Boat Electrical Systems

Boat Electrical Systems

Most small boat electrical systems are not much more that a battery and a few lights and electronics attached to it. Even though they are simple systems there are guidelines that need to be followed for a safe system.

First, the battery should be in a battery box with a cover. At the least the positive (+) terminal has to have a cover over it. This helps prevent an accidental short to ground.  An ON / OFF switch is recommended. This lets you disconnect all your system from the battery and it makes it safer when working on the battery or other components. Last the battery needs to be tied down so they cannot break lose in rough seas.

There should be fuses in the positive lines to your electronics. Connections on the wiring should be crimp connectors, never twist connectors.  Last the wires should be routed out of the way and secured so things cannot get caught in them or by them.

These are all logical straight forward things. By following them you will have few problems. So keep it simple and keep it safe.

Huckleberry Sailing Rig

A Huckleberry Sailing Rig...or that is what my brother called it.

 

In about 1956 my Dad got a family boat. The year before, Dad had built a cottage on Cataract Lake in Indiana. It was not too far from our house, as a get-a-way from his job and for us kids. The boat was a big heavy thing with a 25 horse outboard, and it would go at the most 20 mph. if that. I will say it was a good boat for the family, slow stable, and big enough for two adults, 3 kids and our two dogs.

My brother and I were not allowed to take it out by ourselves. When the boat was taken out, “all of us went”. What is the fun in that…

There was an old row boat at the dock we had, and everyone in the “group that had cottages” could use it. The real owner had a 3 horse out board on it, and when his two sons were around, all us kids used it. We just had to “pay for the gas” or we could row it.

On TV there was a show, I think the Hardy Boys, and they were our age, way down in Florida, and they had small sailboats they used. This excited me. You did not need gas and it was freedom on the water. I spent one whole summer trying to rig a sail on the old row boat. We did get a set up that would blow us down wind, but we had to row back. 8-) It was a 2x4 mast, a bamboo boom,and a old canvas tarp and a few control lines.

We used this set up to go around the edge of the lake to areas where the weekend boaters would camp and we would collect soda bottles that they had left. We got 2 cents a bottle when we turned them in, and with gas at 30 cents gallon, we could collect enough bottles to get a tank of gas for the 3 horse. With gas, we kids could motor across the lake to the public beach where there were other kids that we could get in trouble with. 8-)

My brother called my sail set up a Huckleberry sail and then the other kids started calling me “The Huckleberry Kid”. Thank goodness that did not stick for more than one summer. The others used the Huckleberry sail when it was convenient.

We had a lot of fun with that setup. I was cheap and it sort of worked, and I learned by trial and error a lot about sailing from it. My interest in sailing died for few years when we kids got the “Water Ski and sexy girl bug. The family big boat was traded for a ski boat, and the idea of a sailboat sank below the water for about 5 years till my dad bought a junk sailboat for me to fix up.

That junk sailboat was the real start to my sailboat interest. You can have just as much fun and as much freedom with a day sailor as a big boat…and you will use it more often because it takes less work to get ready to go out.  Arrg… lets go sailing.    

Schooner Haul Out

Schooner Haul out.

I bought a used Very CHEAP old boat trailer to move the schooner we built. I figured the boat would be in the water most of the time and a boat launch ramp was only 3 miles away.

I rebuilt the top of the trailer to fit the schooner. I had to make wheel fender brackets so the fenders would not flop and had to rewire the lights. The tires were OK and I greased the bearing buddys and the bearing’s seemed OK.   

The trailer seldom needs to be used and other then the minor work I did on it when I bought it, it has just sat and gone down from there. When I had to haul out the schooner I took a close look at the trailer. All four wheels were in bad shape. The lug nuts were rusted on and rounded so I could not get the wheels off but the bearings were OK. I found rust holes everywhere. The trailer is basically scrap metal now. I figured the old trailer has one more trip in her before it gets scrapped.

The boat ramp is only 3 miles away, and the light schooner is very light and the trailer was originally for a much, much heavier boat. I figured I would pull the boat out, do what was needed on the boat, put the boat back in and then scrap the trailer. 

I bought the trailer for $75.00, and I think I can get that for scrapping it.  I think it was a good investment over the long run, and I will be happy to see it go.

Schooner Repair

Schooner Repair

I found a soft spot in the wood around the mast step of our wooden Light Schooner. Of course it is not an easy spot to work on and there was no way you could work on it in the water. So out of the water the little boat came. It sat on the trailer for a few weeks before I made up my mind to work on it. I was not looking forward to see what I might find.

Of course you could not work on the area I needed to on the trailer. 8-(  I had to block it up and slide the trailer out from under it. The boat does not seem as large in the water.  I figured the car port would be cool and dry to work on it. The boat took up the full length of the carport and had about 10’ hanging out the opening. Then when you added the trailer pulled ½ way out from under it, the boat and the trailer took up most of the drive way as well as the carport. There was just room for our other vehicles without them being in the road. 

My wife is cool. 8-) She just looked at the set up and asked how long it will be this way. I shrugged and gave a non-committal only a few days.

The couple next door has been trying to sell their house for about 3 years. It is a nice house but it is WAY over priced but they will not lower the price. They complain on anything that they think will lessen the value of the house.  Me working on the boat will upset them I am sure.

I found the soft spot was worse than I had thought. Water had collected at and in the pocket hole where the mast seated. I had a vision of sailing along and the mast dropping through the bottom of the boat. 

The repair has taken longer than I had thought it would but the end is now in sight. The mast will be about 2” higher which should be no big deal. I will re varnish the bright work before she goes back in the water. She should be ship shape with in the week. I am sure wife and others will be happy with that. We have not had any comments from the others which have been totally unexpected. They were boaters also so maybe they thought it was a pull out for yearly maintenance. 8-)

By tradition when you step a boats mast you put a coin under the mast. When I pulled the mast step off I found the coin. I had used a Gold Readers Digest Promo Coin that looked like a Gold Dollar. I had a Susan B Anthony dollar under the other mast. (The other mast step is just fine.) I guess you get what you pay for in mast coins. I am going to use another S.B. Anthony this time as well as the Readers Digest coin for more luck. 8-)

Old Fishing Book

Old Fishing Book Found.

I put a shelf up in our office above the desks and about a foot down from the ceiling. We needed the storage space and I figured that we could put seldom used stuff up there, out of the way, but it would still be accessible. Well, I overloaded it and the brackets that I mounted to the wall pulled out of the drywall  and it fell the other evening. 

It scared the “whatever” out of both of us, and we both jumped to the conclusion that the cats had done something like pushing a computer off the desk. On investigating, I found I could not blame the cats. I still tried to blame the cats. 8-)

As We were cleaning up the fall out, I found a Al Pflueger’s Fisherman’s Handbook. The Copyright was 1974 and the price sticker on it was $5.95. The book had a guide to ID salt and fresh water fish and fishing methods. The book had illustrations of the fish by Russ Smiley. The hand drawn color illustrations were beautifully done and were better than the photos from the Miami Seaquarium at the back of the book. 

The book is very dated in both the information given and the illustrations. I loved the illustrations…many could be framed--they were that good. I am going to have to sit down and go through the book and really enjoy it one of these rainy afternoons when you cannot do anything outside. Till then, I will store it on a better bookshelf.