| Datum: | 20-08-2011 2011 | | | | Prior to our vacation we had sailed the Pegasus to Lelystad, in order to get a bow thruster built in.
This could be planned exactly just before the holidays. We had asked the shipyard to also take a look at the leakage of the shaft.
Building in the bow thruster went on schedule, but that was unfortunately the only thing that went well at the shipyard.....Fred had frequently contact with them and every time a new problem reared its ugly head. This resulted for us in the loss of several days off our holiday. So in the meantime we did some shopping and got our things together. We felt that the gangway was too narrow, so we bought some new scaffold planks in Emmeloord and made a new gangway and painted it. We also bought a good memory foam matrass, which we cut to size for our bunk.
Just so we wouldn’t lose any more days, we decided to depart out of Lelystad. On Wednesday 24 th of August we took our stuff to the boat with our trusted van. Tomorrow would really be The Day!! My father brought us to harbour with his car. We promised to keep him posted on our whereabouts. Most of our things had taken their place and the rest of it would be stored while on holiday. Around 11:30 we cast off and left the harbour on motor. We had only completed 20 mtrs. from the pier, when the propeller had no more drive and we drifted slowly towards the stoney fence of the harbour mouth. Luckily, the bow thruster did his job and so Fred could float the boat sideways along the rocks. What a bummer! I called the harbourmaster with my cellphone and he came immediately with a little boat to take us back to the yard. The workers at the shipyard were surprised to see us back so soon. The boat was hoisted out of the water and then it turned out that the axis ran at least 10 cm out of the motor. So the only thing we wanted was to have this problem solved ASAP. Anyway, we phoned dad to tell him there was yet another delay. The workers got to work! We went for a sandwich in the restaurant. After about 1,5 hours the workers were done and the boat was launched again.
At last, we could leave. Just to be sure, two of the workmen stayed close by, when we left the harbour. It went well.... We decided to sail to Enkhuizen and to berth there in the outer-harbour, in the old centre of Enkhuizen and within walking distance to our favourite pub “The Dubliner”. We are staying a couple of days here to start tidying up the boat and do all kinds of chores.
After a bad summer now there’s a lovely Indian Summer.
It would be a shame to not take advantage of that. So we went to the boat to sail from Roggebot Harbour to the Ketelmeer, a newly construed island to store the polluted mud flat from the Ketelmeer. And furthermore, the island has a trench, where you can berth. After twice sailing the trench, we berth at the beginning. Caroline lowers the anchor and I keep the boat in its place. BAM! The Pegasus runs aground; it is too shallow here. In that case: to the other end of the trenc h. There already lies a big motorboat, so that should not be a problem. Caroline drops the anchor once more, slowly we drift backwards.
Oops! A big yellow barrel is in the way, so : no way. Quickly we raise the anchor to avoid a collision with the yellow thing. Phew, we did it. Obviously, the trench is not really handy for us. We then go to the outside of Keteloog and come to anchor. On the southside we find a nice spot, anchor drops. At last.... lazy lounging in the cockpit.... To indicate that you ride at anchor, you have to raise a black ball in the mast, so we go looking in all the places we haven’t been yet (on the boat) for a black anchor ball. Cannot be found. Too bad, everyone can see we lay here, no black ball. By looking through everything, we’ve taken out a lot of things from the cockpit locker. We sort this out in useful, maybe useful (so let’s keep it on the boat for now) and trash (in a trash bag). As we already noticed on the way there: the dynamo is not charging the batteries. Instead, the batteries have to deliver 5 ampère to the motor to be able to go. Back in the harbour, Fred takes the dynamo out in order to bring it somewhere for repair later in the week.
Another sunny day, even if it is 2nd October!
Saturday was Monuments Day and the estate was open to public. Because there was a lot of people who were interested, we arrived a little bit later at the boat on Sunday. Due to drought the water level has gone down further, at least 20 cm. And yeah, right, of course, as soon as we untied the ropes and ‘sailed’ for about 1 metre, we ran aground. The next hour we are occupied with getting out of the harbour. It was a very good exercise in manoeuvring the boat... I now know exactly what the action of the propeller is. At last we can sail to the Ketelmeer. We were sooo tired, that we immediately dropped anchor at the island Keteloog. Fred attaches the bathing ladder on the side of the boat and jumps in the water to cool off. Caroline thinks the water too cold and considers the ladder too high for her to get out of the water again. She has had a keyhole surgery earlier this year, so she can’t put too much force on her knee yet. Fortunately, there is also an emergency bathing ladder, made of ropes and fixed steps. Fred ties this one under the other bathing ladder, so Caroline has more steps under water. “Is the water very cold?”, she asks. “Noooo, just like an outside swimming pool”, Fred answers reassuringly from the water. Caroline jumps in and surfaces, shivering. Brrrrrrrr .... what a cold letdown!! Well, anyway, we swim around the boat a little. After that we laze comfortably in the cockpit under a radiant October sun. At the end of the afternoon we sail back to the harbour. Because the waterlevel is so low, the harbour master gives us a different landing stage. This one is lower, but shorter, so the boat sticks out a little, but not too much. Another heavenly day!
Dynamo still no good
From the time we have a new dynamo, our tachometer stopped. It turns out that this tachometer has to be connected to the W-connection, something which is not on the new dynamo. Today dismounted the dynamo , so we can bring it back to Auto-Electric. And I can at the same time tell the man that the dynamo does not charge the batteries. In my opinion, I have to have a positive voltage on the B+ connection, when the motor is running. Not so! It’s strange, on the D+ connection, I measure a higher voltage above 12,5 V, when the motor is not running. I’m gonna tell the whole story to the man of Auto-Electric, he just has to make it alright.
Today and yesterday we kept ourselves busy replacing the Victron invertor and the Victron battery charger to a space under the bed of the port cabin. The invertor was placed, actually, at the outside of the bunk, resulting in sizable battery cables lying all over the ground of the port cabin. Now that the invertor is placed at the inside of the bed, we can also tuck away the cables much neater.
The Pegasus was built for the American market, so it has a 110 V installation. I have started to remove these old cables and replace them with new 220 V cables.
It may be that 110 V cables are suited for 220 V, but taken in consideration that the wiring is pretty old, we decided to replace it completely. We are only going to use the RCD and the automatic safety fuses for the 220 V.
We also placed a switching relais invertor/shore power. This little device ensures that all 220 V sockets can be used with either the invertor or with shore power. See schedule below:
Normally this is not possible, because the invertor would get 220 V from the shore power on the exit and would blow up. In this system, the relais automatically switches off the current output when the Pegasus is connected to shore power.
Next week I’ll proceed with connecting the wiring.
On the 12th of December I finished the 220 V installation.
The boat already had a locker with RCD and the automatic safety fuses. Merely, this locker is set for 110 V, but the parts can very well be used for further security of the 220 V.
Also, the Victron Centaur battery charger, the Victron Phoenix Invertor and the VDP automatic switch are now placed under the bed of the left cabin in the back.
Now we can, with an easy mind, leave our electric heater on, in the boat.
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| | | 5-10-2011, reactie van Aad Vlag | Leuke blog, ik hoop die regelmatig te kunnen lezen!
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