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Equinox Project | Tuesday, March 3, 2009 With the engine project on hold until raw materials for the foundation arrived, I spent the day making final connections in the electrical system. Beginning with the "navigation area" on the port side--where all the electronics and nav lighting is to be controlled--I made up the final connections, starting with all the negative conductors, which I labeled, cut to length, and attached to the negative distribution buss using adhesive-lined heat shrink ring terminals. |
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With all the negative connections complete, I continued with the positive wires. In the new wooden backer panel, I installed the three-breaker navigation panel and the adjacent nav lights switch panel, and then made all the final connections to the backs of the panels, including the main panel feeds (positive and negative) and additional wiring to support the panel lighting features. I secured all the wire bundles as needed, and this completed the wiring on the port side. I secured the panel with some black-coated stainless steel screws, which I thought looked better than shiny silver screws. Note that several wires hang down in the space above the quarterberth footwell; these are the raw ends for the depthsounder and GPS wiring, which are not yet installed, so there is excess wiring here that has not reached its completed stage yet. This is not the final appearance, nor acceptable wiring protocol, lest anyone think this is so. |
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I also installed and made the final connections to the VHF; I discovered that the power cable that I'd worked hard to save and reuse didn't go with this VHF, so I had to cut off the connectors and make up some new removable ends to connect the radio's power. I thought about covering these wires with split loom, though that would reduce the convenience of removing the radio for storage, as well as limiting access to the radio's inline fuse holder, but I didn't like how it looked as is. |
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With time remaining in the day, I continued the process on the starboard main breaker panel. Once again, I started with the negative connections, and finished up all these wires before ending work for the day. |
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