Ta Da!!

We have a fresh water head!!

We will have to finish the other one next weekend as we need a part from the store--we only had the exact number of small hose clamps that we needed (actually we didn't have any, but one of our dock neighbors had exactly the number we needed...) and one broke so we need to go buy more before we can finish the second head. Luckily the clamp broke while we were doing the first one, otherwise we might not have been able to turn the water pressure back on! 

So we went to the boat Thursday night with a fairly extensive list of things to do this weekend.  Friday morning I jumped on a web based training at 6:30 am as Matt got ready to go to work.  He left me on the boat and I worked from there on my lap top all day.  I took an hour lunch break and worked on mocking up the install of our dinghy motor lift.  I discovered we needed one more part (of course) and got that ordered.  I left it all set up so Matt could see it and see what he thought of it.  Then back to work for a few more hours.  That evening we went through our list and made sure it was complete while compiling our West Marine shopping list.  Saturday morning we started in on projects and quickly decided we needed to go to Tap Plastics and West Marine before we could get much more done.

At Tap we got a backing plate for our door lock so the part of it in the door and the part of it on the door frame would line up properly and we'd be able to lock the door.  We haven't had a lock for months, which doesn't bother us at CP but we would like to be able to lock the boat at the delta.  Then off to West Marine for a laundry list of items, both to complete projects and to have for the delta trip. 

Once we were back at the boat, Scott and Kim came by for lunch so we could plan out logistics for the Delta trip.  While they were there, Joe and Carrie and Mark stopped by.  Then Eric, who has a PT 35 in Monterey came by.  It seemed like Grand Central Station but it was a lot of fun. We are looking forward to seeing Eric's boat sometime.  We had never met anyone with the exact same boat so it was really neat to hear how the boats compare.

Once things calmed down a bit I started prepping for the head installs.  First I made my own Tee fittings to adapt from the 1/4" water lines we have to the 3/4" water lines the heads require.  Then I mounted the solenoid and vacuum breaker for each head onto a board with some of the hose segments attached.  Then Matt helped me get those mounted inside the cupboards of each head and he helped me get the one in the aft head teed into the water line.  We also got the lock working and messed around with the battery wiring some more.  We called it a night after I cut a new piece of hose and then attached the wrong (old, too short) piece onto the solenoid!

Sunday we slept in pretty late and I had to get to Filoli to work (I volunteer in the garden shop as a cashier).  I REALLY wanted to get our head in so we started in on it but it was not done yet when I had to leave.  Matt had a bunch of other things he wanted to do as well so I wasn't sure if he would get the head done without me to help.  He said as soon as I left Joe came over from across the dock to help drill the holes through the transom for the dinghy motor bracket and then Matt went over to help Joe with something on Joe's boat.  Matt said a couple of hours went by and he realized he should get back over and finish the head install.

So he got the head in place and then spent a good 20 or 30 minutes getting the discharge line on.  He said it was really hard due to the way the hose curved around.  He said Joe came by twice to say hi while he was working on it and when he found out Matt wasn't done yet he went back to his own boat.  Matt finally got it on there, got the wiring hooked up, turned on the water pressure and the power to the heads then came back and pressed the button to try out the flush.  He waited, figuring the air pressure was coming out of the lines, and he heard water running but no water was coming in to the head.  It took a couple seconds for him to realize he hadn't hooked the water line to the head.  That was much easier than getting the discharge line on and soon he was able to do a real test flush.  It works GREAT and is much quieter than the old head.  There is also no nasty salt water stink!  The head we got for the aft head is "household" size and it is noticeably larger and taller than the old marine head that was in there.  All in all we are very happy with how this project came out and we think finishing the forward head next weekend will not take long at all.

Here is Matt checking out the inside of the new head prior to install.

Here is our shim for the lock.  (Tap Plastics deemed the piece they cut our shim from as "scrap" and gave that to us as well for the $1.00 they charged us!!  Matt already has some ideas for using it.  It is about 8 times the size of our shim.)

 My homemade tees to go from 1/4" to 3/4"

 Here is one of my boards

and this is Matt installing my tee into the water line in the aft head.  The large metal tee is the heater vent ducts)

 Out with old

 the board installed for the aft head

 mounting the new head to the base

the four holes in the transom for the dinghy motor bracket (from the inside of the storage cupboard)

I did not get any photos of the dinghy motor lift or the holes from the outside of the transom.  Next weekend!