Finally! - In the water and moving

[Beta Don]

Ok - A few pics of the freezer/fridge. An Isotherm air cooled unit just like Jay is using installed in a high end 90 liter (3 cubic ft) 'ice chest'. One cu ft is freezer, the other 2 are fridge

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The evaporator holds 4 ice trays and below it on a shelf is a large tray (the bottom 4 inches of a rectangular laundry detergent bucket) on a shelf which holds about 8 trays of cubes. The freezer will make 4 trays in about 12 hours, running in a 1/3rd 'ON' 2/3rds 'OFF' cycle

[Beta Don]

Same photo, but with the insulated plexi panel which separates the freezer from the fridge dropped in place. The plexi panel rides in grooves cut in a teak strip visible in the first photo. The panel comes very close to the evaporator - There is no separate door on the evaporator - Just lift the panel and you've got access to the freezer compartment and the big ice storage tray beneath it

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There is actually one more compartment not shown in either picture which is under the shelf holding the ice storage bucket. That compartment doesn't stay 'frozen' but stays pretty cold. A photo of the temperature gauge later

[Beta Don]

Top view of the fridge (and my pantlegs The freezer/fridge divider is not in place . . . . and several items were removed from the fridge - It stays virtually 100% full to the brim all the time. Carolyn is constantly rearranging things. There are two six packs of beer laying flat on the bottom with a plexi 'shelf' above them. The contents of the fridge rests on that shelf - A bit of trouble to get a cold beer, but they are down there!!

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[Beta Don]

The top of the cooler with the lid closed. The box rests on an elevated platform which raises it to table top height. This is placed in the center of the lazarette seats and about 18" in front of the doors to the aft cabin. There is a vertical stainless 1" tube from the floor to the extended hardtop just in front of the freezer fridge (and just behind the engine bay openings) and another pole which you can see just aft of the freezer fridge. There is actually a good bit more room between that aft pole and the aft cabin entry than the photo suggests - We have no problem getting in and out of the aft cabin. The poles are quite handy when the ride is bumpy on choppy seas

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[Beta Don]

Here's the table with the leaves folded open. The leaves are held closed by round rare earth magnets set flush in the table top so the leaves don't go flopping around when you open the fridge. You can see the front pole in this photo. Above the poles on the ceiling of the hardtop extension are lights and switches. One set of LED's directly above the tabletop. A flush mounted LED aft of the aft pole which lights up the floor area of the aft cabin when the cabin door flap is left open. We leave this light on all night so we can see where we're going . . . . you know when! It also lights up the area which makes the boat a bit more visible when anchored out, and we anchor out a lot. Every light on the boat is now LED, some of them with pulse width dimmers attached. When you dim an LED to 50% using a PWD, the current draw is also reduced by 50%

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[Beta Don]

The box sitting on it's riser, viewed from the front looking aft . . . . with a gallon of motor oil I hadn't put away - I told you guys I'm no photographer!!

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The blue numbers to the left of the pole represent the temperature in the very bottom of the freezer (the box had been open for 15 minutes or so taking pictures) and the green numbers below that are a temp probe in the other end of the box and represent the fridge temperature. A switch turns these off most of the time. Neither is super accurate - The box is actually a bit colder than they show. There is a third set of red numbers below the green ones (but turned off) which shows the current being drawn by the compressor - A bit of overkill I'll admit. Once you use it a few times to see what's going on, you never have need of it again. I kinda wish I had left that feature off and just checked it with a meter a few times

The compressor half of the Isotherm is under the engine exhaust tubing in the port lazarette, just in front of the foot of my bed. Also under the exhaust tubing are two AGM golf cart batteries, end to end which power the fridge and most major house loads - Carolyn's CPAP machine included. The lights (all LED's) & miscellaneous other small loads run off the engine starting battery, which is made up of a pair of flooded golf cart batteries located in the engine compartment, near the water lift muffler

[Vic K]

All I can say about your refrigerator/freezer set up is......Kool!

Vic

[JT48348]

Very cool. I can't decide which is the better idea: the cooler/freezer mod or the stripper pole in the cockpit. Don, you're very craft!

[Beta Don]

Well, the 'stripper pole' doesn't see a lot of use unless . . . . *Just for you, JT* . . . . the 'Admiral' is away from the boat for the evening

A couple of other 'poles' we've found very useful - This one rests on the back edge of the dash and runs at a 30 degree angle up to the roof. You would not *believe* how handy this is to grab onto - We seldom transit the cockpit area without putting a hand on it and no, I've never hit my head on it.

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It supports the mast on the roof and is stuffed FULL of cables leading into the hanging locker below. There is DC wiring for the Bow light, the Anchor light and a pair of 8 gauge wires leading to the solar panels. It also contains a network cable to the WiFi booster, a coax cable to the TV antenna, another for the cel phone antenna, and another for the VHF antenna

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The mast can be lowered in about 15 seconds by pulling a single pin which lays it on the roof for trailering, or for sneaking under an 8 foot bridge on the Florida ICW, which we did just a few days ago

The WiFi booster is . . . . amazing! Even anchored out, you do a scan with it and it gets a signal from every home or business WiFi router within miles. Not unusual to see 20, 30 or even 40 usable signals - Of course it they are secured, you can't use them without the password, but you wouldn't believe the times we've eaten or shopped in a local establishment which advertises free WiFi, got the password for our phones and gone back to the boat and found that signal and logged the boat's router into it. The cel phone amp is really useful too. Night before last, anchored out I noticed my phone's data was loading reaaaalllllly slow and saw '1x' where '4G' should be. I remembered I had shut off the cel amp because we'd been in a marina for the previous 4 days and when I switched it on, 1x went instantly back to 4G

Lastly, we installed this one across the hatch leading below which gives you something to hang onto when the boat is rocking and you're trying to go below without breaking an arm or leg. Actually, since we put it there, we find we use it every day, even when tied to the dock. It also enables leaving that triangular hatch board in place all the time which makes a handy shelf for binoculars and all sorts of other 'stuff'

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Yes, there is a rubber duck sitting on both sides of the dash. Another smaller one on top of the burgee flagpole on the bow rail and a bigger one looking out the back window. Our Spot Tracker is nicknamed 'Rubber Duck' and the theme just kinda stuck with us

[tego]

Don, Now I'm really sorry I missed you this past Sunday. It's great to see the particulars about your description of your reefer etc. You've got a great boat! Ben

[rnummi]

Ben it's actually quite amazing. He's got the ideal set up. The mast is really great. An old Hobie Cat boom. Every year Don put into this boat is visible. There's almost no square inch that hasn't been fixed, modified, polished, or tweaked. An amazing boat and a really nice Captain and First Mate.

[Jay Knoll]

Looking good Don.

What is that blue/grey thing on top of the cabin over the cockpit?

[Beta Don]

Looking good Don.

What is that blue/grey thing on top of the cabin over the cockpit?

Jay - I'm guessing you're talking about the first of the three pictures and the white box above the helm with blue and grey in it is the stereo. Above the helm is an overhead 'dashboard' with the white VHF radio on the left - You can see the microphone hanging on the left side. Next to it moving right is a 100 amp Blue Sea analog ammeter which measures current coming from the alternator. Next is the stereo. It's a cheap $80 unit I got on sale from West Marine, but it sounds pretty good and it takes an SD card which we store our music on. The 6" pair of speakers that came with it are mounted in the cockpit coaming below and behind the side windows and another smaller 4" pair mounted on the removable panels facing aft in the aft cabin. I mounted it up there because it came with a remote control and you can adjust the volume of it from the aft cabin without even getting out of bed In retrospect, it's not the perfect location for either radio because their (cheap) panels were designed to be easily read from above, as they would be if they were mounted below eye level. The stereo panel especially is nearly impossible to read when viewed from below - It lights up a pretty blue as you see in the picture, but trying to read the title of the song that's playing is almost . . . . impossible! Moving further right are the switches for the wipers, next to those are the fuse holders for the wipers and to the far right nearly out of view is the horn button. The considerable cabling from that overhead panel runs down a pair of side by side cable raceways you can see just to the right of the drivers windshield

I have a $100 'PowerMax' alternator I bought on eBay mounted on the engine which actually outputs 85 amps, hot or cold, all day long into 4 golf cart batteries when they are heavily discharged. I kept the new 55 amp Yanmar alternator as a spare. No fancy regulation system on the alternator - Just the internal one which maxxes out at 14.7 volts. I do have 3 stage 'smart regulators' on both the 40 amp shore power charger and a PWM regulator on the solar panels, so anytime the engine isn't running, the batteries see a 3 step regulator. *From what I've read* I'm not really hurting the batteries by holding them at 14.7 volts (with minimal charge current - Less than 2 amps - when they are full) with the engine running - Cars do it this way. We'll see how long the batteries last. All good so far

For any serious cruising you will need a really good set of windshield wipers, so don't skimp on those. With the wind on the nose and any serious chop on the water, the pilothouse stays drenched in salt spray and the wipers get a real workout when you're searching for those pesky crab pot floaties. Our boat had no wipers at all when we bought it, so all of that had to be redone from scratch. We bought heavy duty 2 speed motors and added the twin 'pantograph' arms like you see on the big RV's which keep the wiper blades vertical so they sweep a much larger percentage of the glass. The second arm mounts on a bearing like this one http://www.amazon.com/Marine-Bracket-Pa ... B00K5ABEPK
Carolyn's eyes are much better than mine, so she's constantly on the lookout for the floaties and more than once she's complained that we really need a set of wipers on the center window too! Hard to do on an opening window, so Vic has an advantage on us by making his center window fixed, non opening - He can easily add a wiper there if he decides to cruise West Florida and he'll be really glad to have it, I assure you

Don

[Jay Knoll]

Don

Thanks but that wasn't what I was asking about. On the pic of the boat lying alongside a dock I see something on the roof, looks like it has a blue cover on one end

Jay

[Beta Don]

Ahhh! That's the crane arm for lifting the dink. It raises to 45 degrees with a pin, swivels and there's an electric winch inside the boat that pulls a 1/4 inch rope to do the lifting. *Not entirely sorted out as yet* which is why we've been towing the dink.

The 8' hardtop extension is supported with a 1 1/2 inch stainless pipe which runs vertically through the top front corner of the aft cabin roof, one on each side. The port side pipe goes through the hardtop roof and serves as the base for the crane The bottom of that pipe is welded to a 3 x 12 by 1/2 inch thick stainless flat bar which is through bolted to the coaming - You can see a horizontal piece of epee wood just forward of the aft cabin window with two bolt heads down on the coaming. On the port side, those same two bolts mount a 3/4 inch plywood panel inside the boat which holds the winch. The rope runs up through the center of the pipe through a set of pulleys and out the end of the winch arm

I have used it to pick up 200 pounds as a test back home with the boat on the trailer, but a last minute change of dinks has thrown a monkey wrench in the dink lifting plans, so I've not yet actually lifted the current dink up there with it - I'll get it all sorted out one day (hopefully soon) when I'm not finishing up 20 other projects . . . . or following Carolyn walking all over town

Don