It's Tuesday

For those who have not been with us from the beginning, it is Tuesday. Time is different on a boat. We sometimes forget the day, the month, the time of day. We go to bed early and wake up with the start of sunrise. That is not accurate. We wake up and check on the boat two or three times during the night. However, we don't commit to coffee until we are ready to start the day. It has been three years. Three years living on the boat. Three years without the dishwasher, hot shower, flushing toilet, working stove, big screen TV, and everything that we had before the fall. We just celebrated our 5th marriage anniversary and our 20 years of marriage on February 29th. Mike says we should have started living this way 20 years ago. I think he is right. I'm not sure if I would be prepared to do this and Mike would not have joined the Navy. The Navy gave him many of the skills necessary to fix our boat. So, if we had done it 20 years ago, with my son, where would we be now? Depending on the day and the conditions around us, I will give a different opinion. Three days ago, I would say yes. This is what we should have been doing and should be doing now. Today was frustrating. My computer died. This is our only source of income at the moment. I'm posting this on Mike's computer. It doesn't have my software or system setup for working online. I asked Mike today if it was worth it. As always, he says yes. He is out washing clothes by hand at the moment. First he soaks the clothes in a little detergent and harbor water. Then he rinses it in fresh water. We have extra fresh water at the moment. We've had heavy rains for the last couple of days and our dinghy is full. He will be scooping fresh water onto the clothes and hanging them up to dry. The wind has been good and the wind generator (Jenny) is keeping us in power. Every is a survival day sprinkled with a bit of imagination and hope. I'm cooking comfort food now. Instant mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, and mushroom gravy. Take care all. Love you.

Going on the hook

I'm sorry that I haven't posted in a while. We've been working on getting everything ready to go on the hook. Work has slowed down and we won't have the money to pay slip rent for January. We went on a short and exciting cruise toward Fort Sumter last week. After about an hour motoring in the harbor and getting used to the feel of our boat, steam started coming from the engine compartment. We decided to put up the sails and killed the engine. It was a wonderful time and we finally tacked back to a good area and dropped anchor. We watched the sunset and listened to the quiet. It was so different from the marina. With no more traffic noise from the bridge, the only sound was the slapping of waves against the hull and the purr of the wind generator. Note: Bob, you were right. Mike got thwacked on the head by the wind generator. There wasn't any blood, but it did give us a new respect for the whirling blades. The next day, Mike figured out that raw water feed wasn't cooling the engine. We called BOATU.S. for a tow back to the slip. The wind and tides were not good for sailing back to the marina. The towboat operator was experienced and brought us safely back. Mike started digging into the engine and found that the impeller was missing a piece of metal/key. He created a fix from an old screwdriver and got the motor up and running again. Mike still has to go up the mast to install the masthead light. Then we go grocery shopping one last time using the courtesy van and fill up on diesel. After we finish prepping, we will be going on the hook in the harbor. We will pay the dinghy fee so that we can tie up our dinghy at the marina and get fresh water and wash clothes at the Variety Store. Mike will have to bicycle to Harris Teeters for any groceries. By the way, a big thanks to everyone who sent us Christmas cards. A big thank you to Thomas who sent us a wonderful food basket. We are still enjoying the fruit and treats. Happy holidays to all!

A lesson in engineering

Winds got up to almost 40 knots last week. This was enough to knock down our wind turbine tower, surprisingly enough. It failed at the wooden base, so that will have to be redesigned and rebuilt. The fall also bent the main tower, which I think was too tall anyway. I will be building a new tower of stronger materials, with a much more robust base, and a shorter stance by about 3 feet.

Wind Turbine added!

We added another piece of handy gear to the boat: a big wind turbine. Wattage will depend on the wind, of course, but it's a solid unit rated for 300W peak. I had the option to wire it directly to the batteries and ground but that would waste a lot of the power, plus it might interfere with the solar charge controller. I decided to treat it as a clean power source and get the most out of it. A bit of research led me to a nice 50-amp bridge rectifier for 3-phase input which would smooth the turbine output to ripple DC. The DC then goes to a second charge controller to regulate the voltage further, and then finally to the batteries. I've been testing it without an ammeter so far by watching the change in the primary solar controller output, but I am definitely going to add a meter to the system.