Messages

Hi Larry,

If time is of the essence, then it would be worth trying. It certainly won't make it any worse  . You might want to use the Fast Cure version of 5200 since it will fully cure in about 24 hours versus the 5-7 days with regular 5200. Make sure the area where you apply it is very clean: no oil or loose dirt or rust. You might also rough up the surface of the gell coat a little as well with some 40 grit paper so the 5200 will have something to really set its teeth into. Apply the 5200 well past the edges of the cracks.

When you get ready to do the "real" fix ( if required.... ), you can put some Island Girl Pink cleaner on the 5200 and let it set wet for a few days: it will soften it enough you can then scrape it off with a putty knife or equivalent.

Good luck.

John
1988 C34 hull 728
Otra Vez

Phil,

Which of the several "plastic wood" products did you use on your boat?

John
1988 C34 hull 728
Otra Vez

The general class of devices known as "desulfators" are designed to prevent long term formation of lead sulfate on the positive plate of lead acid batteries. Lead sulfate is the expected by product of discharging a lead acid battery. If the battery is promptly fully recharged after a discharge cycle, the lead sulfate is converted back into lead dioxide, which is the normal chemical makeup of a charged lead acid battery.

The problem occurs in batteries that do not receive a complete recharge after they are discharged: if the soft form of lead sulfate is allowed to remain on the battery plate for longer than about 45 - 60 days, it converts from its original soft form to a crystalline form that is hard and will not convert back into lead dioxide with normal charging voltages. However, if high frequency energy is applied appropriately to the crystalline lead sulfate, the molecular structure "resonates" and the crystalline structure breaks down into the soft form, and normal charge voltages will convert it back into lead dioxide. This device was designed specifically for use in vehicles which are regularly under-charged, like police cars, ambulances, delivery trucks, and taxis to name a few. Basically, any vehicle that spends a lot of time sitting at idle with heavy loads on, or sitting with some loads on without the motor running, or spends its days making many short legs with frequent stops and starts of the engine. In these types of applications, the "desulfators" will extend the useful life of the batteries substantially ( I am more than a little skeptical about the claims of car batteries lasting 9 years or more.... ).

If you properly charge your starting and house batteries, and provide proper maintenance ( which includes regular equalization during the season ) if they are flooded cell batteries, a "desulfator" system offers very little benefit to you. You can achieve all the same advantages by following good charging habits and taking proper care of your batteries.

Regards,

John
1988 C34 hull 728 w/ all Lifeline AGM batteries
Otra Vez

Ron,

Is the PS injector cleaner a different product than the regular PS diesel additive you recommended? I checked at Walmart recently and all they had was the regular additive.

Thanks.

John

Thanks Tom for the excellent picture and insight.

Everybody that has one of the members of this family of autopilots has experienced or will experienced the ratcheting. Having seen your picture, it is now amply clear, particularly when you are turning the wheel fast and creating a little more force on the belt by pulling it over the guide rollers.

I guess the Raymarine wheel autopilots are a little like Microsoft: we all use them, but love to hate them. The reason we put up with them is that for the money, they still provide utility and workload reduction. Having had a nice big below-deck Raymarine autopilot on the previous boat, a Stamas 44 ketch, I will completely agree that they do work much better than our little wheel drive "toys", but at many multiples of price and installation complexity. So, in one sense, we are economically stuck with them.

Perhaps we could start a new topic where everyone could submit their varied experiences, questions, and impressions on all variants of the Raymarine wheel driven autopilots, and I could compile and analyze the data. I would be particularly interested in any feedback on the newer/newest system variants: always nice to see if things are getting better or worse.... It might be very interesting to see what common threads emerge, and if there are some common solutions or mitigating actions that could be taken to improve the performance of our little "toys" through better understanding of their limitations and proper usage, and equally important, determine if any of the undesirable performance characteristics could be reduced or eliminated through improvements in installation details. Finally, the items that appear to be design/software related could be presented to Raymarine as documented issues across a significant number of boats, and do away with some of those "we never heard of that before" brush-off answers that we have all heard at one time or another.

What does everybody think?

Regards,

John
1988 C34 hull 728
Otra Vez

Hi Peyton,

While extending the sense wire may give you some incremental increase of the working voltage you will see at the batteries, there is another source of voltage drop that often goes unnoticed and is often a bigger problem than the size of the alternator output feed. The "engine ground" point where the ground wire to the batteries originates is located in a terrible spot for maintaining a clean connection. On every older boat I have looked at that has not had previous electrical system upgrades and/or TLC applied, the ground connection on the engine is generally seriously corroded, especially if it has been operating in salt water.

When I went though our boat electrically, I moved the common ground point off of the engine and to a Blue Sea Power Post about a foot away, then ran a single large ground cable from the common ground Post back to the engine after thoroughly steel brushing and cleaning the attach point on the engine. I then sealed the very tight ground connection on the engine with Boeshield T-9. That process all but eliminated any significant voltage drop at the ground connection. Also, any alternator should have a dedicated suitably sized ground cable from the generator case directly to the common ground point: depending on the numerous nuts, bolts, and movable elements to get the case back to the real ground point is folly.

John
1988 C34 hull 728, standard rig
Otra Vez

Wobegon,

I recently replaced my 20 year old roller furled genoa on our boat, and explored many possible vendors. I finally decided to give National Sail Supply a try. [ www.nationalsail.com ] Dirk runs the place and is extremely helpful. Plus, he somewhat specializes in Catalina sails and is very knowledgeable. Dirk makes no claims to be the right vendor for anything that needs sail: his specialty is durable cruising sales at a fair price. Once I inspected and installed my new genoa, my opinion was that the workmanship and materials are every bit as good as sails I have bought from the "big boys" for a lot more money. After sailing with the new genoa just one time, I concluded that Dirk is seriously under-selling the capabilities of his sails: mine set beautifully and perform magnificently.

I have since bought a mainsail for a Catalina 22 that a friend and I own together, and while it is obviously a lighter sail, the workmanship and materials are excellent as well. The set and performance are also exceptional.

I can highly recommend Dirk and National Sail Supply without any reservations or caveats. Give his a call and see what you think.

John
1988 C34 hull 728, standard rig
Otra Vez

Wobegon,

Most of the split transom boats had the compressor mounted in the aft starboard locker directly below the hatch. However, I had one on our 1991 ( hull 1120 ) located in that spot, and I thought it was a horrible location: it made it extremely hard to go below from that side, which by them is the only access since the propane tank in usually mounted in the port locker. It also it terrible to get to the compressor for service, or replacement of the fuse on the unit. In addition, if you try to stow anything in the starboard locker you run the risk of damaging something on the compressor unit.

For my money, the better location is at the forward inboard end of the space under the salon U shaped seating on the starboard side of the boat. You can easily place a ventilation grate in the inboard wall of the under-seat area for cooling air exhaust from the compressor, and the distance from there to the ice box is within the range of most  prefab coolant lines to the evaporator in the ice box.

For the money, it's hard to beat an Adler-Barbour ( now WAIKO ) Cold Machine. It has ample cooling capacity for the C34 ice box, whatever size it is, and the Cold Machine is very reliable and generally trouble free as long as you don't try to defrost the evaporator with a knife or ice pick  . But that's another story...........

Even in the summer here in Texas ( 100+ degrees and blistering sun ), the Cold Machine ( once the ice box and contents are cold ) on our current C34 seldom runs more than a 50% duty cycle unless you are really fanning the door going after beer for 6 people, one beer at a time . This translates to about 50 to 60 amp-hr per day battery consumption. Unless you are only planning to day sail, you will need more than the standard 2-battery configuration for a house and starting bank, so you will have to add this upgrade to your cost of the fridge if you don't already have provisions for a larger house bank. Of course, Stu and I will then tell you that according to the Gospel of Battery Management, your next upgrade after that should be a battery monitor system such as the Xantrex Link LITE to tell you how you are doing on battery capacity consumption in real time and when you need to recharge the batteries. Soon after that, you will begin to think about a high output alternator so that you can recharge your now larger house bank in a more reasonable time than the rather small stock alternator will allow....... 

Think of it as a woman buying a new purse ( no negative connotations associated with that action, or what follows !!! ) , and the on-going accessorization to get everything to coordinate properly so that the purse looks it's best. Adding electric refrigeration on the boat is like that...... The good news is that it is worth it. Not hustling for ice is a very nice thing when you are out for overnight or several days.

I've attached some photo of my installation. The last photo shows that the louvered vent for the compressor area is a pop-out unit, and it makes many elements of the installation and later potential access actions much easier. In my installation, the normal fan mounting position causes the air to be pulled though the cooling section and them back across the compressor. However, it is possible to simply remove the fan and rotate it 180 degrees so that the fan blows air outward through the cooling coils and through the large louvered vent rather than heating up the whole area under the settee. I also added a small plastic louvered vent in the compartment inboard wall in the middle of the most outboard section of the settee seating.

This is certainly not the only way to have an iceless icebox, but it works for me, particularly having a second round at getting a C34 just the way I want it.

John
1988 C34 hull 728
Otra Vez

Pierre,

The Manson Supreme is a 25 pound unit, and the Rocna is a 22 pound unit. The West Marine retail price for the Manson/Rocna is $299/$400. At the next larger size, the Manson 35 pound is $450 versus the Rocna 33 pound at $500. The Rocna is likely better made, or at least "prettier" than the Manson, but the Manson still has a Lloyd's Type Approval. I have recommended the Manson to a number of people and they have been very happy with it both on lakes with "goopy" bottoms and along the Texas Gulf coast. I elected to go with the 35 pound Manson on our boat, but only because I am adding a windlass soon, and I sleep much better with the bigger anchor down. Here in north central Texas, we have lines of thunder storms come through with sometime 60-70 mph out-flow winds with instant wind direction changes, so BIGGER is always good when it comes to ground tackle if you can handle it OK.

John
1988 hull 728
Otra Vez

You will also want to check the seal on the emergency tiller access cover. Water can drip down from there and will end up on the top of the aft water tank, then run out of the water tank shelf directly and stealthily under the cushions/mattress.

John

I would call Raymarine tech support and tell them your story. It shouldn't do that.

John
1988 Hull 728
Otra Vez

I have the same year boat ( 1988 ). The original charger was wired to the top AC distribution CB position, and was about a 10 amp. When I added a second 50 amp charger, I just drilled another hole above the top AC distribution breaker for an additional CB. There is plenty of room to do it. A 10 - 20 amp AC CB will be plenty for the Truecharge2-40. A 50 or 60 amp fuse right at each battery would be a good choice. The Blue Sea Maxi Fuse and holder works well. You could also use the new Blue Sea 5191 plus associated fuse, but it increases the height too much for some battery installations, and they are not as readily available as the Maxi Fuse. The only reason to have it there is to protect the charger cable from destruction if you short it to ground down stream from the battery; the charger has it's own internal protection.

Definitely run a separate heavier ground cable from the batteries to either the charger output or the DC distribution terminal strip behind the electrical panel. The only ground connection on the original wiring from the distribution panel area to the battery was a #10 wire. If you add a #6 ( minimum ) ground cable direct from the batteries to the ground distribution terminal strip, the whole DC system on the boat will thank you. Then, you can connect the ground output on the charger to either the ground distribution terminal strip or directly to the batteries with another #6 wire.

I have been in discussion with Xantrex about the availability of the optional Remote Control Panel for the Truecharge2, and they should be available by mid-July of this year. It is quite handy in that you can program all there is to program on the new charger through it, and it actually provides useful information as well as easily allowing operational mode changes that can be very handy under specific situations.

The odd blue blob was not standard, and is not a Balmar Duo Charge. The #12 wire was at least several sizes too small for battery charging applications. It is probably a diode-type battery isolator, and you will want to get rid of it as it decreases the charging efficiency of the batteries substantially. See my questions on your later post about just it, here: http://c34.org/bbs/index.php/topic,5016.0.html

Regards,

John
1988 Hull 728
Otra Vez

Rick,

How about sending all your details to the Projects manager of the web site and let them post it on the Projects page? Many of us would probably like to see exactly what you did. Adding a windlass is my next major project.

John
1988 Hull 728
Otra Vez

It is most likely a diode type battery isolator. However, the pair of wires off of each of the 3 upper terminals makes no sense. How many batteries are on the boat? How many charging sources are on the boat?

John
1988 Hull 728
Otra Vez

Hi Bill,

The chassis ground is only there to provide some additional protection for 2 things: potential Radio Frequency Interference from the high frequency switching power supply circuits, and extra protection to prevent the charger case from becoming "hot" with 120 VAC if there is some sort of internal circuit failure that could result in the LINE AC input shorting to the case. In many boats, the AC Green wire ( AC gnd and bonding ) will be connected at a single point to the DC ground circuit in the boat. In the case of the C34, I don't know if that is the case. As Stu indicated early on, connect the chassis ground to the AC ground: that way, if the case becomes "hot", the AC CB feeding the charger will blow and eliminate the potentially lethal AC voltages on the charger chassis. This chassis ground wire doesn't need to be any larger than the AC power  input feed wire sizes.

Unless you have a very low output Truecharge2, don't connect the DC ground from the charger to the DC ground behind the distribution panel: the stock boat wiring has only a 10 gauge wire from the battery grounds under the starboard settee over to the DC ground terminal strip behind the distribution panel. Even at 20 amps, the voltage drop through the 10 gauge wire back to the batteries will have a noticeable negative effect on the speed at which you will be able to recharge you discharged batteries. Follow the wire size guidelines provided in the Truecharge2 Manual for connections of the charger outputs and DC ground using the distances from the charger all the way to the batteries.  The Truecharge2 can be a very capable charger when properly sized for your battery bank and properly installed.

Regards,

John
C34 Otra Vez
Standard rig
1988 Hull 728