Solar Everywhere

by Adrian 22nd Mar 2013 - equipment

In this winter of projects, one that I am particularly pleased with is the upgrade of our solar power system.

Solar panels from aboveWe already had two 65 watt panels installed on the coachroof as a factory option when the boat was built, but the intention was always to install another set of high efficiency panels on top of the arch at the stern.

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Cockpit tent / conservatory

by Adrian 20th Mar 2013 - equipment

A boat extension wasn’t really planned – but that’s been one of our projects this winter.

We’ve had a number of panels made up that attach to the bimini and sprayhood to form a covered ‘room’ across the whole of the cockpit.

Inside view

Called bimini extensions or cockpit tents, these are fantastic when living aboard in colder climates and during the winter.

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Who needs a Boréal? Shelter and tech come to the rescue…

by Adrian 16th Mar 2013 - equipment

Last night whilst motoring the first few hours when crossing the Channel we put up the sprayhood backdrop for a bit of shelter.

It was fantastic, revolutionary almost!

We had full visibility, but were for the first time enclosed in a cockpit.

For us sailors that is an unknown concept, and whilst we wouldn’t do it when sailing in brisk winds (when we’d need full cockpit mobility) it provided a very pleasant environment for long night watches.

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Icy blast in Cherbourg

by Adrian 12th Mar 2013 - N Europe

Its now a year since we took delivery of Vagaris in Cherbourg. We thought the weather was awful then, but that is nothing to now…

We’ve awoken the yacht from its winter slumber in Brighton and brought it over to factory in France to sort out a few small jobs. The trip over was pretty uneventful as we came over ahead of an extreme weather system that has now hit us and the rest of western Europe.

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My Joseph Joseph habit

by Jax 1st Mar 2013 - liked

It’s not my intention to endlessly plug stuff, but I think it’s good to know what does and doesn’t work. And if I talk about Joseph Joseph products I can do both of those things in the same post.

I like a good kitchen accessory and one of my favourite brands is Joseph Joseph.
http://www.josephjoseph.comI like that they try to come up with different and better ways of making kitchen and cookware accessories, and I like that most of them come in my favourite shade of lime green (it doesn’t add anything to their utility value, but it does make me smile).

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Isolation Transformer

by Adrian 20th Feb 2013 - equipment

We’ve had a galvanitic isolator (protecting the boat’s hull against earth current leakage) installed since launch, but I’ve recently taken shorepower isolation and galvanitic protection to the next level.

Isolation TransformerI’ve had a custom isolation transformer made which like all things on the boat, performs multiple functions:

1) It physically isolates the boat’s 240V electrics from the shore power by the use of physically separate transformer coils which transfer electricity from one coil to another via electromagnetic induction.

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Fuel System Overhaul

by Adrian 31st Jan 2013 - equipment

I’ve sailed enough miles to know that fuel and engine problems can seriously disrupt your day – whether it’s sailing into a marina with no working engine or struggling with an engine that won’t provide any power.

New fuel systemFor this reason, I’ve just completed a major overhaul of our fuel system, replacing the standard single filter with dual Racor filters, a supplementary electric priming pump and fuel polishing system.

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Baby, it’s cold outside…

by Jax 18th Jan 2013 - liked

Snow in Brighton MarinaAs it’s snowing horizontally across the marina today, it seems a good time to talk about keeping warm.

This is a hugely important topic for me as I really feel the cold. And now that we’ve moved our sailing horizons from the balmy Med to colder climes, it’s even more pertinent.

I can often be seen on deck of a summer’s night wearing pretty much every piece of warm clothing I own, which begs the question ‘what on earth will I wear when it gets really cold’?

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Space saving girl gadget

by Jax 18th Jan 2013 - food

I got a hand blender for Christmas. Who says romance is dead? I also got a lovely hat, which I left on the bus – gutted. I don’t deserve nice presents. Actually, I was pretty excited to get a hand blender.

Hand Blender2It doesn’t take up much space, and also has a whisk attachment. So it fulfills that boatie requirement of having more than one use.

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Simrad NSS and the WiFi-1 in detail

by Adrian 20th Dec 2012 - equipment

Whilst testing the NSS and GoFree interconnectivity on our boat in the real world I quickly discovered the one flaw with connecting it into your normal ship’s router and wifi access point.

You need to make sure your wifi router can support disabling IGMP multicast packets. The wifi1 does this as standard, since Navico’s radar and sonar devices flood the network with multicast packets, which ordinarily kills LAN ip traffic, meaning your LAN dies (literally no communication / internet can get through).

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