BIGGER NEWS!!

We were so excited Friday about our BIG NEWS and then we had even BIGGER NEWS on Saturday!  We took the boat out after the rain ended Saturday to give the autopilot a whirl.  IT WORKS!!  Granted the conditions were mild, but it held a course, turned nicely, executed a U-Turn, shows the rudder angle if we want it to... all sorts of good stuff.  We still have no idea why it did not work before and does work now but we will take what we can get!

Here are two shots from our auto-pilot sea trial and a gratuitous engine room shot.

Our batteries and charger also seem happy now.  We've been having problems with the charger putting out to much juice (over 15 amps) and the mid battery not holding a charge and not being able to start the engine.  We have a series of combiner switches so we've been able to use the other battery to start both engines, however the batteries (and the charger) are only 18 months old so it seemed weird to having issues.  So Matt took the mid battery into the shop it came from and they checked it out and told us it was fine.  We put everything back together and labeled all the wires, then turned the charger back on.  Once again it was putting out too much juice.  We turned it off and did a bit more fiddling around (really nothing in particular, just labelled a few more things...) then when we turned it on again it worked fine.  We left it on the whole weekend and never saw it putting out more than 13.5.  Who knows.  It is a boat, after all!

We also have the dinghy motor davit and the motor mount nearly sorted out.  In fact, we were ready (physically, if not mentally) to drill four holes in our transom to mount the motor mount, but realized our drill was at home.  I've never seen Matt so happy he had to stop working on a project.  Drilling all the way through the fiberglass is a bit stressful.  Not something you want to mess up! 

Since we had to halt the motor mount project, we instead went to the store for light bulbs and a new light bulb socket.  We have not had any light in the forward head since our last Angel Island trip.  There are two fluorescent lights in there and one was barely giving off a glow and the other one was completely dark.  Well come to find out one of them was turned off!  You may wonder how we did not notice this.  We always turn the lights on and off with the light switch but one of our guests must not have realized there WAS a light switch (it is outside the room) and used the switch on the side of the light.  Anyway, a new light bulb took care of the dim bulb in that head and the one in the aft head that had the same problem.  There are also two ceiling dome lights in the aft head and one of those was not working all the time.  We took it apart and found the piece of plastic that held the light bulb in place was cracked so the light bulb was not staying up against the socket.  We found a new, slightly different, socket and West Marine and were able to swap that out and get that light working again.

Before we go to the delta we hope to have Keith make us canvas screens for the big windows in the saloon and the side windows in the aft cabin.  There are a few screens that came with the boat, but only for the very small ports in the forward cabin, the forward head and the galley.  We also have a few other to dos before the delta trip and we only have three weekends before we leave!  One of those is the yacht club's big cruise to Encinal so we're not likely to get much done that weekend.  So much to do!

This is the motor mount we still have to install, as well as some clips to hold a boat hook at the back of the boat.  Those are on the project list for next weekend.  Plus that is a bowl of pistachios.  If you like pistachios, PLEASE come by and eat some as we have lots.