiphany, and make the small changes needed to make my life easier, and hence save some of my clients hard earned dollars. I am going to abide by the rule, that I will leave the offending boat builders names out of the blog, but you know who you are, and straighten up.


The rules were simple. Do no harm. Use only close up photographs if you were pointing out someone's less than perfect design work or implementation, and don't publish the offenders names. Using the close up photos would allow the builders to recognize their own work, but it would be very difficult for the average reader to know whose bad work it was. I may change my mind about all of this.

The inquisition

"SILENCE! Bow down in awe whilst his most eminent, and fearsome "Installer" enters the chamber. His justice shall be swift and righteous. Bring forth the prisoner with his confession, and lock him in the stocks. The inquisition will now begin. You may now sit. The heinous crimes perpetrated by this guilty boat owner shall now be read aloud for all to hear."

The boat is a zinc'er

The boat is eating itself alive. It's almost like it has a case of aluminum flesh eating bacteria. Purchased about a year ago, the owner had this 1999 cuddy cabin single outboard sent in for a new bottom job, and it was then was moved to the owners slip. A few months later, the owner's diver noted that the engine zincs needed to be replaced, and they were. A few months later, again the engine zincs need replacement, and they were again. About six months into ownership, a motor tilt hydraulic cylinder failed, and the boat went into a local marina for repair, and it was discovered that the motor mount was severely corroded, including chewing a hole through the lift cylinder housing, causing the failure. The owner was understandingly concerned, and he should have been. 

Obsolescence

Just a little fun, shouldn't I really be out working on a boat in the 100 degree Florida sun?
Click here to find out where your electronics end up when they are obsolete

Boating the NASA way

"What's the most exciting thing that has ever happened to us" asks Kate. My first reaction was that god awful storm we sailed through on Georgian bay. Kate says "No, I think the shuttle launch", and she was right. We left the house at 1:00 am, and drove to Titusville. We arrived a bit after 5:00 am at a large hotel's lobby jammed full of reporters, camera crews, and NASA contractors. We find our host, grab some bagels, are given our passes, and hop into his car. Every square inch of the causeway's shoulders going out the space center is jammed with vehicles. We get checked through the main KSC guard gate, and then through another check point, and drive up to the observation area set aside for employees and contractors. We are now about three miles from the shuttle, with a clear view, and as close as NASA will let unprotected personnel get. It is now about T minus 30 minutes, and counting. A long row of metal bleachers are set up with a PA system that's providing the communication feeds between the NASA centers, and the shuttle. We have our host from Morton Thiokol on one side of us, and a group from Rockwell on the other side who are translating what is happening. 

Oops, short lessons

Lower bridge?

Lowered antenna.

Going green?

Buy new transducer.

Illustrated lessons for a less expensive boating life. The morals, check your antenna, before the low bridge does it for you, and it will. The green stuff on the chart is where birds stand, and it's never a good idea to take your boat there.

Oh the horror, filthy bilges , dirty jobs

I open the hatch, look down into the engine room, and reel back in dismay. Several inches of black oily water, intermingled with amorphous brown lumps sloshing at the keel. Every place you could put your on feet is covered with black slime. The once white engines are now grayish, and look like Jackson Pollock had painted them with a pallet that consisted of only used black engine oil. Old egg crate insulation foam crumbles into dust at the slightest touch. "You gotta be kidding. Is this a joke, you want me to work down there? Do I look like I own a Hazmat suit? I have one word for you, "Soap" and lots of it. Have you heard about this stuff? After seeing this, I know I don't want to see what the head looks like. Not a chance, hire someone to clean up this pigsty if you can't, and don't call me until it's looking better. Believe it or not even marine installers have some marginal  standards."

Stiffening up a small Garmin GPS

I have thrown, metaphorically speaking, a zillion of these small Garmin 4x and 5x chart plotters into boats. They are compact, full featured, and a good choice for smaller boats. In most cases they are good to go as installed, but on occasion it would be nice if the mount was a wee bit stiffer. Don't despair, there is an easy way to make the mount a little stiffer, for under a dollar or less, even if you're paying full retail. 

Chilling while inverting, battery powered air conditioning

Once upon a time I was doing on and off electronics work for a small dealership. Along comes a new boater with a check, and he buys a little 26" foot cruiser, but the sale is conditional. The conditional part of this purchase is he has to have air conditioning installed on the boat for his wife to use while on the hook. "No way" I say, "You can't get a genset into this little craft, you can barely get into the engine room in the first place. The customer comes back and says there must be a way. My response is, "Well I can get the air conditioner to fit in the boat, and maybe it could be powered by a portable Honda genset that could ride on the swim platform." His response is "He will check with his wife."

The next day he comes back and says his wife didn't want the portable Honda genset on the boat becuse it would be ugly, and hands me a piece of paper filled with scribbled numbers, and says an inverter could be used. I look at the numbers. "It's theoretically possible", I say, "but the battery bank will be huge, and the weight increase on the boat will be notable." The salesman literally begs me, and against my better judgement, I reluctantly I build it.

Loys gets Toys

You can't take the fascination of the wind away from the sailor. This is truly the case with Loys, an experienced, and avid "Half Ton" sailor. Loys decided he wanted a wind instrument for his hull #1 Intrepid 26' center console boat, and since there was already a small N2K backbone in the boat, the Airmar PB 200 weather station was an ideal choice. It does remarkable things in a very small package with zero moving parts. Okay, I know that it isn't a sail boat, but in the real world, there are some real pluses to having this device on board such as fast real time compass heading data, knowing the barometric pressure, temperature, windchill, the wind direction for docking, and it's also a back up GPS system.

Cardboard boat racing

My reactions were a bit mixed when I first saw the cardboard vessel designs, and they ranged from "That should work", to "Oh dear, what were they thinking". But much to my surprise, all of the boats actually worked surprisingly well, and a lot of thought had gone into what essentially was a construction period of not more than a day. This is one competitive, large, and very unique family.

Bird eating spiders, and the "World's largest air boat"

 "It will be fun Dexter, you might see 1000lb feral boars with tusks of death, spiders big enough to eat birds, poisonous snakes, and the place is really swampy." I note the incredulous look of polite disdain cross young Dexter's face as his somewhat odd uncle tries to pump him up about a day trip to Myakka River State Park. " And oh yeah, we are going to ride on the world's largest air boat, and see lots of man eating alligators," Okay that's better, I suspect he thinks, there might actually be an event here that will enliven what he already knows will be a dreary day with a bunch of adults talking about nature and other dull stuff.

As far as I can tell, and I have done some real digging, the Myakka Maiden is the world's largest air boat. It's 52' long with a beam of 16', and caries up to 73 passengers. Like its sister ship, the Gator Gal (50'), both are plywood flat bottomed West System-esque constructed vessels, and USCG certified. Despite the captain's very interesting, and informative dialog about the flora and fauna of the area, what most passengers really want to see is Florida's official state pet, the alligator, hopefully rending some poor victim into smaller bite sized pieces. Alligators are thick as thieves in the lake, and you will see many of them. Little toy dogs (I call these breeds generically "Kickme's") would last about 60 seconds doing their yipping on the banks of this lake.

Elite Craft's entrails removed, the vessel is gutted.

The boat has truly been ripped apart because it was not perfect. Close to perfect yes, but not perfect. Like an itch in-between your shoulder blades you can't quite reach, it has been nagging at Sandy until he finally snapped. This boat is now 21 years old, and is most likely the best original Elite Craft in existence. I have done a couple of stories about this striking vessel, here, and here also, and it has now been gutted

When I say gutted, I really mean gutted. Out came seats, carpeting, engine, shaft, rudder, all through holes and the list goes on and on.

Out of the closet

Mothra vs the Installer, the BFTV

I clamber onto the boat, and nearly trip over a large box containing a new TV. Alright, this must be the new replacement for the cockpit, and I push it off to the side. I go down into the salon, and upon seeing the box there, I can feel my very soul being sucked into the ether. It's huge, it's heavy, it's the television equivalent of Mothra. My instructions had been clearly stated, we measured, it will fit, make it work. Like most of us that aren't effete intellectual snobs, I watch TV, and to keep marital bliss, I don't alway get to watch exactly want I want. But come on now, do you really need to sit in the dark, and pretend you're in an Imax theater on your boat? Oh well, it's not my role in life to tell people what I think, unless asked, and then it is a rare occasion I don't have an opinion.

Carefree learning for kids, and some adults

And now for the numbers. Carefree Learner is 41' LOA, was built out of plywood and epoxy in 1978 by 96 students from Sarasota high school at no taxpayer expense, and with a lot of help from the community. She has carried over a whopping 174,000 passengers consisting of 6th grade students, Sarasota high school marine science students, and local community organizations over the past 32 years.

My excursion starts with watching the arrival at the dock of Carefree Learner loaded down with a 6th grade class. I was surprised at how orderly the disembarking was, despite the obvious enthusiasm, and energy of the passengers. Life jackets are collected, water bottles found, thanks given to the captains, and the little urchins are herded off by their teachers to a yellow bus to continue their ongoing incarceration in a state mandated institution. Carefree Learner also sports a very unique marine feature, a not oft used 'Time Out" bench back at the helm.