Swedes getting back to roots with Albin 25

[tribologist]

Been looking for an Albin 25 for a while. My wife’s sisters family had one in Luleå, Sweden that we enjoyed until we moved to Connecticut in 2000. This last Tuesday we picked up “Driftless”, a decent looking 1970 with a low hour Isuzu/Yanmar 27 hp engine on a nice trailer. The plan is to do a few day trips with her this fall to become friends with her and teach her Swedish again , Make trailer 100% up to date and then start playing in Long Island Sound and Connecticut river before Going down LIS and up Hudson to Eire Canal and/or lake Champlain Canal next year.

We plan to do it in pieces and have our older son help picking us up with the trailer when needed. We will have to figure it out.

I driven by car over100 times to Syracuse from Connecticut following the Eire canal and I cant help myself stopping at the locks when ever i can. We are so looking forward to ride it.

The main thing Driftless need is polishing the gelcoat, bottom paint, replacement of plexi windows and possibly going back to the bench seat. Im also going to get a 12 v fridge for it. Seen nice threads discussing it so it seems easy.

Im also working on setting up a Raspberry Pi based chart plotter/AIS/Autopilot for it.

Regards,

Ulf & Elisabeth Jonsson

[Mark Deeser]

Congratulations on your most excellent find, sounds like you’ve located your ideal boat. The canal trip sounds great, we hope also to do it one day. Do you see any value in exposing our 27 FC to the Swedish language ? I know she does not have the same pedigree as Driftless, more of a clone. Enjoy your new adventure.

[tribologist]

Thanks Mark,
If i understand it right, the A27 was made here in Connecticut. I don't know if any people from the original factory came over? The funny part about boat terms are that you rarely if ever get exposed to them in daily life so i have a pretty limited boat vocabulary in English since I mostly been boating with my wife. I would love going out with you on the A27 if you lived closer to improve my “boat english”

My profession is engineering and specifically bearing lubrication. Even though i worked for 10+ years on that in sweden i mostly worked in english and there are many bearing related things i dont have swedish words for.

Ulf

[rebuckley]

Congratulations and welcome to the board, and LIS!

[tribologist]

Thanks!

Hull number is 737...

Ulf

[WillieC]

Start with Bransle. Use it three times in a sentence and it is yours forever! Such as:
Honey, I Bransled up the tank and were good for about 40 engine hours!

[tribologist]

Don’t forget practice color names when using the head....

I noticed the fill cap earlier today. Forgot looking at the warer fill if thats in swedish too.

Are the seals on them regular o-rings?

[WillieC]

Yes and yes. I think it's vatten. At least with the o-ring you can make 'Mercan ones fit.

I used to have embedded in my brain the German warning on the VW bus sliding door.
Fahren nur mit...Schiebetur... or something like that. And that is all the gray matter can remember. Thankfully.

"Don’t forget (to) practice color names when using the head...." now that is funny! And my wiring diagram was eaten by critters long ago!

[tribologist]

I have a nice one but it is of very limited use...

This boat have the most messed up wiring in history! It is like a haystack. We actually had her out today for the fist time and as soon as I got out on the river I noted the oil pressure dropped at higher rpm. I thought for sure the oil filter was collapsing so I went back to the dock and swapped the filter. No improvement.... Then I measured the voltage on the pressure sender and it was constant with engine speed.... As soon as I took off the multi meter it dropped... The pressure sender is hooked up with hose and it barely grounded.... I think I will replace the tubing with brake line and make a proper bracket for the pressure switch and sender.

Ulf

[WillieC]

Oh, Ulf... it sounds like you are just getting started.

So you have a mechanical sensor for the oil pressure gauge that is remote from the engine, then the wires go from the sender to the gauge. Am I close?
My sender is mounted on the engine crankcase with no hose or tubing. Only wires run up to the gauge. Can you do something similar and end up with no tubing, or a short piece of pipe only? I also have a simple low oil pressure sender that turns on an idiot light and audible alarm.

[tribologist]

Right now there is a sender and a switch on a tee up on top with a hose going to the pressure tap. I an going to look how i can direct mount them. I like to have both a gage and a switch (alarm). The problem is to install both on one fitting and dont end up with something that can start to vibrate. The pressure sender is on the heavy side.

I think i will map the current sender/readout and see if i can find a good quality combined pressure sensor/switch. VDO makes 10-180 ohm senders that has built in switches but i dont know if it match the instrument until i test the current instrument. Im started to work on the wiring and this is one of the things i need to fix.

Ulf

[WillieC]

Mine just uses a black iron tee screwed into the crankcase, if I recall correctly. Whatever engine you have, it doesn't hold a candle to the might MD17C Volvo Penta for vibration superiority. It won the 1975 JD Power award for excessive vibration at all rpms AND while not running. You'll be fine.

You may be able to find a combo switch, but I am a fan of using what I have at hand.

Another route you may consider, since who knows how accurate pressure gauges are in the first place without verification from a certified testing laboratory, is to install a plain old mechanical gauge at the crankcase buried down under the engine box, keeping the idiot light and audible switch. Run it a few times and see what the pressure is when the light goes out and fuggedaboudit. On the old VWs, the oel light was an excellent indicator that you just gunnysacked your engine. German redundancy, if the trail of metal parts was not enough information to reach the correct diagnosis.

[tribologist]

There was an old Swedish cook book author, Kajsa Warg, that became famous for “Man tager vad man haver” = “You use what you have”. When it comes to reliability I'm more of the “man skaffar vad man behöver” = ”you get what you need”. Boat has plenty Kajsa Warg stuff.... mostly on the electrical side. I might just make a bracket and run braided hose on AN fittings to the sender and switch.

2FCC7C10-B1FD-419F-9C2E-70DE661F8AEB.jpeg

[WillieC]

“man skaffar vad man behöver”

Inspiration for the Rolling Stones hit..

Nice wiring! Just start cutting and see what happens!