And Aw a-a-a-a-a-y-y we go!
Skip Gundlach
refit are finished on Flying Pig. Those interested in the gory
details are encouraged to go to the log sites, the photo galleries,
and perhaps prior emails, but it suffices to say that we've come from
a wreck to a gem.
New hardware, fittings and other niceties following the structural and
hull repairs make our seatrialed vessel seaworthy, comfortable and
otherwise a joy to be aboard. Despite the blistering hot temps here,
we've survived with fans and a night-time shower. Unfortunately for us
in those areas where we may be shortly, if it's 95 out, the fan we
have in the aft cabin, where we sleep, won't be used, as it's 110V,
and a high drain on our electrical system.
That said, we do have household current aboard, and will use it to
charge our computers, power some of our internet and entertainment
stuff, and, even (luxuries are found, even aboard), grind our coffee
in the morning, saving me the 75 strokes on the manual grinder I had
used for about a year, until we were given a very high quality
electric unit which not only does a great job in grinding, but is so
quick as to be nearly meaningless in load on our batteries which
supply the unit which translates 12V to 110V.
I'll spare you the details on what we have done, but it's enough to
say that it's been staggering, and regularly, on the telling of the
umpteen acquaintances we've made as a result of our notoriety, goggled
and jaw-dropped over and about both the amount and speed of our
recovery. In the meantime, lots of new stuff (replacing old) was
added, so we should be very good to go for a long time, ordinary
maintenance aside.
A few days ago, we passed along (to a fellow cruiser) the vehicle
which had, right after our wreck been given us by another cruiser,
and, as I type this, will return the rental we had, later today. As
always with departures, there are last minute runnings-around to
attend to, but they're minor and will be accomplished quickly.
We've acquired so many new and helpful friends that it's difficult to
try to enumerate them, but the significant ones of the moment are
Erkki Taada and Phillip Savill.
Erkki used to build satellites for the Canadian government, and had a
payload on one of the shuttles, among other things. Thus, he's pretty
good at electronics, and has been working tirelessly to get us up and
running in areas we've not yet had success in achieving. He's also
very fully equipped, or has friends who are, where he's not, as a
machinist and other very useful skills, and has helped immensely in
the accomplishment of many mechanical areas.
Phillip is an accomplished power boat captain and master fisherman
(delete questionable joke about baiting skills) who just happens to
also be a master craftsman in wood, having built his own boat to look
like a victorian salon inside, and having done many restorations of
Tampa historic buildings. In the meantime, he used to build boats for
a living, so knows more than enough to have been very valuable in many
other areas aboard.
These two are joining us in our initial leg. We'll anchor overnight
at Egmont Key, the location of our recent sea trials overnight stays,
and head out at first light direct to Key West (nearly a straight shot
south), going around there and continuing direct to Fort Lauderdale.
In FTL we'll stop at the Seven Seas Cruising Association offices for
more charts, attend to any issues which have arisen in our dash
(anticipated time minimum 3, more likely 5-6, days from our expected
Thursday AM departure) there, fuel and water the boat, and head out
again.
>From there we'll jump into the Gulf Stream, gaining 2-4 knots (half
again our boat speed, perhaps), and barring any oddities in distress
or weather, not get off until we either get to the NYC area, or, if
it's *really* fast, perhaps even Cumberland/Portland Maine. The Gulf
Stream, in opposing wind directions, is really nasty. However, this
time of year, that's a very minimal percentage of the time, and the
prevailing winds are favorable for a very fast passage.
The more time we spend aboard, and the more time spent sailing her,
the better we love Flying Pig. We'll be out of touch by both internet
and phone for the periods of our being at sea, but we're hopeful of
being able to do radio-based email in the short-term future. Whether
we get it done before we leave FTL is subject to reality, but when we
have it, we'll identify how to find us that way, too.
We've just had a mini-storm here, washing the decks which are
currently in total disarray, as we've not yet stowed all that we took
off in our rehab. We also are currently (as I type this) without
internet connection, so I'm hopeful I'm able to get it out before we
actually leave. If you see this on Wednesday, July 11, you'll know I
succeeded :{))
Finally, though I know you've heard it many times before, endless
thanks to all who have lent support, work, love, aid and otherwise
helped us turn our wreck around into something more positive than we
can effectively communicate. We're very blessed, and continue to pay
it forward. Obviously, what goes around comes around.
Stay tuned for further developments. As we regain connectivity, we'll
post new pix in the new gallery "Away We Go - - AGAIN" in the Flying
Pig is Aloft gallery - the first one in the link below.
L8R
Love from Skip and Lydia
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to
make it come true. You may have to work for it however."
(and)
"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its
hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts."
(Richard Bach, in The Reluctant Messiah)
KLC Lewis
"Skip Gundlach" <SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1184185418.4...@o61g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...
cavelamb himself
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might:
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright --
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
The moon was shining sulkily,
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business to be there
After the day was done --
'It's very rude of him.' she said,
'To come and spoil the fun!'
The sea was wet as wet could be,
The sands were dry as dry.
You could not see a cloud, because
No cloud was in the sky:
No birds were flying overhead --
There were no birds to fly.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Were walking close at hand:
They wept like anything to see
Such quantities of sand:
'If this were only cleared away,'
They said, 'it would be grand.'
'If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year,
Do you suppose,' the Walrus said,
'That they could get it clear?'
'I doubt it,' said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.
'O Oysters, come and walk with us!
The Walrus did beseech.
'A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
Along the briny beach:
We cannot do with more than four,
To give a hand to each.'
The eldest Oyster looked at him,
But never a word he said:
The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head --
Meaning to say he did not choose
To leave the oyster-bed.
Out four young Oysters hurried up.
All eager for the treat:
Their coats were brushed, their faces washed,
Their shoes were clean and neat --
And this was odd, because, you know,
They hadn't any feet.
Four other Oysters followed them,
And yet another four;
And thick and fast they came at last,
And more, and more, and more --
All hopping through the frothy waves,
And scrambling to the shore.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Walked on a mile or so,
And then they rested on a rock
Conveniently low:
And all the little Oysters stood
And waited in a row.
'The time has come,' the Walrus said,
'To talk of many things:
Of shoes -- and ships -- and sealing wax --
Of cabbages -- and kings --
And why the sea is boiling hot --
And whether pigs have wings.'
Wayne.B
<SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Well, it's been a very long time coming, but the rehab, repairs and
>refit are finished on Flying Pig.
Good luck, and be safe out there.
Slow and steady wins the race.
Keep a good weather eye peeled for those low pressure systems coming
up from the tropics, and from off the coast. I don't want to be
reading any more news articles about you guys.
Wayne B
(currently in Long Island Sound awaiting passage of a mid-western cold
front)
Terry K
And stay away from errant drifting WWII mines, or whatever!
G'Luck!
Have you ever sailed the reversing falls, Billy?
Please show your free laundry ticket to the commissionaire.
Be careful, my wife might recruit you. Wanna watch a parking lot for
8 bucks an hour?
Terry K
Skip Gundlach
We left our slip at about 10:30 yesterday and went up the creek to
fuel. I'd
estimated we'd take 50 gallons, but it was only 48, instead. We
executed a
close-quarters turnaround, and headed out on the rest of our lives -
again! - at a little after 11AM.
The wind was right on our nose heading south, so we motored our way
under
the Skyway Bridge, perhaps for the last time. A few squalls caused
multiple
openings and closings of our hatches and ports, in blistering St.
Pete
summer with 95 degree heat.
Once under the bridge, we set sail on a perfect close reach, and once
past
the shallows at the end of the Southwest Channel, headed direct to Key
West
on a lovely beam reach. We set all the sails (well, the genny, the
staysail
and the main - we'd been told that there would be more wind than would
make
the spinnaker prudent) and pulled confidently forward in all of 5
knots of
wind, making about 5 knots.
Unfortunately for us, the wind was light, then died altogether, so we
pulled
in the furling genny and motored slowly at about 4 knots with the
staysail
and main pulled blade tight to minimize rolling. In truth, though,
the
entire night and most of the next day was nearly flat water. We slowed
the
boat down in order to not arrive in Key West before daylight, and as
I
write, we're again at 4 knots, which will put us at a fishing spot
right at
dawn.
We set up our watch schedules as 8 on/ 8 off, with a pair splitting
each 8
hour shift. So far, that has worked very well, indeed. We were all up
and at
'em in the beginning, of course, so we didn't start our shifts for the
first
few hours. Lydia went immediately for a nap, having stayed up until
3:30,
again, so, needed the rest. Phil and she took the first watch at 4,
and
Erkki and I puttered around with electronics and took naps, coming
back on
duty at midnight in relief. After a wonderful breakfast of French
toast and
eggs, he and I were entertained by not only the Milky Way, but also
light
shows of lightning off in the distance, and even a few meteorites
blazing
across the sky.
As I write, I'm waiting for the third of the satellite passes which
are
giving us real-time pictures of the weather around us - for thousands
of
miles. The most recent showed us the Gulf of Mexico and west of
Central
America as well as down to about Guatemala and north about to
Arkansas. The
next one showed us the Atlantic at about the same latitudes as the
first,
nearly out to the western coast of Africa. When the satellite goes
directly
over us, in about another half-hour, we get a view of an area from
well into
South America and up to Hudson Bay. Overall, we have real-time
information
on weather.
Last night, we got our first real test of the SSB - Single Side Band
High
Frequency radio. I participated in the Mobile Maritime Net - the only
boat
to check in, with the others being mobile (auto or truck mounted) or
fixed,
land-based stations. We had been very concerned over our apparent
inability
to communicate over our radio, but it turned out to be a hazard of
marina
life - metal buildings, metal roofs, and a forest of masts. While we
could
not hear the control (the guy who directs traffic, so to speak), I
was
getting through loud and clear.
Today we started fishing in earnest. We put out our trolls, and
quickly
caught a Bonita (sort of like a tuna, but extremely bloody - we cut
him up
for bait for when we're in the Gulf Stream), two barracuda (which we
tossed
back), and then a mackerel. A lovely fish, we filleted him
immediately,
hoping to catch another for dinner.
In between, we believe we must have attracted a shark, as not only was
the
lure gone, but the leader was much abraded quite a bit up the line
from the
lure. Ever optimistic, we set again (all this while doodling along at
about
4 knots). Interrupting the electronics project we had, as well as just
as we
were going to stop the boat and take a swim, a very large fish hit our
port
side line. After long time of reeling, as she'd pulled off a lot of
line
before we got to the rod, we successfully boated a 48" king mackerel.
I said
she because there was also a huge egg sac. We decided we'd better put
away
the rods for a while, as we have something on the order of 20 pounds
of fish
from that single catch. We've just finished a huge meal, immediately
roasted
on the grill, which was more than awesome, not to mention filling.
There's
still a gargantuan amount of fish left from the first half, which is
all we
had room to cook. The second half is being saved for other delicacies
-
sushi, sashimi, ceviche, a salad, and sandwiches, among others.
In 77 feet of water currently, the color is stunning, and while we
can't see
(or, at least, know what we're seeing) the bottom, crystal clear. Our
delayed swim was tempered by the reality of sharks, so we waited until
we'd
moved well away from the area over which we cleaned the King Mackerel.
No
sharks showed up for the remains we were throwing over, but there was
a
small crab which stood by and then latched on to one of the smaller
bits,
immediately heading into deeper water. It was amusing to see him swim
sideways to keep up with the drifting boat until we tossed over his
treat.
Once clear of the area, we put the boat into a hard turn, so that its
motion
would be minimized, and jumped in, hanging on to mooring lines we'd
put in
the water to wash. While the water was very warm, it was still
refreshing,
and we took advantage of our stop to do a "Joy Shower" - Joy dish
detergent
makes a great salt-water wash. So, we stood on the platform one at a
time -
it's not that large! - and jumped in to rinse off. After getting off
the
soap, we climbed out for our fresh water rinse with the shower on the
stern.
That platform got a lot of work today, cleaning three fish, and
washing down
with the pressure-fed salt-water washdown on the stern (with Joy, of
course!), so it looks great. We have taken to doing our entire
exterior teak
with the lightest grade of olive oil available, so we thought we'd do
the
platform as well. However, if this pattern continues, there won't be
any way
we'll have any olive oil left on it! Our exterior teak looks marvelous
doing
this - and there's no sanding, either!
Well, I'm now on watch, so I'll stop here. More to follow.
L8R
Skip
Skip Gundlach
Erkki and I had the dawn patrol today. Our shift included looking at
lots of
shipping, as well as distant thunderstorms, on our radar, as we
tracked the
Gulf Stream in search of a lift north. All the light shows resulted in
nothing, however, as they were too far away to affect us. One
(additional -
after all the rest so far) problem which surfaced early on, however,
was
that apparently our mast-top navigation light has no red light. That
means
vessels approaching us from our port side can't see us. That's meant
that we
have to run our deck level navigation lights, as well as our masthead,
or
steaming, lights. As those lights are of the heat-generating type,
they use
a lot of electricity. So, we'll have to attend to that rather quickly,
as we
won't want to run our deck level lights any more than necessary - not
to
mention that the mast-top light is new, and high-tech, so we want to
get it
replaced immediately.
Fortunately for this set of circumstances, however, the wind continues
to be
nonexistent - or so low as to require running the engine. Running the
engine
generates more electricity than we use, so it's been ok about the
lights. As
I write this, we're again under motor, with sails furled other than
the
main, which is up to minimize rolling in the light waves which are
present
tonight.
Earlier today, the wind was entirely dead, starting shortly after
first
light. As sunlight is the biggest age component of sails, we stowed
them
all, and motored on. Fortunately, the Gulf Stream added speed to our
travels, as expected, and we continued to make good time with light
use of
the "Iron Genny" - so nicknamed for replacing the genoa (the big sail
up
front) - similar to the "Iron Horse" of pioneer times.
However, it was so hot that we also took a swim and bath break around
noon.
It was very refreshing, and lowered our body temperatures, despite the
Gulf
Stream being in the upper 80s. We renewed our vigor and continued to
motor.
As I was off shift, I went down to nap, again, and when I came up, the
wind
had picked up to a wonderful 4 knots, in a direction suitable for
putting
out the spinnaker. So, of course, we did.
Another phantasmagorical sail under that marvelous piece of rainbow
cloth.
We were making 5 and 6 knots in the water, but with the Gulf Stream
lift, we
were making 9 or more knots over ground. We'd been making such good
time
since we entered the stream that we took a meeting and the crew
decided we'd
go to Daytona Beach, instead. There, it will take less time to drive
home,
and, as a bonus, there may be a ride available from one of Erkki's
friends.
As I write, we're off North Palm Beach, making over 8 knots with a 4
knot
lift from the Gulf Stream. As it's such a boost, even though it goes
offshore rather much by the time we get to Daytona Beach, we'll ride
it
until nearly 30 miles to go, then triangulate into the entry. This
will
duplicate the entry I made all these years ago, on our proving cruise
with
my second ex-wife's father. He'd been taking on crew as he did a
single-handed circumnavigation, and we were one of the last legs; it's
what
convinced Lydia that it's what she wanted to do for the rest of our
lives.
Tonight on the SSB was better, in that I could hear the traffic, and,
while
the control in mid-Florida couldn't hear me, a guy in Texas could, and
relayed our information for us. We're now in the winlink.com tracking
section, so those interested could go to the web site and look for our
call
sign, seen in the sig line, but KI4MPC (Kilo India Four Mike Poppa
Charlie).
However, this time around also exposed a weakness, said to be a well
known
difficulty in our particular radio. At high power, we get voice
clipping.
Practically speaking, that means people can hear us but not understand
us.
The good news is that it amounts to a product defect, and should be
remedied
at no cost - albeit not only a delay, and probably at least the
shipping
costs to return it to the factory or some authorized service center.
So, there are some things we'd like to get repaired or corrected, as
soon as
possible. If there's a service center in Daytona Beach, it's worth
spending
some time there to have that defect remedied. Of course, if there are
service centers, likely NYC would have one, which would be OK, too, as
we at
least are able to check in with the Mobile Maritime Net. Likewise, if
my
supplier can send me a replacement mast light overnight, I could get
that
installed while we're in Daytona. Given the level of security that
represents in shipping lanes, that's a high priority. Fortunately for
the
nuisance factor, there are also several other things I need to do up
the
mast, so I can attend to them at the same time.
Overall, we're doing much better than hoped, and the breakages and
difficulties are part and parcel of cruising. The saying goes that
"Cruising
is boat repair in exotic locations!" I'm not certain how exotic
Daytona
Beach, and New York City environs is, but at least it fits with the
usual
epectations of having to fix something after every voyage. Fortunately
for
us, those things so far are minimal.
Erkki and I have the midnight shift tonight (ends at midnight) so I
should
get another full night's sleep, and be ready to go at it again. So
far, so
good, and we're thrilled to find that it's meeting our expectations.
L8R
Skip
Skip Gundlach
from
the heat and sleep deprivation (why that was in later posts). The
last one
will make more sense after this:
Saturday, July 14. Happy Bastille Day!
Last night was a litany of electronic difficulties. The mobile
maritime net,
which, albeit with a relay, had worked so well before, this time was
nearly
unintelligible to the folks on the other side. While I could hear very
well,
I wasn't well heard. Tonight, I am unable to understand any of the
traffic -
so I'm back to not knowing whether I have a problem, or it's just the
nature
of the solar cycle or some other global difficulties.
Then, after we'd redone a wiring-problem installation of a depth
sounder and
speed log, upgrading to being able to independently switch on the
lights, we
found that the depth sounder wasn't reading the depth, and the speed
log
wasn't working, either. Fast forward to the next day and the impeller
(the
thing that gets pushed around by the water running by it) became
loose,
again, apparently, rotating and providing electronic input to the
display
unit and now we have a speed indicator that works. Another of our
instruments has the same difficulty, but I will pull it out (making a
small
amount of water in the boat) and free it up. We concluded that our
last week
in the marina slip,, with extremely high and low tides, as well as a
case of
the red tide (which killed a lot of small fish and made for a very
nasty
water environment), had gunked up our impellers so that they didn't
work I
have one other minor check point to do in order to see about the depth
sounder - new right before we left! - and hope that it's a simple fix.
We're on 8-hour doubles shifts, which is to say that each pair can get
an
entire 8 hours of rest. Before our expected changeover at midnight,
Erkki
and I elected to let our relief sleep an extra hour, in order to allow
them
more rest. After they arrived, and we had briefed them on what was
happening
with our course, speed, and location, I went to bed. I got a great
night's
sleep, but it wasn't so restful topsides.
Adding to our list of things to investigate or take care of is the
refrigeration. We believe that we are just stressing it immensely,
with all
the constant opening and closing, insertion of warm water and newly-
caught
fish, and the huge amount of heat added each time we trade out one
slightly
colder bottle of water for another, newly poured, 90 degree gallon.
However,
where we used to be able to easily maintain single-digit temperatures
in the
freezer, and 35 degrees in the refrigerator, we're struggling to get
to 20
in the freezer, and are over 50 in the reefer. Back to last night.
There were miscellaneous squalls to be avoided, but, primarily, there
were
issues with each and every one of the instruments in our helm area.
The
speed and depth logs mentioned earlier were already known inoperative,
but
at various times overnight the chartplotter failed, the GPS integrated
to
the chartplotter lost its fix (repeatedly), the other helm-mounted GPS
either wouldn't light, wouldn't acquire the satellites, or wouldn't
even
come on. The speed indicator lost its light (apparently - it's
connected
with the autopilot, which controls the light level), entirely. The
fish
finder, which integrates speed, depth and temperature, is so old that
the
display is difficult to read. Adding insult to injury, the speed
portion is
the other impeller mentioned, which I will have to pull out (opening a
hole
in the boat) in order to free up. Disappointingly, it's also the trip
log,
so our distance traveled will have to be recorded based on the
distances
between waypoints.
And, finally, the lashing securing the boom to the point of the
staysail
where it attaches to the sheet (which controls how tightly it's
pulled)
opened, creating momentary flogging and banging. The killer was,
however,
that it required heading into the wind, in order to take the strain
off the
sail, to repair it. While that job was pretty straightforward and
simple,
the autopilot chose that occasion to hiccup, and the speed, autopilot,
chartplotter and GPS (both of them - the one below which controls the
autopilot, and the one at the helm) all took dumps at the same time.
The end
result was lots of hand-driving to keep the boat pointed correctly
while
repairing the sail, and, in the end, a lack of knowledge of where the
boat
was, and how to get to where we were going, other than by compass.
While driving by compass is ok if you are confident of where you are
and
where you're going, if you know neither, and are in the area of very
shallow
water, as the end of that particular leg of the trip was, it gets a
bit
nerve wracking. In the end, the instruments were persuaded to return
to
duty, and the sailing resumed.
That's the good news - the wind had finally picked up enough to sail,
without having to run the engine. All through the night, Flying Pig
proceeded at a stately pace, timed to get us to our earlier-defined
fishing
hole. Well, as might be expected under the circumstances, with all
that fish
aboard, Phillip - the fisherman aboard - elected to pass on that
exercise
and proceed directly into Key West's Northwest Channel.
Our trip through Key West was uneventful, if also boring (if you
disregard
all the potentials for going aground!), and we set sail on a very
close
reach in order to get to the Gulf Stream once in the channel. Well,
wouldn't
you know, despite being able to tack from our exit directly into our
track
for finding the Gulf Stream, the wind was again light, and,
eventually,
died. Again, we struck the genoa (the big jib on a roller), and
started the
engine.
The engine and all the related stuff has worked flawlessly - except
for, you
guessed it, an instrument. The temperature gauge is flaky at best. It
was an
electronic instrument I got, new in the box, at the first Seven Seas
Cruising Association convention I attended, in the Saturday morning
flea
market. It's worked exactly as I'd hoped in its first few trials, but,
on
this trip, it's totally unreliable. Fortunately, I have an electronic,
infrared, thermostat, and checking the engine temperatures at several
locations along the way have assured me that all is well - even though
I'd
much rather receive real-time info about our coolant temperatures!
Lest you think this last day has been all bad news, last evening,
before
being relieved by the others, Erkki and I were joined, as we
frequently are,
by the off-watch crew (you can't sleep all the time, and nobody's
seemed to
want to read all that much, either!) for conversation and dinner.
Right
after dinner, we noticed a dolphin (well, a porpoise; dolphins are
what we
hope to catch for dinner) jumping beside the boat. We figured he
wanted to
play, and sure enough, he came alongside, did rolls and swoops, and
then
raced ahead of the boat for about a minute before diving deeply. In
between,
I managed to get a few good shots of him, including some of the ones
where
he was looking back up at us, to see if we were watching him!
Our crew arrangements are working out marvelously. Erkki and Phillip
are
great company as well as competent watch standers. As I write this, it
appears we'll make Ft. Lauderdale by mid-day tomorrow. Our entry to
the Gulf
Stream was gentle and gradual. We could see the different color of the
water, but the expected temperature differential never materialized -
perhaps, because it's July, and the water all around is also very
warm.
Initially we got some help with the usual slide that a sailboat does
as it's
being pushed sideways by the sails. However, once we were on our
course at
the edge of the Gulf Stream, we got about a knot of lift to begin
with. Now
that we're fully in the stream, however, we're seeing a 3.5 knot
(nautical
miles per hour) improvement in our speed. We'll stop in Ft. Lauderdale
for
more charts, fuel, water, perhaps deal with some of the equipment
challenges
we've found, and then head back out. If we can get a better wind, our
trip
north should be a great deal faster!
Stay tuned...
L8R
Skip
justwaitaf...@gmail.com
am afraid my laptop would be the first to get smashed on the
console... I have been following this for a looooong time. All the
distractors now wish they were you, even with the troubles I bet!
Better luck and fair seas to you and your crew.
Skip Gundlach
After an extraordinarily short sail last night in very light wind, we
again
gave up and fired up the Iron Genny. We continued to get a great lift
from
the Gulf Stream,. 4 knots of lift, in fact, most of the time. In the
times
we've had a decent wind, we're making 10 knots over ground. Lydia and
Phillip had the dawn patrol, and it was a very good one at that.
Lydia's
been rather gun-shy of night watches after the wreck, but this one was
very
productive. Thunderstorms and squalls were skirted after spotting on
the
radar, her understanding of the operation of the chartplotter and GPS
was
enhanced, and in general she felt much better about night operations.
As it was my turn off-watch, I had another good night's sleep, other
than
that Erkki and I elected to allow the relief watch to sleep until
1:30, so I
got a late start. When I arose, I found that the crew had mutinied and
demanded to go to Savannah. We'd been making such great time, and the
route
looked feasible, that - I think - they didn't want it to end quite so
soon,
and so wanted to press on.
That sounded good to me, other than that I was concerned for our fuel
and
water. Fortunately, upon investigation, we found that our smaller
water tank
was the one which we had exhausted, and so the larger, nearly half
again the
size of the original, was the one we were working from now. In
addition,
we'd
already resolved to do salt water showers or swims, again, using the
fresh
water shower at the stern, or the regular cabin showers, for (just)
rinsing.
As it turns out, that won't be necessary, but it's good practice,
anyway, as
Lydia and I expect to be enroute to New York in a few days, and not
come off
the water except for emergency or disastrous weather.
However, there were several complications to the plan to go to
Savannah,
having to do with transportation, scheduling, and others. In the end,
the
problem which cinched my desire to go to Jacksonville (even though
we'll
have to go to Savannah, anyway, in order to mail off our proof-of-
export to
the tax people in FL) was that after detailed calculations, Erkki and
I (who
very much wanted to go to Savannah) determined that we would be out of
fuel
well before our arrival. On the other hand, we could comfortably make
Jacksonville, in the early morning hours, at the rate we expected to
go.
In my absence (while I was asleep), the fuel tank had been sounded
with a
stick they'd found. I had a chart of the tanks aboard as well as an
indicator of the depth as related to percentages of volume. The
dipstick
which came with the boat had ¼ tank markings on it, and we had
slightly more
than ¼ tank available. That was informative in that we could now
extrapolate
our fuel usage, and how much more we had available.
In their enthusiasm for all the lift we'd obtained from the Gulf
Stream, and
neglect of the impact of the fuel we'd have to burn while coming
ashore from
the great distance we were out, the fact that we'd nearly certainly
run out
of fuel before our arrival had escaped them. So, Erkki and I did a
more
detailed analysis, and determined that we could safely - but with only
a
small reserve - make Jacksonville. So, that's where we headed.
As usual, there's no wind today, so at about 5 we got ready to take
our
swim. Oops. There's no wind because we're motoring in the direction of
the
wind, at the same speed as the wind. Stop the boat, and there's a
small
breeze. Boats tend to blow around when there's a breeze, and this was
no
exception. Flying Pig is such a sailor that she doesn't want to stop.
No
luck whatsoever in putting her in irons - heaving to - which makes her
sidle
sideways with small jogs. So, we dumped all the sails, lay a-hull
(sideways
to the waves and wind), and jumped in.
Because we headed in toward Jacksonville, we were now out of the Gulf
Stream, and the water was a few degrees colder. More, it was a very
different color - not nearly as pretty as in the Gulf Stream. However,
it
was refreshing, and that was really the point. Notably, though, the
wind
continued, and it was sufficient to allow us to put up the sails
again. This
time, as it was nearly dead astern, we put out the spinnaker and set
the
main sail in a wing-and-wing configuration. As I write this, we're
making
more than 6 knots through the water, in dead silence - other than the
splashing of the waves from the bow. When the boat stands up, as it
does
under spinnaker sailing (vs heeled over under standard sails), the
water
flies off the bow, very impressively and entertainingly for those
sitting in
the bow seat over the anchors.
Depending on our winds, we expect to be at the Jacksonville inlet
shortly
before dawn. We'll make our way up the St. John's River and make
arrangements for our crew's car to go home, try to get connected to
the
internet, post all the log notes and collect our email, and even more
importantly, attend to some of the repairs we need doing. It's been a
great
run. We'll have done over 700 miles in about 5 days, and everyone's
still
talking to each other!
My attempts to check in on the Maritime Net tonight were again
frustrated.
As was the case a couple of days before, I learned that the difficulty
was
some inconsiderate HAM using a digital form of communication. With
thousands
of frequencies available, and this being a very long-standing net, an
experienced hobbyist (one who would use this type of communication
would be
very experienced) should surely know that this frequency had a
significant
purpose, and should have avoided it.
On the whole, however, if that's the only thing I can find to complain
about, I guess it's doing pretty well. I'll take another nap in a
while and
then take the dawn shift with Erkki. We'll bring her home.
L8R
Skip
Skip Gundlach
Well, it wasn't quite an open revolt, but shocking, none the less. As
usual,
the day was pretty flat and uneventful. We motored on into the still
air,
sweating. Our watch rotations are working out pretty well, on our last
day.
As is our practice, we've got the main up, blade tight, to minimize
roll in
the swells by virtue of that great slab resisting movement by pushing
the
air as it tried to flop one side to the other. The wind, however,
while
apparently nonexistent, is actually a light breeze directly on our
rear, at
the same speed as our progress forward.
Thus, when we stopped to swim and do our afternoon bath, the wind
pushed the
boat forward from behind. We tried to heave to - make the boat stop
moving
by stalling it by turning the wheel one way but the sails the other,
but our
intrepid Flying Pig just kept going around in circles. Adding the
genoa to
the equation didn't change matters. So, we dumped the mainsail and had
a
great swim.
The wind came up as we were getting out of the water so we put up the
spinnaker, again, but this time, as it was nearly straight aft, we
also put
the main sail out to do a wing-and-wing. Unfortunately, the wind was
not
strong nor consistent enough, and the main interfered with the airflow
over
the spinnaker. As has been common in the daylight watch hours, all
hands
were on deck, and the actual watchstanders's responsibilities were not
strictly delineated. Whoever was in the cockpit tended to do whatever
was
needed, whether it was their watch or not. It was thus that Phillip
and I
found ourselves there, and Lydia and Erkki were sitting in the stern,
chatting, and Lydia doing some photo shoots.
By this time the winds were building and , the seas (what little there
were)
were becoming a bit confused (due to the shifting winds), and it
looked like
it might turn into a lovely downhill sleigh ride on spinnaker alone.
However, that meant that the main would have to be dropped. To drop
the main
requires going into the wind - a maneuver which would put the
spinnaker all
over the standing rigging and perhaps damage it. On the other hand,
one of
the common techniques to drop a spinnaker is to "blanket" (cover,
dropping
the wind) it with the main. It's a pretty simple process, but requires
some
detailed steering in order to make the mainsail do its job. In the
end, I
erred in not flopping the main over on the same side as the spinnaker,
which, as you will see, caused a little excitement.
Phillip and I made ready to drop the spinnaker. It's a maneuver I
commonly
single hand, by taking the halyard (the line which pulls up the top of
the
sail in one hand and the spinnaker in the other. However, first you
have to
get the spinnaker sock down.
Under a lot of pressure (lots of wind), the sock which makes such a
snap out
of dousing the spinnaker is a bit challenging to pull down. The other
common
technique (if you're not racing and don't have to worry about what
direction, at what speed, you're going) is to relieve the pressure on
the
sail by motoring downwind to the same speed - or as close as you can
come to
it - as the wind. So, when the main, which was on the wrong side of
the mast
for the purposes of our maneuver, didn't do its job, I started the
engine
and began to do the downwind maneuver. See above about the sail - (!)
- I
was doing a bit of steering to try to get the spinnaker blanketed.
Any change in engine state is cause for heightened attention on the
part of
the crew. Combine that with full throttle operation and strange
maneuvers,
and all hands jump to attention. Add to that inexperience in sailboat
terminology and anything other than the entirely flat water experience
we'd
had all this time, and Erkki, jumping in to help, became concerned for
our
safety when he saw Phillip struggling a bit in corralling the
spinnaker
sock, which was flopping around due to the sea state. As he was trying
to
help, he attempted to lower the spinnaker, but didn't understand
either
which line, or how to deal with it. Compounding what was later more
clearly
understood, Phillip was trying to direct him, being the guy on the
foredeck.
It's a little like the blind leading the blind, as Phillip isn't an
experienced sailor (while being a very experienced mariner, on which,
more,
later), so communicating what to do wasn't clear. What little I did to
attempt to assist, by identifying lines (while I was driving), it
turned
out, wasn't particularly helpful to his comfort level.
Given that we were originally going to re-hoist it, Phillip and I were
going
to simply lay it on deck, turn the boat around to drop the main, and
then
put it back up again. However, it was getting toward dark, and one of
the
general rules is that you reduce sail in the dark. If the wind were to
continue to build, it would be difficult to deal with the spinnaker in
best
conditions, but perhaps dangerous in the dark. So, I made the decision
to
stow it, rather than re-hoist it.
Unknown to me as I'd not been seeing it at the time, however, these
exercises had frightened Erkki, and, after it was over, he'd
communicated
the negative impact of that experience, without the root cause, to the
others. He didn't understand what was happening, what the purposes
were,
and, worse, stepped into a maneuver already in progress, where we
didn't
have the time to make explanations. Not surprisingly, that led to
something
other than an enjoyable experience. Add attempting to take confusing
direction from more than one source (Phillip and me, on opposite ends
of
the boat from him). Add the elements of fear, and you have the reasons
most
people leave sailing if they aren't incapacitated in some way, or have
responsibilities which force them elsewhere. Not only isn't it fun,
sometimes it can be dangerous. That it wasn't, at all, dangerous,
wasn't
evident without the background of what was happening. Of course, I had
not
seen any of this, and aside from the comments received by the others,
was
totally unaware of his discomfort.
So, he was very ready to get off the boat. Revolt #1. Our dawn patrol
watch
together was very good, and our discussions helped him understand how
we got
to the point he'd gotten involved as well as that, while
"exciting" (not
really, but not dull), not any more dangerous than walking around on a
moving boat can be, regardless of what 's happening at the time.
However...
We're now into the next day, and have pulled into Jacksonville. On the
way
in, before the shift change, I'd called around and learned about where
to
fuel, arranged rental car transport for us in the afternoon and for
Erkki
and Phillip to get home, and a place to tie up while we did some
running
around (see below).
You'll recall that our electronics haven't been behaving all that
well.
Erkki, being an extremely high-level electronics designer, and
Phillip,
being an extremely high-level mariner, have not been happy with the
state of
our electrical system. That's not to say that I am, but I'm a bit more
fault-tolerant, as that's just the way it is with older gear. Lydia,
on the
other hand, has an extremely low tolerance for anything which involves
waiting (Lord, Give me patience - but I want it right now!),
including,
perhaps, a warmup period for our radar, or effort, such as touching an
older
piece of gear which was designed to require manual activation for a
light,
auto-dark after a few seconds to preserve battery life. Thus, revolt
#2.
Well, mutiny might be a better word. This is already too long, so I
won't go
into technical detail, but it suffices to say that our electrical
system,
from the stuff already aboard, to much of the newer gear added
(including
the new and expensive radar) was either poorly installed, simply
doesn't
work properly, or, worse, or perhaps in addition, has underlying
issues
which were supposedd to have been resolved as we went but have gotten
worse,
instead. Easily said from the outside, the consensus was that
"something"
must be done, and worse, it was fatally dangerous not to resolve this
before
making another move more than 5 miles from shore.
While I don't agree (people have singlehanded safely and successfully
without even the charts and other backups we have aboard which are not
high-tech), I did agree that we had a problem. So, after fueling and
moving
the boat to where the Jacksonville Marine folks had so kindly allowed
us to
park for a while, and picking up our car, we went
to lunch and hashed (pardon the expression) out our difficulties,
first
attempting to identify the problem, and then possible solutions. It
was
agreed that we'd do some diagnostic instrument shopping and return to
the
boat for some inspection.
Again shortening the story, the best that can be said is that the
installations of electrical (including electronics) gear have not been
tidy,
professionally standard, or, in some cases, complete. Compounding the
difficulties is that there are transients, dropouts, spikes and other
irregularities in the supply of electricity to our electronics. Thus,
it is
impossible to properly assign blame to the instruments until those
gremlins
are slain. At that point we can determine whether any given instrument
is at
fault, or if those gremlins were causing the difficulties.
Unfortunately,
that's a massive job. Whether we park ourselves somewhere for a couple
of
weeks and hope that the next one who has his hands inside all the
electrical
areas does it better than the previous several, or I do it myself,
we've not
yet decided. Stay tuned.We hugged and grinned and said our good-byes
and
otherwise sent our crew off in my rental car for their trip home.
Finally, as we were about to go to bed, it was evident that the
refrigerator
and freezer were not making cold sufficiently. Investigation proved
that it
wasn't making cold at all. Troubleshooting revealed that it was in
protective shutdown due to inadequate voltage. How revolting.
So, we have our work cut out for us. More later.
L8R
Skip
Wayne.B
<SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>Finally, as we were about to go to bed, it was evident that the
>refrigerator
>and freezer were not making cold sufficiently. Investigation proved
>that it
>wasn't making cold at all. Troubleshooting revealed that it was in
>protective shutdown due to inadequate voltage. How revolting.
>
>So, we have our work cut out for us. More later.
Definition of cruising:
"Fixing things in interesting places"
Skip Gundlach
Oh, Savannah, oh, don't you cry for me. For I've gone to go to
Charleston,
the techie for to see!
We headed out the channel at 7:30, and turned the corner for Savannah.
The
breeze was light, so we - again! - motored toward our destination of
Savannah at 23 degrees. As I was already very up and awake (see below)
I
took the first watch and Lydia went back below to sleep. Soon, the
wind
moved around a bit so I could put up the sails. There was a trawler in
front
of me that caused some concern, as I'd have to change direction so
that I'd
be in front of him. However, as I proceeded to put up the main under
idling
autopilot, I saw that he was anchored. No problems! Even better, as I
came
around on my port tack, and passed him, I saw what must have been 25
porpoises milling around the boat. Perhaps the shrimpers threw off by-
catch,
attracting them, or maybe
the porpoises just wanted to show off, but they were all around the
boat,
and their
blowing as they surfaced was clearly visible from the half mile away
or so
that I was. Perhaps, one day at anchor, we'll be fortunate enough to
have
our boat surrounded by porpoises, too!
The wind was still low enough that I motorsailed, but at least it was
in a
position to do some good to our speed. Whenever the sails are useful
for
sailing, they also stiffen the boat, so the ride was very comfortable.
By
the time Lydia returned, just before our new, 4-hour shift change, the
wind
had moderated, but still was providing some lift. I suggested that we
continue to motorsail at a relatively high rpm in order to fully
charge our
batteries in case we found some wind and wanted to turn it off.
Of course, I reviewed where we were, and identified the various
vessels in
the area. Three of them were warships - a submarine in the middle of
what
may have been supply ships, as they didn't look like fighting craft.
As we
were moving out of the area of our chartbook of the East Coast of
Florida, I
went to the back of the book where there was a larger scale chart.
Imagine
my surprise when I saw that Charleston was actually very close to
Savannah,
in relative terms, Better yet, the coastline was curving so that we
would
have relatively even less extra to go there. As our kids were not able
to
come to Savannah, we quickly agreed that Charleston it was.
There is an overriding reason to hurry to Charleston, as well. It's
where
the guy I know from the internet - the one who got me started down the
road
to ship's internet connectivity - who loves to work on boat
electronics, and
is component-level qualified, making his living as a theater and
church
electronic organ repair professional. While he can't leave Charleston,
if I
bring the boat to him...
Before we went to bed last night, I troubleshot the refrigerator to
being a
low-voltage problem. We'd not had what I thought was low voltage, but
apparently the computer which controls the refrigerator does. Once we
ran
the engine, and the sun came out, we quickly recharged our (rather
large)
battery bank to "full", and the refrigerator continued to run until we
shut
off the engine.
Once again, it stopped cooling, and the freezer and refrigerator temps
rose,
even though the battery monitor shows "full." I'll have to run the
engine
again, apparently, to raise the voltage. We need to resolve this
quickly, as
it's crucial to our ability to live long term without shopping
continuously.
Meanwhile, we'd been referred to an anchoring spot up the river as we
were
leaving our kind hosts' dock. It proved to be nearly impossible (it
was, for
us) to get a hook into what sounded and felt like hard rock and
pebbles over
it. At least we got a polished anchor from the experience!
We looked at the charts of the river and moved much closer to the
inlet.
That proved to be excellent holding, and while disconcerting to find
ourselves so close to shore if the wind and current were just right,
it
never got shallower than 12 feet, and was mostly closer to 20. Two
tidal
shifts later, we'd slept soundly and woke to head out again.
So, as I write, we're on a starboard tack, the wind having shifted
nearly
opposite to what it was when we started, and it's picked up a bit,
too.
We're
moving right along on a broad reach, with an easy and comfortable
motion. In
the meantime, I've pulled the two most recent satellite pictures, with
another due in an hour or so. The most recent (last and upcoming) show
the
area where we are, but also from Savannah out to past Mexico City, and
from
Hudson Bay to Columbia. The next one will show from Texas to about 500
miles
from the African coast, and from Columbia and Venezuela to nearly the
tip of
Greenland. This particular piece of electronic gear is very certainly
a
bright spot in our otherwise mostly-frustrating electronic array.
Meanwhile, the wind has shifted, and picked up, so we're on a broad
reach,
making 7 knots in 10-12 knots of wind. We just had a real treat of
what
appeared to be a family of porpoises starting at the side of our boat,
but
then going to the bow for about 15 minutes of fun. The little ones
were
shepherded by a much larger one - don't know if it was Daddy or Mommy
- but
they swam so as to look at us, as if to say, "Please, take our
pictures."
So, of course, we obliged. Unfortunately, the water's not perfectly
clear,
and the speed of our boat (and them, of course) made it such that
there was
a lot of blur in the pictures. However, we believe we have many lovely
shots
of as many as 6 together, playing under my feet as I sat on the bow
seat. It
doesn't get much better than this...
My maritime net checkin was successful tonight, and we left a message
for
the internet buddy who's also a ham, but only has his rig in his car,
as
that's where he is most of the time. Also tonight we finished off the
last
of the fish. Our master fisherman had failed to catch anything at all,
let
alone something we could eat - but, boy, did we eat fish for the first
4
days! Of course, it's now our turn to become self-sufficient, so we'll
have
to practice. Now, however, darkness looms, and we have to secure for
unseen
circumstances, so I'll stop here. Next stop, Charleston!
L8R
Skip
Skip Gundlach
We pulled into the Charleston area early in the morning after an
absolutely
marvelous sail. Lydia had gone down to sleep after letting me sleep
longer
than the expected midnight change, and in return, I kept at it until
past
dawn and our entrance. That sleep deprivation would come back to
haunt me
later, as the out of sequence posting demonstrated a few days ago.
We got Larry on the phone and were directed to a special entrance we'd
missed both when looking at the electronic and paper charts of the
area. We
were also directed to the City Marina as necessary for us to
accomplish what
might be refrigeration repair (more difficult for a service person to
dinghy
out), electrical troubleshooting, instrument repairs and the like. As
much
as it's against my religion and our budget, we bit the bullet and
signed up
for the Franklin plus daily fees to be at the (very VERY long dock -
the
MegaDock, where the big guys park) end of the outside floating dock.
Larry had his hand-held VHF radio with him and was able to hear our
traffic
with the control for docking and thus was waiting for us when we
landed. We
quickly connected to shore power and commenced to troubleshooting
while
Lydia went off to discover who she'd chat up in THIS marina (if you
let her
off the boat, she's gone for hours, as there isn't anyone she meets
who
doesn't turn into a conversation, some of which involve geneology, let
alone
hail-fellow-well-met).
We quickly determined that we weren't getting nearly enough power to
the
batteries which appeared to be OK, but very low. Larry's first
supposition
was that the batteries were dead, but futher digging showed that the
charger
wasn't putting out anything like the 70 amps it was rated for. Out
come the
manuals and to cut it short, the charger and its controller were
fried,
literally (see gallery pix). So, the first order of business, as long
as
we're on someone else' (expensive - a surcharge of $6 per day)
electricity,
we need to get something to accelerate the charging, so it's off to
West
Marine. New charger installed, we're topping up the batteries.
To do our tests, we've turned on everything we can find to generate
lots of
load. If our charger is up to the task, it should shoulder all the
load and
have some left over. However, as we put all that we can find into
the
system's
load, it turns out that it's high enough to take all the charger has
to
offer. As it's a relatively small charger, that's not really
surprising -
we have lots of time when connected to regular 110V power, so it's not
worrying. However...
Then, while it's working, we check the alternator (the busy thing on
the
engine which is supposed to not only supply the electrical needs while
operating, but have lots left over to bring the battery up to cover
the
non-running times' consumption. We'd assumed we had high output
alternators
based on the markings on at least one of our spares. NOT! Just like
the
case marking sez, they're suitable for charging the starting battery,
and
nothing else. No wonder we've got low power. We've been assuming all
along
that our alternator was not only keeping up with the running load, but
could
easily cover other loads (like this computer!) as well. Instead,
we've been
steadily sucking out the supply, rendering us nearly bankrupt in power
terms. (You look at a boat's electrical system like income and
spending,
with the bank - except it can't be filled beyond a certain point -
supplying
the extra, such as drawing from your savings. We were making far less
than
we were spending, and our "bank account" - the battery bank - was
nearly
empty...)
It does its thing overnight - so, now it's the 20th. More working in
the
engine room. As it's cooled down a bit, I go in with one of the two
spare
alternators I have, and change it out, on the thought that perhaps the
one
which has been on the engine since we bought it was somehow
defective. Ever
hopeful, perhaps this one is 70 amps? Nope. Same basic output. If
we
load up everything possible at the same time, it's more than the
alternator
can supply, let alone fill the battery with the excess.
All this alternator testing makes for a very hot engine compartment,
and
heats the rest of the boat. Our marvelous extraction fans do a great
job of
pulling the hot air out of the engine room, but are awfully hungry for
electricity to feed them. As we're trying desperately to charge up
the
batteries, that's not a good thing. So, I continue to work on in the
heat.
Making it worse, I got only a few hours of sleep last night, as we
were up
until the wee hours. Tonight's no different - I was so out of it from
the
heat and lack of sleep that I posted our third day of the trip before
the
second!
So, we'll continue this saga at a later time. In the meantime, it's
been
great to actually meet the guy with whom we've been corresponding,
skyping
(internet telephone, with pictures, sometimes, even), phoning and
otherwise
picking his brain. Later, we'll do some basic touring, but save the
high
activity levels for our return trip when we're not trying to get to
NYC.
L8R
Skip
Bob
> July 19th -
> I go in with one of the two
spare
alternators I have, and change it out, on the thought that perhaps
the
one
which has been on the engine since we bought it was somehow
defective. Ever
hopeful, perhaps this one is 70 amps? Nope. Same basic output. If
we
load up everything possible at the same time, it's more than the
alternator
> can supply, let alone fill the battery with the excess.
Skip............. just how many amps do you use in a day?!?!!!!?
Bob
Wayne.B
<SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>My apologies for the out-of-sequence posting. I was totally blasted
>from
>the heat and sleep deprivation (why that was in later posts). The
>last one
>will make more sense after this
Skip, in all seriousness I would caution you to manage your cruising
to avoid sleep deprivation. I've been there and done that, and it
will lead to errors in judgement, sometimes serious.
We did 4 or 5 all nighters on our trip north last month and on the
first one I did not sleep all that well on my off watch. Come morning
it was apparent to me that I was not functioning on all cylinders.
Even though we were getting a 3 1/2 knot boost from the Gulf Stream
and the weather outlook was promising, I made a command decision to
alter course for Port Canaveral and get a good night's sleep. It was
a tough call at the time, and no doubt cost us some time, but in
retrospect I think it was the right decision. It's like reefing - the
time to do it is when you first think about it.
There are no cruising awards for endurance, and the slip ups stay with
us for a long time.
Skip Gundlach
So, now a few days later, we're correcting these electrical problems
before
trying to determine exactly what's up with various instruments. One
clue
about all this was found last night on the way back from the showers:
As I walked down the extremely long dock, I noticed what seemed to be
a
strobe light atop someone's mast.
That someone was me, and the wind speed instrument's cups were
interfering
with the view as they went around, making it flicker. Once I had that
figured out, as that phenomenon stopped as I got far enough along
to have the cups in front of (rather than obscuring) the view of the
lens,
I continued on. Then it looked as
though it was dimming/burning. I stepped back, and it stopped. Forward
and
it started again. WTF???
The way navigation lights work, in order for people who are looking at
your
boat at night, is to have certain lights visible from certain angles.
When
you get past that angle the visible light disappears. So, what I'd
been
seeing wasn't our anchor light - it was the green light showing from
the
right side of the top of the mast. I'd thought it looked a bit odd, as
the
white anchor light is very bright and sort of blue in color. No
wonder...
But, back to the story, as I got closer to the boat, I found the green
light
disappeared (which is how it's supposed to do) - but not before the
red
light started to show up and confuse the view. Being much lower than
the
mast and not off a half mile or more, the view was very small as
compared to
the output of the light. Thus it looked as though it was getting dim -
but
in reality, it was showing both red and green together, and as I got
closer,
red only. Because I was nearly directly under it, I didn't get much of
the
light by that time, making it difficult to determine what it was.
Walking
further down the dock allowed me to see more of the light, to the
point
where the red and white were visible at the same time. BRIGHT red
light...
So... The red light's lit - at least for now. I'd lit the nav light
when we
were powering everything we could touch in order to see how much the
alternator was putting out, and had forgotten to turn it off. If in
fact
it's not broken, I presume it to also be a voltage issue (most of our
instruments have been misbehaving - see the "how revolting" post - we
presume them to be under-supplied).
So... Perhaps all of our electronic glitches (the radio aside - one of
my
contacts has provided the link to the solution in our Ham and SSB
radio) can
be resolved merely with the application of adequate power.
Today has been somewhat of a lay-day, in boatyard terms, in that not a
great
deal has happened. I've restowed the maelstrom, which resulted when
Lydia
emptied our storage that hid the wiring I needed for final
installation on
the new charger. In the process, I uncovered the other spare
alternator.
It's got labeling on it saying it's 70A. I'll install that tomorrow,
along
with a new belt, as the one that was on it has pretty well been used
up.
There's also some possibility that the worn belt was a contributing
factor -
who knows? - maybe they are *all* 70A and we're just not able to pull
it out
of them?
I'll also be making the final wiring of the charger. It's been in a
temporary location as we were doing our testing. If the new alternator
and
belt *does* produce that higher amperage, then we'll keep it. If not,
we're
in for some higher output, new, charging on the engine.
Tonight we had a lovely evening aboard an Island Packet whose owners
have
been following our adventures on line. We find we're notorious (in the
definitive, not pejorative, sense of the word) as a result of the
internet.
Earlier today there were a half-dozen dock-walkers from other boats
who
stopped by and marveled at what we'd done and been through. They also
admired the burnt-out hulk of our old massive battery charger, sitting
on
the dock, waiting for removal...
I've also worked on pictures. I absolutely detest Shutterfly, but if
one has
only a dialup connection, those tiny thumbnails will be visible
without
waiting an entire day to see them. So, there are pix at
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0CcN3DFqybMXNw.
However,
there's also pix at our gallery www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery -
click the
first picture, and follow the links. The thumbnails in those galleries
are
as big as the shutterfly full pix and can be clicked to see larger
detail if
you like. Getting those together and up kept us up late again, so I'll
try
to sleep late before I head back into the engine room!
As I write, it's now Sunday Morning, and I'm off to deliver the USB
hard
drive I copied 20Gigabytes of music onto for our Island Packet
friends,
coffee in hand. Then it's back into the engine room!
Having now exited the engine room, there's lots done there. It remains
to
test it all. However, the battery condition is now in the "charged"
zone for
each of the dozen cells, where none of them were there on our first
reading
a few days ago.
Unfortunately for me, the alternator which I put on (the one with the
70A
label) had a stripped mounting tab, and I had to come up with a bolt
which
would go through in order to put a nut on it on the other side. Dad's
Hardware Store (the name the kids used to give my supplies at my land-
based
home, cuz any time they needed something, it was available, in stock)
has
migrated to being Dad's Chandlery. While it's still being stocked, and
therefore we didn't have the truly proper bolt for the application, we
did,
indeed have a makeshift solution. That temporary fix will be resolved
as we
get confirmation of whether or not the alternator will actually keep
up with
our loads, and fill the batteries as well.
Now that our refrigeration (34.3 currently) and freezer (7.1
currently) is
no longer a concern, and we don't have to worry about a repair person
coming
aboard to work on it, we'll probably ditch the lovely electrical
supply
here, and anchor out to test out our ability to make power on the
hook.
We'll no longer be able to leave our laptops up all the time, but when
we're
cruising, we won't be able to do it then, either. So, we'll get into
our
cruising mode.
And, perhaps, tomorrow, we'll do our electrical loads test, recording
each
and every thing we use as to how much power it consumes. From that,
we'll be
able to develop a power budget, making sure we always have more power
coming
in (over the long haul) than we are spending. We have what, for most
boats
this size, is a massive battery bank, so our storage should be
sufficient to
handle low-power-generation days. We just need to be able to identify
our
loads, and utilize our power judiciously.
So, I'll leave you here, and we'll go get some dinner. Fortunately for
us,
it's moderated in heat recently, which makes being below in the engine
room
much more pleasant. That's the forecast for the next couple of days;
perhaps
we can get all of our heavy lifting done before it gets hot, and
concentrate
on some seatrialing to prove out what we've done.
Stay tuned :{))
L8R
Skip
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to make
it
come true. You may have to work for it however."
(and)
"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its
hands.
You seek problems because you need their gifts."
(Richard Bach, in The Reluctant Messiah)
L8R
Skip
Skip Gundlach
Hi, Bob,
We don't yet know. We're gong to do an energy audit, prolly tomorrow,
to see just exactly how much each item uses.
However, the root of the problem was twofold. We didn't have an
effective shore power charger, for some extended period of time (we
don't know how long, as it was just discovered). That meant that we
were being profligate with our 12V ashore and at the dock, and running
our entire, or a major part of the, load, on just the solar and wind.
At the dock and at the stands, that was pretty low as compared to
being out in the briny. The second problem was that, as we were
motoring for most of this trip, and assuming we had plenty of amps to
use pretty much whatever we wanted while motoring, in fact, either the
belt was slipping and/or the alternator was not putting out enough to
replace the amps being used and recharging that which was being taken
otherwise.
So, for a long time, and in particular in the last week, our batteries
have been in severe deficit. However, they're now up to snuff, the
shorepower charger does a great job in keeping up and dumping power
into the battery, and the wind and solar are now again making
meaningful contributions to our overall operation.
We're taking all the alternators to be tested tomorrow; if they aren't
up to snuff (the one I'd just put on didn't put out at all), we're in
for new alternators of higher output. I've got responses from several
sources about the means to achieve that in the same mounting as I
have, so I'm hopeful we'll be fine about it. Once we've proven our
charging sources, we'll go on the hook and prove our ability to live
in our budget.
Of course, in the end, it's pretty simple. We modify our lifestyle to
accommodate our electrical income. If we can't make it work, we'll
break out the Honda genset. If we find we use that all the time,
we'll figure out some means to make it reasonable to do so. We
planned on using it regularly, in any event, for powering our hookah
rig, so I'm currently looking for something which won't outgas to hold
the gasoline, as it uses straight, vs our outboards which are 2 cycle,
and, in particular, doesn't use much of it, so we'll have small usage
and some storage issues.
Thanks for the interest. Stay tuned in the coming posts about our
actual resolutions...
Lew Hodgett
> We don't yet know. We're gong to do an energy audit, prolly tomorrow,
> to see just exactly how much each item uses.
Add battery capacity, any way you can, it solves a lot of problems
including poor alternator performance.
Lew
Bob
There is another path............. reduce load = smaller house bank,
smaller battery charger, smaller alt, less engine running, quiter,
cooler, also less things to fix!
Bigger aint always better. My 400 Ah house bank is huge...............
for me :)
Bob
> On Jul 23, 12:59 pm, Bob <freya...@yahoo.com> wrote:
Hi Skip:
Do you have a way to determin a battery's level of charge?
Battery Monitor?
Hydrometer?
Bob
Lew Hodgett
>
> There is another path............. reduce load = smaller house bank,
> smaller battery charger, smaller alt, less engine running, quiter,
> cooler, also less things to fix!
>
> Bigger aint always better. My 400 Ah house bank is huge...............
> for me :)
As long as you remember that you must replace 125AH for every 100AH
consumed and the max sustained recharge rate is 15% of the battery
bank AH capacity.
Being realistic, over time, electrical consumption will increase, not
decrease.
These days, minimalists are few and far between.
Lew
bruce...@gmail.com
>(Richard Bach, in The Reluctant Messiah)to your system.
Skip,
I strongly suggest that you get a digital voltmeter with at least one
decimil place readout and wire it into your system. Use a selector
switch so that you can read the voltage of any battery bank. It is
priceless for monitoring what is going on with the electrons.
The one I have is a LED readout so it is easy to see at night.
You can use it to check everything - charging? It will climb up to
about 14.4 volts and then drop off to about 13.6, or if you are using
a manual charger you can monitor voltages and switch the charger at
the appropriate time. How much power are your nav lights using just
switch them on and check the voltage. Ho! Ho! Turned the lights on and
the voltage driopped 0.1 volts at 12.7 volts. A little math and you
know how much power yout lights draw.
Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)
Pete C
Somehow I think Skip would prefer to spend time writing lengthy
cruising blogs, than learning about S.G. levels... =)
cheers,
Pete.
Jeff
...
> You can use it to check everything - charging? It will climb up to
> about 14.4 volts and then drop off to about 13.6, or if you are using
> a manual charger you can monitor voltages and switch the charger at
> the appropriate time. How much power are your nav lights using just
> switch them on and check the voltage. Ho! Ho! Turned the lights on and
> the voltage driopped 0.1 volts at 12.7 volts. A little math and you
> know how much power yout lights draw.
What math is that? How does the voltage drop at the battery tell you
the Amperage its delivery?
BTW, I agree about the DVM, its essential on any boat that has more
than a minimal electrical system. Better yet is an Amp-hour meter,
certainly pricey but worth every penny if you have larger loads, such
as a fridge, and tend to live off-grid.
RW Salnick
I second the comment that you need a way to monitor amp-hours in and out
of your batteries - it is the only real "fuel gauge" for batteries that
there is. And it is essential if you are not living plugged into shore
power. We have a Link 2000 and I absolutely love it.
bob
s/v Eolian
Seattle
Jeff
>
>> BTW, I agree about the DVM, its essential on any boat that has more
>> than a minimal electrical system. Better yet is an Amp-hour meter,
>> certainly pricey but worth every penny if you have larger loads, such
>> as a fridge, and tend to live off-grid.
>
> I second the comment that you need a way to monitor amp-hours in and out
> of your batteries - it is the only real "fuel gauge" for batteries that
> there is. And it is essential if you are not living plugged into shore
> power. We have a Link 2000 and I absolutely love it.
Yes, I love mine also. Since we have a single house bank, and the
stating batteries don't need a meter, we run the fridge through the
second leg of the meter so we can monitor its usage day by day.
One must be careful though - our meter has a "drift" that I've never
been able to adjust out. I've found that the best measure of battery
state (other than specific gravity) is actually the charge rate. In
any case, I read the monitor several times a day so that I don't get
caught by surprise.
bruce...@gmail.com
I had, foolishly, assumed that he knew the resistance of the devise,
mainly I guess because the O.P. was talking about a low amperage mast
head light.
The problem with the amp hour meters is (I suspect) they aren't very
accurate. I admit that I've only read the manual on a couple of
different makes but they both talked about initializing the meters and
then later into the manual they mention that you need to re-initialize
(or maybe they said "zero") the meters from time to time..
I quite like the basic idea but given that as the battery ages the
charging time changes I cannot see how the meter can be absolutely
accurate and if it is only approximately then I can envision problems
although it certainly seems to make things simpler.
Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)
Bob
> Bob wrote:
> > Bigger aint always better.
> These days, minimalists are few and far between.
> Lew
Hi Lew:
I must agree sadly with you.
In my 20s I sported about the west coast on my Norton motorcycle. It
was basically two tyres, a frame, and two cylinders. Light, fast, and
easy to fix cause everything was right there. I just could not
understand other riders who zoomed past with full dress Honda lead
wings, huge faring, fiberglass saddle bag condos, AND pulling a
trailer. I think there was a mortycycle under all that shit. Sorta
defeated the purpose of a motorcycle I thought. Christ, they
reportedly even had a reverse gear !?! But they seemed to be having
fun............
I wonder what I can fix for lunch since I don't have a
refer............. oh yes,
boiled pasta
cabbage, carrots, some unions
peanut sauce
fish sauce
Squeeze of lime
some wonderful red chili sauce with that rooster on the bottle.
And a nice glass of tea
Umm........ fresh crunchy............ AND NO REFER !
After lunch ? Since I don't need to install another alternator or
write a daily 1000 word blog I think Ill bike over to the library and
flirt with woman in the children's section. She's way
cute..................
Bob
Jeff
> The problem with the amp hour meters is (I suspect) they aren't very
> accurate. I admit that I've only read the manual on a couple of
> different makes but they both talked about initializing the meters and
> then later into the manual they mention that you need to re-initialize
> (or maybe they said "zero") the meters from time to time..
>
They are quite accurate in a sense, but I think mine gets confused by
the number and variety of charge sources and sinks. This leads it to
automatically adjust its concept of charge efficiency poorly.
Recently I realized it was using 73% when a better choice was 87%.
However, if you understand that is happening, its easy to compensate.
In my case, I knew that it was losing about 15 Amp-hours a day. A
few hours of charging, as when powering through Wood's Hole is enough
to reset the meter. On a day by day basis, when my alternator charge
rate drops down to around 40 Amps, I know the 450 Amp-hour bank is at
about 90%.
> I quite like the basic idea but given that as the battery ages the
> charging time changes I cannot see how the meter can be absolutely
> accurate and if it is only approximately then I can envision problems
> although it certainly seems to make things simpler.
>
Its better on the usage side than on the charging side. But still,
its infinitely better than nothing.
bruce...@gmail.com
Well, yes. The output side is just amps times time but when you start
charging it gets difficult as depending on the battery's age you may
need to put back 110% - 125% - ???% of the amp hours that you have
used. This was the part I never could figure out how to compensate
for.
For the moment I use a volt meter and keep a watch on the voltage. I
guess it is sort of a mental gage but I wish someone would invent one
that maybe measured S.G. and compensated for that, automatically
compensate for the ageing battery bank.
Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)
Electricky Dicky
Bruce and anyone else interested...............
Take a look at www.smartgauge.co.uk
I have a customer that has a Smartgauge and a BMV501 on board. He was
concerned that the BMV was indicating the bank at 86% when the
Smartgauge showed 53%. His bank was sulphated and the Smartgauge was
correct. Continuous Equalisation charges brought his bank back up
(luckily). I put my money on the Smartgauge, And yes I sell them and
fit them but you make your own decisions ;-)
--
Richard
Nb "Pound Eater" Parkend G+S
"Governments are like Nappies, they should be changed often."
(For the same reason)
Leanne
news:1185292706.7...@g12g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
I just could not
> understand other riders who zoomed past with full dress Honda lead
> wings, huge faring, fiberglass saddle bag condos, AND pulling a
> trailer. I think there was a mortycycle under all that shit. Sorta
> defeated the purpose of a motorcycle I thought. Christ, they
> reportedly even had a reverse gear !?! But they seemed to be having
> fun............
We call those Hondabagos.
Leanne
bruce...@gmail.com
wrote:
Thanks for info. I started to read your technical section and the
lights went out but will do more studying later. I've always liked the
idea of a meter that showed amps in/amps out but never was able to
figure out a method of outwitting the time necessary for the chemical
changes to take place during the charging phase.
Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)
Pete C
> Thanks for info. I started to read your technical section and the
> lights went out but will do more studying later. I've always liked the
> idea of a meter that showed amps in/amps out but never was able to
> figure out a method of outwitting the time necessary for the chemical
> changes to take place during the charging phase.
Hi,
Just google for 'battery conductance tester', that's basically what it
is.
Whether it's worth having or not IMHO depends largely on whether the
prospective user knows little about electrics and isn't able to use a
hydrometer.
cheers,
Pete.
KLC Lewis
"Pete C" <pete...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1185367588.0...@57g2000hsv.googlegroups.com...
Pete, do you propose using a hydrometer everytime you want to know your
state of charge? This could be a couple of times each day, or more.
Pete C
> "Pete C" <petecn...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> Pete, do you propose using a hydrometer everytime you want to know your
> state of charge? This could be a couple of times each day, or more.
Hi,
For those who know a bit about electrics and can use a hydrometer I
would propose:
Do an energy budget/audit.
Size the battery bank for 40% DoD (depth of discharge) on a normal
days/period of use
Use the hydro to verify the above a few times as well as check the
batts are getting fully charged.
Use the hydro to check a few times that an exceptional days/period of
demand doesn't draw the batts below 80% DoD
Comments???
cheers,
Pete.
KLC Lewis
My own energy needs are quite modest. Nav instruments, VHF, stereo, running
and anchor lights, computer (laptop), the occasional cabin light for short
periods (converting to led units). No refer, no power windlass. Of course, I
do need to be able to start-up the iron genny from time to time.
My battery bank is 4 new-this-seasonTrojan T-105's and a 40 amp smart
charger for dockside use. 2 US32 solar panels rated at 64 watts. Voltmeter
always reads "top of the green" at 13 volts after dockside charging, bottom
middle of the green after sailing for a day and anchoring out overnight with
the anchor light lit. Engine starts right up like it has a fully-charged
battery when weighing anchor in the morning. But translating this to "how
much power do I have left?" leaves me paranoid.
Pete C
If you're able to use a hydrometer, this FAQ tells how to relate
battery 'SG' to state of charge:
http://www.batteryfaq.org/
http://jgdarden.com/batteryfaq/carfaq4.htm
http://jgdarden.com/batteryfaq/carfaq4.htm#soc
Bear in mind 'state of charge' isn't a percentage of the battery's
*rated* capacity, as they lose capacity as they get old or sulphated.
State of charge is a percentage of the *actual* capacity of the
battery, taking into account it's age and condition.
To work out the actual capacity you need to compare the drop in state
of charge to a known amount of charge used.
So if drawing 1 amp for 10 hours (10 'amp hours') from a battery makes
it's state of charge drop by 25%, the actual capacity is about 40 amp
hours when it's fully charged.
If the above battery then reads a 75% state of charge, then
approximately 30 amp hours of charge are available until it's
completely flat. (Though of course it should be recharged when the
state of charge is around 50% or less)
If the above is a bit too then try and get someone to explain it to
you in person as it's a little difficult to do in a short posting.
hope this helps,
Pete.
Richard Casady
wrote:
It is, or used to be, the practice on submarines. Not much extra work
when you are checking/adding water. The original smart charger was a
sub sailor with thermometer, hydrometer, and voltmeter. Who knows what
those guys are doing now.
Casady
KLC Lewis
>"Richard Casady" <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
>news:46afd503...@news.east.earthlink.net...
That raises another question: Just how often are you supposed to check the
water? Once a day? I've been doing it about once a month.
Larry
4ax.com:
> never was able to
> figure out a method of outwitting the time necessary for the chemical
> changes to take place during the charging phase.
>
>
Lemme know if you outwit it. We'll be billionaires!
The Japanese have come really close, of late:
Google "nanotube lithium ion battery"
and read some of the new articles. Very interesting battery technology is
just over that hill over there!
Larry
--
While in Mexico, I didn't have to press 1 for Spanish.
While in Iran, I didn't have to press 1 for Farsi, either.
While in Florida, I had to press 2 for English.
It just isn't fair.
Larry
news:46afd503...@news.east.earthlink.net:
> It is, or used to be, the practice on submarines.
Naw.....We check on the control rods, now....(c;
Skip Gundlach
am threading it to be under my original post which spawned the Amps
discussion. Due to the multiple responses, this is pretty long
(surprise! Mine are *never* long :{)) )
> From: Lew Hodgett
>
>
> Skip Gundlach wrote:
>
> > We don't yet know. We're going to do an energy audit, prolly tomorrow,
> > to see just exactly how much each item uses.
>
> Add battery capacity, any way you can, it solves a lot of problems
> including poor alternator performance.
>
> Lew
We've already got massive batteries. The issue is properly keeping
them charged. At 750 nominal (less aging) AH, we can go for a long
time with no charge input. But if we don't put in the charge,
eventually the biggest battery bank will be flat, even if nothing is
drawn from it, out of normal charge dissapation (flooded = ?%/
month)...
> From: Bob
>
>
> On Jul 23, 8:45 pm, Lew Hodgett <lewhodg...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>> Skip Gundlach wrote:
>>
>> > We don't yet know. We're gong to do an energy audit, prolly tomorrow,
>> > to see just exactly how much each item uses.
>>
>> Add battery capacity, any way you can, it solves a lot of problems
>> including poor alternator performance.
>>
>> Lew
>
> There is another path............. reduce load = smaller house bank,
> smaller battery charger, smaller alt, less engine running, quiter,
> cooler, also less things to fix!
>
> Bigger aint always better. My 400 Ah house bank is huge...............
> for me :)
We will be carefully monitoring our use once we get our audit
finished. We *believe* (time will tell) that we'll have ample
charging available for the uses we need to put our load to.
> From: Bob
>
>
> On Jul 23, 8:00 pm, Skip Gundlach <SkipGundl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Jul 23, 12:59 pm, Bob <freya...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> Hi Skip:
>
> Do you have a way to determin a battery's level of charge?
>
> Battery Monitor?
> Hydrometer?
>
> Bob
Actually, all of the above:
We have a TriMetric 2020 monitor, by Bogart Engineering, which
provides a
lot of information. Volts, amps in or out, state of charge in
percentage
terms are all front-and-center. Menus allow time from equalization,
AH
left, current state of AH up or down in numerical terms, time from and
what
is low and high (two separate measures), and so on.
Our controller for the KISS wind generator (in addition to the on/off
control of the generator itself) is a Xantrex 40A unit. When it's
piping
outside, we can get close to 30A before the internal controls shut
down, but
it doesn't start producing meaningful amps until ~15knots (designed
for the
Caribbean market). It's whisper quiet in our setup; YMMV dependent on
how
well you balance the blades. At full charge, that controller diverts
to a
heat strip setup, required because our water heater wouldn't accept
the dual
voltage unit where we used to send overcharging before we replaced the
water
heater. We have not yet installed (because we can't find where we
stored
them) an incandescent monitor lamp so that if that's happening we can
hurry
and turn on charging loads for AC devices, taking advantage of the
overstock
of amps.
Our controller for the 370W of high-voltage Solar is a Blue Sky 6024H
MPPT,
which provides as much as 30% more than the rated values of our
panels. At
9AM in Charleston, we typically show 12-15A, and at best, sometimes as
much
as 25A in mid-day. That controller just turns off the load (open-
circuits
the panels, I think is what's happening) when they're full. It also
has an
equalizer button, but with 750AH, it's unlikely we'll ever see enough
amperage to actually accomplish that, even connected to shore power.
We also have a battery conditioner attached - it uses the battery's
own
power to pulse, helping prevent/minimize sulphation. The very long-
cycle
charge regime of the solar and wind has meant that we very rarely see
less
than "full" on the monitor. Making sure we see above 13V nearly all
the
time we're not running huge loads is the bigger deal...
Our new shoreside battery charger is a Xantrex TrueCharge40A unit. We
have
4 L16H in series/parallel 12V, plus the windlass and starter
batteries
separated on an isolator. The shore charger, plus whatever solar and
wind
input has occurred since the TC40 installation has brought us back to
full,
with SGs previously in the 1.250 range to over 1.265 in all cells and
no
large variance (65, 65, 70, 75, 75, 75, 85, 80, 90, 80, 75, 75 in the
12
cells) either from cell to cell or in individual batteries.
We have no remaining halogen bulbs (haven't taken out the foredeck
light;
might be one in there) due to their current draw. All on board
lighting is
either fluorescent or LED, outside is either LED or the afore-debated
incandescent running/steaming lights left so because of "all the
current
available during engine operation" - which I may have to re-
evaluate...
> These days, minimalists are few and far between.
Heh. Guilty as charged (pardon the expression). But, we believed
that we provided for that in our initial design. It proved that we
were dependent on a charging source (the prior 70A NewMar beast) which
wasn't happening. We'd not have behaved as we did onshore, at the
hook. That we discovered our alternator simultaneous problem, we feel,
now that it's corrected (more below), that the shore and engine
charging parts are up to snuff.
> From: bruce...@gmail.com
>
> Skip,
>
> I strongly suggest that you get a digital voltmeter with at least one
> decimil place readout and wire it into your system. Use a selector
> switch so that you can read the voltage of any battery bank. It is
> priceless for monitoring what is going on with the electrons.
>
> The one I have is a LED readout so it is easy to see at night.
>
> You can use it to check everything - charging? It will climb up to
> about 14.4 volts and then drop off to about 13.6, or if you are using
> a manual charger you can monitor voltages and switch the charger at
> the appropriate time. How much power are your nav lights using just
> switch them on and check the voltage. Ho! Ho! Turned the lights on and
> the voltage driopped 0.1 volts at 12.7 volts. A little math and you
> know how much power yout lights draw.
We have such a meter, but have not wired it in. It's part of a
multimeter that I use all the time. It's what I used to determine
that the alternator shop had mis-ended (male instead of female) the
tach lead on the new 94A unit.
OTOH, we have a pretty good one in the TriMetric, also digital, with
10ths in both amps and volts. We keep an eagle eye on it...
When we put in the new alternator, we (with a full battery bank) shut
off the shore charger, turned on the inverter, and loaded up
absolutely everything we could on the boat. Inverter with all the
electrical stuff we could find (two computers, all the charging
equipment for handhelds, three fans, etc.). Every single instrument
and light, in and out. All the pumps rated for continuous duty, with
salt and fresh water taps left open. All the AC and DC fans, engine
room and otherwise. The one single remaining incandescent wall
fixture. The fuel polisher and reefer, etc.
We managed to create just under 50A of load. Short of transmitting on
the SSB/Ham (we did it in standby, for only 2A), that's the worst it
can possibly get with no outside input. Of course, letting it go like
that, for an extended period of time, even with the capacity of our
bank, would be very hard on the battery were there no input.
So, after letting it consume about 15AH (per the TriMetric), we
cranked up the alternator. WhoooEEEE!
The meter went from -48 to +40, and slowly started to come down. The
battery voltage, which, by now, had been down to about 12.1 due to all
the drop, steadily climbed. It quite quickly reached well over 13,
and kept climbing.
Of course, that's also way more drop than we'd likely get before we
did something about the load, but it was very reassuring to see that
not only could we sustain that load at about 1500RPM, but put as much
back in as our shore power charger would in a no-load situation.
So, once we'd proven the point, we shut down most of the loads other
than the computers which were both on (connected to shorepower
otherwise), and saw the voltage immediately charge rate climb, level
off, and then start to taper. We got to 14.4 and things started to
calm down.
Having proven *that* point, we shut it down to keep the temps in the
boat somewhat reasonable, and reconnected the shore power. The
batteries were recovered (14.4, then equalibrium at 13.3, with the
shore power cycling occasionally, and the solar cycling in and out as
well, providing ~10A at that time of day, when it wasn't full.
Significantly, the radar didn't drop out when we started the engine,
whereas it always had before. Seatrialing the instruments is next,
but I'm convinced that our problems will either be entirely, or
mostly, resolved with the proper application of power. As it is, my
freezer is well under spec, running so fast that the evaporator
briefly acts as a cold plate, resulting in an under-temp spec (it
comes up relatively quickly to the set temp), where we've been
struggling to keep it under freezing, let alone the 4 or 5 it is now
(set point 8, 2* hysteresis).
Hm. How many times do I have to sample to earn my merit badge? In 5
days I've been in Charleston, I've done it 3 times.
:{))
> From: RW Salnick
>
>
> Jeff brought forth on stone tablets:
>> BTW, I agree about the DVM, its essential on any boat that has more than
>> a minimal electrical system. Better yet is an Amp-hour meter, certainly
>> pricey but worth every penny if you have larger loads, such as a fridge,
>> and tend to live off-grid.
>
> I second the comment that you need a way to monitor amp-hours in and out
> of your batteries - it is the only real "fuel gauge" for batteries that
> there is. And it is essential if you are not living plugged into shore
> power. We have a Link 2000 and I absolutely love it.
I *think* I have such in the TriMetric...
That ought to hold us for a while. I'd bother the librarian but Lydia
would complain - and, besides, I'd rather write :{))
Well, no. I'm changing my tag line on the skype and googlechats to
"I'm in the engine room, but try anyway - I may hear it" - it used to
be that I was in the bilge.
Hands, please, for those who have spent more than 100 hours in their
engine rooms in the last month - I have - in addition to doing the
research and running around to fix those things which have cropped up
(Roger, I know you qualified last year)...
PS to Geoff - has the above eased your concerns about our
instruments? It's why we're still here...
L8R
Skip
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things
you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain
Lew Hodgett
> We've already got massive batteries. The issue is properly keeping
> them charged. At 750 nominal (less aging) AH, we can go for a long
> time with no charge input.
A 750AH bank will require an alternator that can put out about
110A-115A at engine idle to properly recharge them.
This will require a dual belt drive such as is required to drive a
Leece-Neville machine.
If you don't need a dual belt drive with your present alternator, you
have the wrong alternator.
If you discharge this bank by 40%, you have consumed 300AH which must
be replaced with 1.25*300 = 375 AH.
To replace 375 AH you will require 375/115 = 3.3 hours of engine time.
It ain't rocket science.
Nobody said wet cell batteries were efficient, but they are mobile.
Yes I must confess.
In my misspent youth, worked on the engineering team that designed the
great-great-great-great-grandfather of the L/N 4800.
Lew
Skip Gundlach
Hi, Lew, and thanks for the expansion.
We have as a target of never letting our batteries get below 75% - and
only rarely below 90%. Recent excitement aside, we've succeeded in
that. Our original tests of relying solely on solar and wind (last
year, on the hard), for 6 months, went very well. Of course, we
didn't have the same wind as normally seen in the water, and also
didn't run instruments, offsetting that.
Our solar and wind were calculated to provide somewhere between 150
low and 300 high AH/Day on average. Continuously cloudy (well,
raining - it was completely overcast here at 5 and we were still
getting 12A from the solar), windless days will throw that off, of
course. However, we watch that meter like a hawk, and having had a
bit of training about the interface of volts and amps as to what's
happening in there, believe we'll be better managers than before.
If we were dependent on our engine alternator entirely for recharging,
we'd prolly do something different. However, as backup, but aboard
for our use of power tools in strange countries, as well as our hookah
rig, we have a 2000w Honda much bruited about here on other
occasions. Were it necessary while on the hook, likely we'd start
that before the diesel, solely for charging.
However, of course, having just slain the dragon of no effective
alternator power (and shore charging, too, but we expect that to be so
infrequent as to be unworthy of mention other than as powered by a
Honda if needed), we have no track record to fall back on. Stay tuned
as we live on the hook and under way in the next few weeks...
L8R
Skip
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to
Larry
news:1185414683.1...@b79g2000hse.googlegroups.com:
> The meter went from -48 to +40, and slowly started to come down. The
> battery voltage, which, by now, had been down to about 12.1 due to all
> the drop, steadily climbed. It quite quickly reached well over 13,
> and kept climbing.
>
>
POWER is our FRIEND!
Larry
--
Transportation and Support
S/V "Flying Pig"
Ask Skip how a Mercedes runs on old frying oil...(c;
Larry
@newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net:
> To replace 375 AH you will require 375/115 = 3.3 hours of engine time.
>
>
A pipe dream of battery chemistry. 375AH requires 5 hours (from 50%
discharge, not zero) at 38A, not 115. Batteries charge at 10% of AH
rating, not 30, if you want to convert the electrolyte, giving it time
for circulation.
The two batteries will recharge from 50% very nicely at moderate
temperature at 75A for 5 hours on the new 90A alternator. NO battery
will charge at 115A for very long before the interplate electrolyte has
been converted faster than it can be replaced by convection in the
electrolyte. This is why you see the current drop in the first
place....NOT because it has become charged. After the initial current
blast has reconverted lead sulphate into acid, that acid must move out of
the way to be replaced by more lead sulphate ions convecting in from
below by the heat of charging. There's quite a circulation. Charging
too fast, say at 115A trying to force it fast, only results in the
conversion of H2O into hydrogen gas and lead oxide, that violent gas
bubbling it's doing at high charger currents, once the initial lead
sulphate to sulfuric acid conversion has wained on the initial blast.
I suppose we could build a magnetic drive circulator pump into the bottom
of the cells under the plates and you could charge the hell out of it,
then....
Larry
--
Charging takes time.....the more time, the better.
Larry
news:Xns99796FB67C...@208.49.80.253:
Lew, try a little experiment to showcase my assertion:
Charge like hell until the voltage rises up and shut her down with NO
LOAD on the batteries. Wait 30 minutes. Charged batteries will still be
charged and immediately draw little current at float voltage.
Crank the alternator-from-hell back up and watch the current....It'll go
back to hard charging at lower-than-float voltage because the convection
in the electrolyte has replaced the supercharged electrolyte with
uncharged electrolyte to continue the replating process. The current
will drop and voltage will repeat its rise charging this hard as
electrolyte, once again, becomes saturated before convection takes place.
You can repeat the phenomenon over and over with no load on the battery
between charges.
Once the cells are TRULY charged, there will be a small current when
charging starts, but the voltage will already be high putting charging in
float mode almost immediately.
Larry
--
SLOWLY.....we recharge SLOWLY.....
Lew Hodgett
>
> A pipe dream of battery chemistry. 375AH requires 5 hours (from 50%
> discharge, not zero) at 38A, not 115. Batteries charge at 10% of AH
> rating, not 30, if you want to convert the electrolyte, giving it time
> for circulation.
Spoken with the vision of a person with his head squarely placed where
the moon doesn't shine.
Plonk
Lew
Electricky Dicky
I hope that you enjoy a long read ;-)
BTW as I said I sell and fit them however I do not design and
manufacture them, and its not my site.
Electricky Dicky
wrote:
Sorry Pete I cannot relate to the above, it is a far too simplistic.
Here in the UK and I feel also in the US battery capacity is normally
quoted at a 20hour rate.
Therefore in the example offered above - 1A for 10hrs giving a 25%
drop in "State of Charge" the actual original battery capacity would
have been more like 35AH given a Peukert of 1.25
Ok I realise that you used the term "about" but we are talking major %
differences here.
To put the test another way are you saying that if the load had been
100ma for 100hours = 10amp hours your conclusions would have been the
same?
I would then suggest the battery's max capacity would have been 22Ah.
Electricky Dicky
wrote:
>On Jul 25, 2:37 pm, "KLC Lewis" <nos...@spamless.com> wrote:
99% of my customers would not know what a hydrometer was
99% of my customers have no idea what their audit is
70% do not care
30% want to be able to look at something to tell them whether to
charge or not
>
>cheers,
>Pete.
Electricky Dicky
wrote:
And you have 450AH available ;-) I have customers who live on their
boat with less than that!
Paranoid is a bit OTT but aware is sensible.
Jeff
> Lew Hodgett <lewho...@earthlink.net> wrote in news:1QTpi.12042$zA4.313
> @newsread3.news.pas.earthlink.net:
>
>> To replace 375 AH you will require 375/115 = 3.3 hours of engine time.
>>
>>
>
> A pipe dream of battery chemistry. 375AH requires 5 hours (from 50%
> discharge, not zero) at 38A, not 115. Batteries charge at 10% of AH
> rating, not 30, if you want to convert the electrolyte, giving it time
> for circulation.
You've made this assertion many times, and its still completely false.
Or possibly, I have magic batteries. I have 4 Trojan T-105's for a
total of 450 Amp-hours. The 110 Amp alternator, controlled by a Link
2000R generally charges at about 90 Amps, slowly dropping to around
75. At that point, its around 80% full. Continuing to charge, it
goes down to 50, when I figure its close to 90%. The first set of
batteries last 6 years, and were really killed by a sever winter. The
new set is on its third year.
BTW, I don't have double belts, but I cook at least one year.
Geoff Schultz
> A pipe dream of battery chemistry. 375AH requires 5 hours (from 50%
> discharge, not zero) at 38A, not 115. Batteries charge at 10% of AH
> rating, not 30, if you want to convert the electrolyte, giving it time
> for circulation.
I note that my batteries (2 Caterpillar 153-5720 8Ds) are speced at a max
charging rate of 5% of their CCA, which is 1500 A. That works out to 75 A.
Each of the batteries have a rating of 210 AH, which based upon Larry's
math, would be 21 Amps, or 42A for both of them.
That said, this whole discussion doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I
watch my 3 stage regulator charging rates, and it spends very little time
charging at full throttle. When initially turned on, the charger goes into
bulk charging mode and attempts to get the charging voltage up to the bulk
charging voltage. This voltage depends upon the battery temperature and I
have a thermocouple which sends the battery temperature back to the
charger. I've specified a temperature coefficient in the charger (which is
specified in mV/degree C) and as the battery gets warmer, the bulk charging
voltage drops.
Anyhow, I try not to let my batteries get below 12.5V. When I charge the
batteries I see my charger outputting at its maximum charge rate (110A) for
about 15 minutes and then it typically has reached the bulk charging
voltage. Then the charging rate drops as it maintains that voltage. My
typical charging cycle runs for about 1 hour, and at the end of that hour
I'm only outputting about 20A. It will take several more hours for the
rate to drop to 0.
Thus, this talk about charging at some rediculously high rate for X hours
doesn't seem to have much to do with real charging systems
-- GEoff
Larry
@newsread1.news.pas.earthlink.net:
Sorry you feel that way. Telling them they can recharge by shoving current
like hell into it in 3 hours is still a pipe dream.
Larry
news:Xns99795ACB0C3...@216.196.97.136:
> I note that my batteries (2 Caterpillar 153-5720 8Ds) are speced at a
> max charging rate of 5% of their CCA, which is 1500 A. That works out
> to 75 A. Each of the batteries have a rating of 210 AH, which based
> upon Larry's math, would be 21 Amps, or 42A for both of them.
>
> That said, this whole discussion doesn't make a lot of sense to me. I
> watch my 3 stage regulator charging rates, and it spends very little
> time charging at full throttle. When initially turned on, the charger
> goes into bulk charging mode and attempts to get the charging voltage
> up to the bulk charging voltage. This voltage depends upon the
> battery temperature and I have a thermocouple which sends the battery
> temperature back to the charger. I've specified a temperature
> coefficient in the charger (which is specified in mV/degree C) and as
> the battery gets warmer, the bulk charging voltage drops.
>
>
The 3-stage charger bulk charges the initial load of electrolyte between
the plates that WILL take a tremendous current and charge with it until
it has been converted back to acid and replated the lead. Then, as you
say, it drops back to give the battery time to recover its electrolyte by
convection back between the plates with a much lower charge current
(stage 2) after the voltage rises from the recharge I alluded to in stage
1. State 2, a more sedate charge rate that prevents you from warping the
plates with 100+ amps by melting them, possibly causing a
short/explosion, continues unabated with short periods of zero current
for charge testing, then turns back on until the test period voltage
remains higher than the natural voltage of the cells, indicating nearly
full charge. It then switches to stage 3 which is a very slow topping
off charge.
Investigating Lew's 115A at 14V massive charge for 3 hours shows 115 X
14V = 1,610 watts being shoved into the battery. At first, this will be
absorbed a lot by the chemical reaction converting back to acid. But, as
the charge between the plates quickly completes and he goes into the
gassing phase converting his water into hydrogen, this power starts being
turned into heat, heating the electrolyte and plates, which are soft to
begin with, an possibly, probably, warping the plate structure,
especially if the cells aren't straight up vertical, such as being heeled
over with sail aloft of sloshing about in the waves. 1,610 watts is a
lot of DC power to pour through a rubber or plastic case...and will not
just go off easily sealed away in those tight battery boxes that insulate
the battery from any air cooling....making the heating problem worse.
He didn't want to hear my sad story, so I hope the rest of you will think
about what I'm saying before the big bang coats your boat with
acid....not a pretty sight at all!
Larry
--
Cursing me won't change physics or chemistry.....
Pete C
> Sorry Pete I cannot relate to the above, it is a far too simplistic.
> Here in the UK and I feel also in the US battery capacity is normally
> quoted at a 20hour rate.
> Therefore in the example offered above - 1A for 10hrs giving a 25%
> drop in "State of Charge" the actual original battery capacity would
> have been more like 35AH given a Peukert of 1.25
>
> Ok I realise that you used the term "about" but we are talking major %
> differences here.
Very good point, to get a good comparison of actual to rated capacity
you'd need to discharge at a 20hr rate.
So for a 40Ah battery this would be 40(Ah)/20(hours) = 2 amps.
cheers,
Pete.
Pete C
> >For those who know a bit about electrics and can use a hydrometer I
> >would propose
[stuff snipped....]
> 99% of my customers would not know what a hydrometer was
> 99% of my customers have no idea what their audit is
> 70% do not care
> 30% want to be able to look at something to tell them whether to
> charge or not
Exactly! E-X-A-C-T-L-Y!
If they knew a bit about electrics and could use a hydrometer, they
wouldn't be your customer, as they woundn't need professional help,
would they?
cheers,
Pete.
KLC Lewis
It takes me about 10 - 15 minutes to check all of the cells in my bank. This
is with the boat sitting calmly at the dock. I would much prefer not to have
to open those cells with the boat in motion, sloshing battery acid around.
If a meter will give me reasonably accurate information, which I can verify
from time to time with a physical check of the electrolyte when it can be
done safely, so much the better.
Pete C
> It takes me about 10 - 15 minutes to check all of the cells in my bank. This
> is with the boat sitting calmly at the dock. I would much prefer not to have
> to open those cells with the boat in motion, sloshing battery acid around.
> If a meter will give me reasonably accurate information, which I can verify
> from time to time with a physical check of the electrolyte when it can be
> done safely, so much the better.
Well, buy a Smartguage then! :)
cheers,
Pete.
KLC Lewis
I've been looking at them. Can't find a US source on the internet. Also
looking at the Xantrex Link 10. Part of me says that since it takes more
wires to hook up and uses a shunt, its information should be more accurate.
The other part just says, "duhhhhhhhh"
Stephen Trapani
Can't a person extrapolate state of charge with a simple voltmeter?
Stephen
KLC Lewis
"Stephen Trapani" <fahget...@nowhere.net> wrote in message
news:D53qi.947$6N....@newsfe05.lga...
From all the websites I've been looking at, it would appear that each
company's product is the only one that works. But as I understand it,
voltage tells you how much potential for doing work is there, but it won't
tell you for how long that work can be done.
Richard Casady
wrote:
>
>>"Richard Casady" <richar...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
>>news:46afd503...@news.east.earthlink.net...
>>>On Wed, 25 Jul 2007 08:37:20 -0500, "KLC Lewis" <nos...@spamless.com>
>>> wrote:
>
>>>
>>>Pete, do you propose using a hydrometer everytime you want to know your
>>>state of charge? This could be a couple of times each day, or more.
>>
>> It is, or used to be, the practice on submarines. Not much extra work
>> when you are checking/adding water. The original smart charger was a
>> sub sailor with thermometer, hydrometer, and voltmeter. Who knows what
>>
>> those guys are doing now.
>>
>> Casady
>
>That raises another question: Just how often are you supposed to check the
>water? Once a day? I've been doing it about once a month.
If they never need much water, you are doing fine. If you are seeing
the plates, add water more often.
The sub guys would give them a deep discharge, and then recharge them
at as high a rate as temperature allowed. Three engines on the battery
and one on propulsion was not rare. Most of a full charge in two hours
or so. If I recall correctly, some european boats have been built with
water cooled batteries,
Casady
KLC Lewis
I must be doing something right, then. :-)
Pete C
> Can't a person extrapolate state of charge with a simple voltmeter?
Good point, you can, with a few caveats which are covered by the
battery FAQ I posted a link to.
I'd probably use the voltmeter as a rough and ready guide on a day to
day basis, and a hydro now and then to verify it.
Cross referring the two could be pretty useful.
cheers,
Pete.
Electricky Dicky
wrote:
>
Give the part of you that say's duhhhhhh a beer and tell him to go sit
in the corner whilst the brighter bit of you reads the Smartgauge
website. Chris Gibson tells it the way it is. If I fit an amp hour
counter on a boat with a year old bank, what do I set the bank
capacity at? What value should the customer reset it to in a years
time? Now go have a beer and let duhhhhh take over, his answers are
just as valid as yours ;-)
And if those settings are not valid - garbage in - garbage out!!!!!
KLC Lewis
"Electricky Dicky" <m...@privacy.net> wrote in message
news:polha31nn4hkoc5k5...@4ax.com...
Well, I've read over the Smartguage site, and find it rather informative in
many areas. But other sites, selling other products, seem to indicate that
without a shunt so that the meter can read ALL current into and out of the
bank, the meter can't tell what's really going on. I don't find anything on
the Smartguage site that says how their meter can do it without a shunt, and
with only two wires connected directly to the battery bank.
Karin
Bruce in Alaska
Stephen Trapani <fahget...@nowhere.net> wrote:
It can be done, IF you have charactorized you battery cells before hand,
and have a good running record of SG vs Voltage on a per cell basis.
Other than that you just "Guesstimating", and that is about as accurate
as a DartBoard.......
Bruce in alaska
--
add a <2> before @
Lew Hodgett
> We have as a target of never letting our batteries get below 75% - and
> only rarely below 90%.
Trying to get the recharge above 90% will require a lot of time and
vaporize a lot of electrolyte.
Consider cycling between 70%-90%.
Much easier to accomplish with less wear and tear on the equipment.
> Our solar and wind were calculated to provide somewhere between 150
> low and 300 high AH/Day on average. Continuously cloudy (well,
> raining - it was completely overcast here at 5 and we were still
> getting 12A from the solar), windless days will throw that off, of
> course. However, we watch that meter like a hawk, and having had a
> bit of training about the interface of volts and amps as to what's
> happening in there, believe we'll be better managers than before.
Not a fan of wind, far too much noise. Much prefer solar and so will
your neighbors in an anchorage.
Unless you can mount at least 100 sq ft of solar, you are still going
to need a good alternator.
Do yourself a favor.
Get a copy of the performance curve (AMP v RPM) for your unit and
check the output @ 3,000 alternator RPM.
This should be the "hot" not the "cold" rating curve.
If it is the "cold" rating, deduct 20%.
You can now get a handle on your energy audit.
Without an honest alternator output value, you are flying blind.
> However, as backup, but aboard
> for our use of power tools in strange countries, as well as our hookah
> rig, we have a 2000w Honda much bruited about here on other
> occasions. Were it necessary while on the hook, likely we'd start
> that before the diesel, solely for charging.
No comment.
Keep in mind a dedicated 10W solar panel will keep the starting
battery charged.
No need to make life complicated.
Lew
Richard Casady
>richar...@earthlink.net (Richard Casady) wrote in
>news:46afd503...@news.east.earthlink.net:
>
>> It is, or used to be, the practice on submarines.
>
>Naw.....We check on the control rods, now....(c;
Actually the nuke boats have a battery, and, to charge it an engine
half the size of the four in a WWII boat. Something to get the reactor
started after a shutdown. Able to push the boat maybe three knots.
There is a retractable electric motor, maybe 300 horsepower worth.
Casady
Wayne.B
<SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>We've already got massive batteries. The issue is properly keeping
>them charged. At 750 nominal (less aging) AH, we can go for a long
>time with no charge input. But if we don't put in the charge,
>eventually the biggest battery bank will be flat, even if nothing is
>drawn from it, out of normal charge dissapation (flooded = ?%/
>month)...
To recharge 750 AH in a reasonable length of time you need a 3 stage
charging source of 150 to 200 amps (25% of capacity). Don't let Larry
tell you anything different. Wiring of appropriate size is also
required of course.
If you had a generator you could do that the way we do - use the
charger half of a high powered inverter/charger. Since you don't, you
will need a seriously high powered alternator with an external
regulator. An alternator of 200 amp capacity will typically be a
large frame Leece-Neville, require two drive belts, and quite possibly
some custom work on your engine drive sheaves and alternator mount.
All of this is not cheap of course, and it will take some shopping
around just to find someone qualified to do the work. Nothing less is
going to get the job done however.
Wayne.B
<SkipGu...@gmail.com> wrote:
>We have as a target of never letting our batteries get below 75% - and
>only rarely below 90%.
That is unrealistic. It takes too long to charge batteries above the
80 to 90% level because charging current must be tapered down.
Much more realistic is to run your batteries between 50% and 80%. That
requires a good 3 stage charging system capable of supplying 25% of
your capacity during the bulk charge stage.
Geoff Schultz
news:j2qia35pm4lmruus3...@4ax.com:
And don't forget cooling. A 200A alternator is going to generate a lot
of heat and will need to be cooled. You just can't throw it into an
enclosed engine space and expect it to crank out 200A without burning
up. You need to have a 3 stage controller with a thermocouple on the
alternator and you need to pipe air into the engine space.
-- Geoff
Wayne.B
<geoff"at"@geoffschultz.org> wrote:
>And don't forget cooling. A 200A alternator is going to generate a lot
>of heat and will need to be cooled. You just can't throw it into an
>enclosed engine space and expect it to crank out 200A without burning
>up. You need to have a 3 stage controller with a thermocouple on the
>alternator and you need to pipe air into the engine space.
Good points. In the end you may find that a generator coupled to an
inverter/charger has a lot to recommend it.
Wayne.B
wrote:
>I don't find anything on
>the Smartguage site that says how their meter can do it without a shunt, and
>with only two wires connected directly to the battery bank.
It can't of course, it can only guesstimate. If you want to measure
something you need the proper tools. The tool in this case is a
shunt.
On the other hand you can argue that all that is really needed is a
digital voltmeter to approximate state of charge. If your batteries
are reading 12.6 volts under a light to moderate load, they are at
100%. Dropping down to 11.6 volts under the same conditions, they are
at 50% and need to be recharged immediately.
Skip Gundlach
> On Thu, 26 Jul 2007 01:51:23 -0000, Skip Gundlach
>
I'm obviously missing a great deal of intelligence here.
I had thought we'd properly sized our bank and input sources to allow
for our anticipated usages.
Obviously I was mistaken; I need a large-frame alternator and the
appropriate drive components, in order to only bring my bank to 90%.
Instead, I'm inputting, over an entire day, unless they're already
full, in which case the controllers either divert or disconnect the
load, on average, somewhere between 150 and 300AH, an average (varies,
of course) of 6-12A per hour. Obviously, that's inadequate to keep a
battery topped up, especially a big one.
Trickling it in, I'd expected to rarely stress my batteries, rather
than subjecting it to high inputs for short times, and to, for the
most part, keep them full. I see I'm mistaken and must put not less
than 100A into the battery bank any time I'm charging, and must make
time in my schedule to run the main engine at least often, if not
regularly.
My 370W of solar, and KISS wind generator, are taking waaaay too much
room on the arch considering they're doing nothing to enhance my
charging regime. I figure I can save at least 100 pounds off the load
on the stern if I ditch them. Where I am, right now, in Charleston SC,
at 9AM, I'm only making 10 solar Amps with a bank which reads 13.9.
Yesterday, at 5:30, when I turned off the outside power and fired up
the inverter and put everything I could find on the load, it only was
making 20A. Controllers apparently size the output to the load (?).
I wonder what it would do at noon with a load?
I have no idea what it will do in real-world situations. I've only
seen 25A at the dock, sometimes, and 30A from the wind, but today's
dead calm, so there's nothing there.
Perhaps I'll just have to learn to live on less than 200AH/day, and
buy one of those massive alternators. Damn. I thought I was finished
in the engine room for a while. Oh, well. My 360CFM air exchange
ought to make it a little less stifling in there
Oh, and, of course, never leave the dock, as to do so would be to
surrender to a schedule. After all, if you get somewhere, sometime,
you've fulfilled *some* schedule, even if it wasn't something
targeted. But since I but since I can ill-afford the prices in any
marina, let alone this one, we'll have to do it from the hook, which
is ok, too. I just wish I'd get to see more places...
I'm going to cast caution to the winds today and go out for a sail, to
seatrial our repairs. However, we'll return to the security of the
dock this afternoon. We might play tourist for a while here, but we'll
have to do it from the hook, having exhausted the excuses to be at a
dock, not requiring any outside mechanics' assistance.
L8R
Skip
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery !
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"You are never given a wish without also being given the power to
make it come true. You may have to work for it however."
(and)
"There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its
hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts."
(Richard Bach, in The Reluctant Messiah)
Geoff Schultz
news:1185543637....@22g2000hsm.googlegroups.com:
You had better learn to live on 200 AH or less if you're going to stay
on a hook! You can have the biggest battery bank around, but if you
can't keep them charged, they won't do you any good. I'd rather have a
much smaller bank that I keep charged rather than a huge bank that's
undercharged.
Solar panels are great if you're somewhere that has lots of sun. I
personally de-rate the panels to 1/2 of their listed wattage to come up
with the *maximum* that I'll see out of them. This is 11 AM - 1 PM sun
and then it falls off before/after that. As the batteries climb in
voltage, you'll see less and less wattage.
Wind is great if you're somewhere that's windy. Summer on the dock in
Charleston doesn't fit that bill. The Bahamas or Caribbean quite often
does. I personally would rather spend $ on wind generators rather than
solar as I feel that you get a better bang for the buck. The wind can
blow for 24 hours, but at best you get 6 hours of good solar generation
without sun-following panels.
On BlueJacket we use about 150-200 AH a day. Refrigeration takes up the
bulk of that at about 85 AH. Replacing all of our incandescent lights
with LED based lights really helped save power. The rest of the power
goes into stuff like making water (about 40 AH), running the computer to
get weather faxes, stereo, watching DVDs on the TV, etc.
Whatever power I don't generate via my solar panels or wind generator, I
make up via the generator powered ProSine inverter/charger. (Note that
I wouldn't recommend ProSine as I've had to replace the unit too many
times.) I don't want to run the engine to charge the batteries as I
don't like to run the engine under light loads and I like to reserve
engine hours to moving the boat.
So you're right where most cruisers are when they find out that they're
power hungry and their generation doesn't match their consumption. The
easiest thing to do is to cut back on the usage, but that only goes so
far. Good luck balancing things. It takes a while to figure it all
out.
-- Geoff
www.GeoffSchultz.org
Pete C
.>
> I'm obviously missing a great deal of intelligence here.
>
> I had thought we'd properly sized our bank and input sources to allow
> for our anticipated usages.
>
Hi Skip,
This is what I'd do:
"For those who know a bit about electrics and can use a hydrometer I
would propose:
Do an energy budget/audit.
Size the battery bank for 40% DoD (depth of discharge) on a normal
days/period of use
Use the hydro to verify the above a few times as well as check the
batts are getting fully charged.
Use the hydro to check a few times that an exceptional days/period of
demand doesn't draw the batts below 80% DoD"
If you do the above why not write it down as well as charging times
etc in a log and post it.
I'd keep the solar/wind for now, just treat it as 'gravy' to stretch
the time between charging or reduce the charging time.
I won't say the above is the full solution, but is a worthwhile
learning exercise. There's probably some more advanced stuff to learn
but you have to do the basics first.
Any comments from other people?
cheers,
Pete.
Geoff Schultz
people don't *really* know how many hours a day their system runs, I would
suggest that you get a 12V run-hour meter and wire it into your system.
Log how many hours it runs and keep that in a spreadsheet and calculate how
much power you're using on a daily basis.
I do this and it lets me know how well the system is working and points out
any potential problems which may be forming. Since I designed and built my
system, I also have a tendancy to play with the expansion valve settings
and thermostat set-points. This allows me see how the changes have
effected the performance. I tend to go a bit overboard and keep track of
both the refrigeration and freezer run hours.
-- Geoff
Bob
> Perhaps I'll just have to learn to live on less than 200AH/day,
OH MY GOD !
Skip, you need either:
1) shit can everything: solar, wind, humongous dueling alts and get
one good gen set.
OR
2) walk the streets. find some peyote buttons or lsd and go on a
vision quest. A significant paradigm shift is in order.
Bob
Larry
news:ommja3lvcr3rsqtsl...@4ax.com:
Maybe this is what we need......(c;
http://www.fleetsource.com/Alternator_p/4900j.htm
Will a 4 cyl 4-154 Perkins turn it and the prop simultaneously, or will we
have to wait for the batteries to come up before coming out of neutral on
the tranny??
Larry
--
While in Mexico, I didn't have to press 1 for Spanish.
While in Iran, I didn't have to press 1 for Farsi, either.
While in Florida, I had to press 2 for English.
It just isn't fair.
Electricky Dicky
<waynebatr...@hothail.com> wrote:
>On Thu, 26 Jul 2007 12:55:16 -0500, "KLC Lewis" <nos...@spamless.com>
>wrote:
>
>>I don't find anything on
>>the Smartguage site that says how their meter can do it without a shunt, and
>>with only two wires connected directly to the battery bank.
>
>It can't of course, it can only guesstimate. If you want to measure
>something you need the proper tools. The tool in this case is a
>shunt.
That is analagous to using a flowmeter in your fuel line to drive your
speedometer (via a lookup table) ;-)
A shunt is used to measure current as you well know.
The Magic box that looks at the shunt counts in and out then
"guesstimates" based upon a number of parameters set by the installer
that may be right or may be wrong at that point in the banks life. The
final result is therefore ????? However most with amp counters assume
the numbers are gospel!
>
>On the other hand you can argue that all that is really needed is a
>digital voltmeter to approximate state of charge. If your batteries
>are reading 12.6 volts under a light to moderate load, they are at
>100%. Dropping down to 11.6 volts under the same conditions, they are
>at 50% and need to be recharged immediately.
Granted (maybe) but the "average" boater has no idea what load is on
at the time, and the average boater feels everything is OK if he sees
12.00 volts!
How do you explain the real life discrepancy between units as
discussed in my original post? The amp counter was WRONG!
Oh and by the way try leaving an amp counter on a battery with no load
for 6 months and see if it reads the correct information! No amps out,
no amps in, bank is 100% !!! is it hell!
Lew Hodgett
> I'm obviously missing a great deal of intelligence here.
>
> I had thought we'd properly sized our bank and input sources to allow
> for our anticipated usages.
>
> Obviously I was mistaken; I need a large-frame alternator and the
> appropriate drive components, in order to only bring my bank to 90%.
Wet cell batteries are a very mature technology.
The rules for them are very simple.
1) If you want to consume 200AH/day, you must generate 250AH/day of
replacement energy.
You can play all kind of regulator games, but in the end, the overall
average replacement rate is about 15% of the bank capacity or in this
case, 15%(750)=112.5A.
The minimum recharge time will be: 250/112.5=2.2 hours.
How you choose to get it done is your business, but the above rules
define the task.
Solar:
For an engineering estimate, use a 2ftx4ft,80W panel which translates
into 10W/sq ft.
Derate 50% for dirt, clouds, angle of attack, etc, thus 5W/sq ft.
As a year around average use 12 hours/day, thus 12hours(5W/sq ft))=60
watt-hours/sq ft/day.
60watt-hours/12volts=5amp-hours/sq ft/day.
To generate 250AH of solar you need 250/5=50sq ft or at least 7
2ftx4ft panels.
Probably not going to happen unless you build a hard bimini so you
have a place to plant your solar garden.
That's why alternators like the L/N 4800/4805 family exist.
Modest size, only 145/165 output depending on model, but either
deliver in excess of 100A at 2,000 alternator.
Ya pays ya money, ya takes ya pick.
Lew
KLC Lewis
> A shunt is used to measure current as you well know.
> The Magic box that looks at the shunt counts in and out then
> "guesstimates" based upon a number of parameters set by the installer
> that may be right or may be wrong at that point in the banks life. The
> final result is therefore ????? However most with amp counters assume
> the numbers are gospel!
snippage
> --
> Richard
>
> Nb "Pound Eater" Parkend G+S
> "Governments are like Nappies, they should be changed often."
> (For the same reason)
So it really comes down to choosing your choice of "magic boxes" which
"guesstimate"? How is the Smartguage better than the Link 10, if they both
"guesstimate" the state of charge?
Vic Smith
wrote:
This is a wireless SG sensor setup.
Data can be fed to a PDA, laptop or desktop and crunched
by the relevant software for analysis.
http://www.electrosense.com.au/SG-Electrode.htm
Toss out those old hydrometers.
You can probably get a nice setup of these for less than $10k.
Agitator beds for the batteries could be added if desired, but
I haven't looked for them. If I ordered any of this stuff I would
want a couple pocket protectors thrown in gratis.
--Vic
Pete C
wrote:
> This is a wireless SG sensor setup.
> Data can be fed to a PDA, laptop or desktop and crunched
> Toss out those old hydrometers.
> You can probably get a nice setup of these for less than $10k.
> Agitator beds for the batteries could be added if desired, but
> I haven't looked for them. If I ordered any of this stuff I would
> want a couple pocket protectors thrown in gratis.
LOL!
For checking SG under way a refractometer might be easier, on the
pocket at least! eg:
<http://cgi.ebay.com/Battery-Acid-Antifreeze-Glycol-Coolant-
Refractometer-
F_W0QQitemZ230154976520QQihZ013QQcategoryZ111537QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem>
cheers,
Pete.
Vic Smith
wrote:
>On Jul 27, 10:06 pm, Vic Smith <thismailautodele...@comcast.net>
So many gadgets, so little time.
--Vic
Electricky Dicky
wrote:
>
Don't ask me, it was Wayne that said that the "Smartgauge" estimated
not me!
KLC Lewis
Sorry, I was thinking you were the one selling the Smartguages. Unless you
are, in which case I still ask the question. They are all magic boxes that
guesstimate, so how does the Smartguage guesstimate better? And if you
aren't the proper one to answer, can the correct person please jump in?
OldNick
<lewho...@earthlink.net> wrote stuff
and I replied:
snip
I agree largely with you Lew, but I reckon that you are being a bit
_generous_ with the solar panels' capabilities.
>Solar:
>
>For an engineering estimate, use a 2ftx4ft,80W panel which translates
>into 10W/sq ft.
>
>Derate 50% for dirt, clouds, angle of attack, etc, thus 5W/sq ft.
>
>As a year around average use 12 hours/day, thus 12hours(5W/sq ft))=60
>watt-hours/sq ft/day.
>
>60watt-hours/12volts=5amp-hours/sq ft/day.
>
>To generate 250AH of solar you need 250/5=50sq ft or at least 7
>2ftx4ft panels.
Human bevaviour: Bestiality with a brain
Wayne.B
>Maybe this is what we need......(c;
>http://www.fleetsource.com/Alternator_p/4900j.htm
>
>Will a 4 cyl 4-154 Perkins turn it and the prop simultaneously, or will we
>have to wait for the batteries to come up before coming out of neutral on
>the tranny??
It will use 3 to 4 hp under load. That should not be a problem if the
Perkins is running OK and you use dual belts.
That's the right unit assuming you can get a mount fabricated and the
Perkins has dual drive sheaves. Nothing less is going to get that
bank of L-16s charged in a reasonable length of time.
Bruce in Alaska
Pete C <pete...@gmail.com> wrote:
> LOL!
>
> For checking SG under way a refractometer might be easier, on the
> pocket at least! eg:
and the clothes......
Bruce in Alaska
Wayne.B <waynebatr...@hothail.com> wrote:
Actually a single GearTooth Belt and GearTooth Sheaves can transfer
up to 8 HP with ease.....
Wayne.B
wrote:
>Actually a single GearTooth Belt and GearTooth Sheaves can transfer
>up to 8 HP with ease.....
Probably so but most of us do not have gear tooth sheaves.
dazed and confuzzed
You can do 24 HP with an 8 rib micro vee.
But if you have vee belts, it doesn't matter....
--
“TANSTAAFL”
____________________________________________________________________________
"A prudent man foresees the difficulties ahead and prepares for them;
The simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences." - Proverbs 22:3
____________________________________________________________________________
Larry
news:1a7ma3lqf0eulh6b2...@4ax.com:
> reasonable length of time
= 5 hours from 40% down....(c;
Larry
Larry
>>snippage
>
http://www.factorydirect2you.com/di.html
I always thought it would be great to modify a cell cap to permanently
mount the probe for one of these digital hydrometers into one cell on the
house batteries. No guesstimating here....you can READ the GRAVITY, the
only way to tell the condition of charge in a wetcell battery.
Price has come down a lot....$50!
Even if you couldn't mount it, its use would be much easier than a glass
hydrometer with the batteries buried like they are in most yachts. Lots of
boats, you can't even get the glass hydrometer into the cells, much less
actually read it.