April 28, 2016
Precision 6
Thursday
After some other business away from the shop, I got to work again on the scuppers. The epoxy had cured overnight, leaving my new recesses ready to go. The screened fitting fit flush and finely.
I was awaiting delivery of the second fitting–I only had one on hand–as well as some elbows I needed below the deck, so for the moment I held off on installation. I did install the two exit through hulls in the transom, completing that side of the new drainage system.
Next, I continued work on the electrical system. I hooked up a battery so I could start to check the various circuits for operation. Most of the lights on the boat–two of three cabin lights, plus the bow and stern lights–operated when tested, but the forward cabin light turned out to be rusted within and was missing its switch, and therefore inoperable. I removed the damaged fixture and ordered a replacement light.
The owner reported that the VHF was inoperable, and after some troubleshooting and testing I traced the electrical problem to a bad fuse holder near the radio, which I replaced. This process also highlighted some issues with the existing fuse holder block on the port side of the boat, which serviced the VHF as well as the depthsounder and knotmeter (old as well as the new), and I couldn’t determine the issue, so I simply replaced the fuse holder/terminal block with a new one that I had on hand, and redid the short wire runs for the depthsounder and knotmeter, running them through an existing switch so they could be turned off as needed. At the same time, I secured a 12-volt outlet to a nearby structural member, and cleaned up the wiring pending final installation of the instruments a little later. Everything tested operational once I’d made these changes.
To ensure that I could complete the new instruments’ installation soon, I continued work on the exterior cover panel where they’d be mounted. I lightly sanded the primer that I applied earlier, then during the day spray-applied several coats of off-white LPU to generally match, or at least be consistent with, the existing deck surfaces.
The wiring to the single mast light led through the deck forward of the mast step, and was hidden beneath the forward cabin light fixture (the one that didn’t work and I’d removed). I couldn’t get power to the plug above deck, so I looked into the issue further and eventually removed the existing wiring through the deck, cutting off several old extensions and rewires from the past till I had the basic wires remaining. Digging into the old wire harness leading to the mast light plug, I found that red connected to green, and black to white, so now I knew which wires were which inside the boat and could make up a connection to a new wire pair, which I led above deck through the existing cable clam and reconnected to the old 2-way plug for ease of mast stepping and unstepping. With the meter, these wires tested operational. Later, I’d redo the mast side of the lighting circuit as required, but this completed the boat side troubleshooting and testing, and repairs as needed.
Total time billed on this job today: 4.25
0600 Weather Observation:
Clear, 22°. Forecast for the day: Sunny, 50s