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Refit: Winter 2008-2009
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Winter 2008-2009 Refit | Saturday, January 31, 2009
A couple new options have appeared in the search for
wind instruments. This is good, since things are now
approaching the realm of reality for what I need. I
was having trouble justifying the high price of premium
instruments like the Raymarine ST60 series (street price
around $775) and TackTick T101 wireless wind system (street
price around $1200), although both are nice instruments.
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Raymarine ST60 |
TackTick T101 |
The cheesy Raymarine ST40
instrument (street price around $302), with its ugly and
oddly-sized display and the powerboat-type anemometer that
screams Wal-Mart-style cheapness, never really entered into
serious consideration, despite its low price. There's
just nothing to like about this instrument. |
Raymarine ST40 |
To me, the wind instruments
are just a fun, entirely unnecessary diversion, and these
systems just seemed like overkill for my purposes--never
mind their high price tags. I originally added
Standard Horizon
wind instruments in 2004, and enjoyed them for a couple
seasons. However, the apparent wind function began to
become erratic and inaccurate one year, followed by the
cessation of accurate wind speed information as well.
I lived with the non-functioning wind instruments for 2
or 3 seasons (despite numerous and ultimately
unsuccessful attempts to troubleshoot and repair the
problem, whatever the problem is), and the lack of "Boat
TV", as we called the display (so dubbed because of the
amusement factor of sitting at anchor and watching the wind
speeds on gusty days), certainly never affected our sailing.
Still, I hoped to install a new system this winter, rather
than continue forward with the inoperable instruments that I
had.
Recently, it came to my attention that there
were two options of which I'd previously been unaware (both
are new products). One is a less expensive version of
the TackTick wireless system, the T033 wind system (street
price around $730). However, this is still a
premium system, at least in terms my own cost vs. need
basis. |
TackTick T033 |
The other is the Northstar
Explorer W310 wind system (street price around $430), which
appears to be quite comparable to the Horizon system that I
currently in place, both in pricing structure, installation,
and display appearance. It comes with the typical
long-arm sailboat anemometer and vane setup, similar to the
TackTick ones shown above.
As of this writing, I
continue to look into these options, happy to have found at
least system that fits more easily into my hopeful budget
and, more importantly, into my own feelings of what wind
instruments are worth to me. The final decision is
still pending. |
Northstar W310 |
Now for some actual work.
It was time to reinstall the propeller shaft and coupling,
since I'd decided not to pull the engine this year; my
inspections indicated that there was no pressing need for
this, and while this job is still on the list for the near
future (likely next winter), my schedule for the coming
weeks and months was going to be full enough that I saw no
reason to undertake an unnecessary job.
As I'd done
twice before, I reinstalled the shaft and couplings using
plenty of water proof grease on the mating surfaces and on
the bolt threads. The coupling slipped onto the shaft
easily, and the reinstallation was straightforward. |
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Next, I reinstalled the
propeller, again using the waterproof grease on the shaft
taper and threads. |
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With the running gear back
in place, I moved on to some other small jobs, including
cleaning up the excess sealant around the new access hatch
in the cockpit, which I installed a week or so earlier, and
cleaned, sanded, and varnished some of the brightwork:
coamings, swash boards, and lazarette hatch. |
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Total time today: 3 hours
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