Since my foibles are something of a running joke here, I thought I'd share some more.
Yesterday I took the ebb tide all the way out the Gate (again!). On the way back in (dang, no whales) the boat lurched on a swell and I stumbled into my pedestal - where the toggle controlling fwd/rev sits. You guessed it - from fwd to rev in an instant. Suddenly my amp draw was way down..hmmmm.
Moral: Install a guard on your toggle switches...
AND...my belt tensioning is a bit..um..crude. Basically my motor is mounted to a plate on one fixed pivot bolt, and the others can slide in a slot. Propshaft is on another plate. Move the plate, tighten the bolts, presto, belt is tensioned. To get at this though I have to crawl into a hole, lay sideways and sorta upside down. And I'm outside the Gate single-handing.
Enter the cam-lever. Snap it up, bolt is loose, snap it down, tight as can be - 10 seconds to reset my belt. Gotta get one. (A real belt-tensioner might be even better, but I've never been able to figure out all the parts involved @Grainger - anyone done this?)
For those keeping score, that's about a 50mile round-trip and I used 110AH (@48v) of a 345AH pack (AH not Peukert compensated - guestimate ~130AH). Voltage under 20amp load reading 50.3 at start and 48.4 at end. About 50% usable wind and had the tide with me in both direction (4.7kt ebb, 4.2 flood). Took about 8 hours (when the wind was up I had close to 8kts SOG)
-Keith
e-S/V "Aja"
San Francisco
No comments:
Post a Comment