Getting Wired Part 3

Got some wire supplies the other day. Had some additional wire I needed to replace/clean up. Mainly, I wanted to move the wires that cross in front of the engine out of the way. Along the way of planning this part of my refit, I saw one wire that wasn't even tinned (went to the starter), and most of the connectors didn't have any sort of heat-shrink. I felt it was a good idea to remedy those items.

I saw a lot of the wires went to a single-stud bus bar... not really a bus bar since there's only one post, but I wanted to install an actual bus bar to spread things out and have things better organized. The positive also has a cover. It was a little tight installing that one since there was so many other wires in the way but I got it where it would work out.

I found special connectors to use on this project. You'll see in the pictures below, they are 90 degree lug terminals. I mainly bought to come straight out from the selector switch to keep the wire from sharp bends. I previously had connectors touching at the battery switch so I wanted to prevent that. Now, when the switch is set to off, it's really off. The terminals are made by Panduit. The battery switch has 5/16" studs on the back so I got three of them (LCB2-56F-Q), and I bought one 3/8" (LCB2-56F-Q) that worked out well going from a fuse connected to the house battery and goes to the selector switch. (note: the description says pack of five, but the price is for individual connectors).

cleaning up these wires in the way

supplies laid out

old POS side

Old NEG side

 

Cover base

Bus Bar installed

Covered

first wire to the selector switch, going to the bus bar

The wire supplies didn't stay organized for very long, but still somewhat grouped together. The large tool with red handles are not bolt cutters, but actually a crimping tool for heavy duty lug terminals (for wire larger than 6ga). The yellow handled tool is a wire/cable cutter. Makes some nice clean cuts. The blue handled tool is a ratcheting type for crimping smaller gauge heat shrink (not insulated) terminals (the red, blue and yellow terminals in the bags).

It's pretty time consuming to take old wires out, run the new one's in, set the terminals, crimp, heat shrink, then install. While it doesn't look like much, I'm just getting started. Plenty more to follow on this project.

Getting Wired

The mast is now sanded down. Used paint stripper to get out the paint in the tracks. I recently went for a short visit to the boat to talk with a rigger where we chatted about additional work to be done. All to prepare it for repainting.

They should be stopping by the marina to pick it up soon.

I setup new batteries for the house bank, in place under the starboard quarterberth. I ordered wire that will connect the batteries together and got to use my hammer crimper for the first time. I think it turned out well and finished nicely with heat shrink. I'll shorten and finish the other end when I'm at the boat next time.


4 gauge to connect between two house bank batteries

heat shrink in place

I was looking over the current wiring beyond the battery bank, on top of the fresh water tank and looking to redo some of them. Current wiring that went to the batteries had 5/16" terminals but need to be changed to 3/8". In general, I think it could be cleaned up a bit, with identifying where they go and putting some labels on them.



Now the mast will be away, I can get back to other projects.

One of the other projects I'm working on is putting together an electrical panel with breakers by the nav desk. I originally wanted to use a bus bar to connect the new VHF in its new position without running multiple wires back to the batteries. Someone suggested I install an actual breaker panel to make sure power is disconnected so went with that idea instead. There will be enough positions for breakers to add a few other items if/when the time comes to expand the electronics.

 I ordered the panel through Front Panel Express using their free software was pretty easy to put together. Black anodized aluminum with the HIN engraved into the panel. The breakers are Blue Sea A-series. Blue Sea is nice in that they have the dimensions for hole spacing and cutout templates for their products.


Next post I'll show the panel after it arrives.

Winter slow down

No, I haven't gone anywhere. This time of year, things slow down and like most people, it's just a matter of staying warm. In the meantime, there are winter projects and project planning.

I've sold the Garmin 546s. Didn't take long for that to sell. I intend to upgrade to a nicer chartplotter and integrated radar.

I've been looking over where and how I'm going to mount the Pronautic charger.

Still working (slowly) on building a new battery box that will hold two Group 31's.

Varnishing the rudder cheeks and adding a few coats to the tiller.

And, I just made a few orders for supplies on other smaller projects that I'm waiting for a couple more things to come in but here's a picture to show what I have so far. Just not going to talk about what the projects are just yet, but I have some wires, a strap and hardware. :-)

Checked on the boat today. I thought I left something I needed on the boat, then realized what I was looking for was in the truck. I saw the pink anti-freeze was frozen in the water filter for the engine. From what I've seen, it does freeze, just doesn't expand (maybe when it gets even colder?). Decided to look in the bilge and saw it's frozen too. I really need to dry that out as soon as it warms up again. I'll keep a close watch on everything as this winter continues.

Not much but that's the latest I'm up to. Hopefully soon, I'll find out where I'll be moving too for work and will then have to sort out where the boat is going to be stored at later.

Stay warm out there!