The Ship Must Have a Heart.
Boat wise, this is a major breakthrough. Blog wise I’m sorry to say it’s a huge cock up…
Over the last few days we’ve finally managed to get the domestic generator that we bought several months ago on board, which means that as long as we feed it diesel we can pretty much do what we like electricity wise now.
It’s a 7kVa set, and the prime mover is a three cylinder Kubota D905. And I’ve already discovered that you can weld all day off it, and that it’s quiet (I put it down on flexible mounts.)
The generator weighs nearly half a ton, so big that it was logistically adventurous getting it on. In the end I plumped for having it delivered by the harbour launch Windsong, and lifting it on by means of davits welded out over our stern. How did I weld the davits on before the generator was delivered? With great skill and dexterity of course, and a little help from my friend Pete. I’ll give you a clue, it involved a trailer, 60M of heavy electrical cable, and a very hectic morning indeed.
Of course once we had the wee beastie on the boat we could fire it up so she could weld in her own bearers, sort of make your bed and lie in it stylee.
The reason for stating that it’s a huge blog disaster is this: As the harbour launch approached Wendy Ann 2’s stern I dug out B’s camera, only to discover that in my rush of organisation I’d neglected to charge it’s batteries, and my phone camera’s lens is covered in teak oil and therefore buggered. So I’ve not a SINGLE photo of the momentous occasion.
Sorry.
All I have is a couple of pics of the generator in it’s home (which only a week ago was full of stuff like wendy’s original Lister steering engine, my compressor, and a great big day fuel tank), and another with the framing out of the deck that’s going over it all begun. And I only got those because I went home overnight halfway through the job so I could get the camera’s battery charger.
Sorting out the rest of our generator room and fitting the deck should keep me busy for a wee while, but for now we’re basking in the good glow of getting stuff done.
posted by IsmilebecauseIhavenoideawhatsgoingon at 10:16 am
5 Comments:
Yep, you'll certainly be generated and launched into more creatiive projects. Well done.
Madre
Sunday August 2nd 18h
Looks like a great fit.
Could be you can use the heat produced by this beast elsewhere on board in the winter?
And so must the Tin Man.
Madre 10-08-09 20h45
tim zim's right- stick a calorifier in the loop (or a cheap storage cylinder will do for now if money's tight), for that special hot-water hand-washing feeling...mmm. You gonna leave it radiator cooled?
Hi Anon.,(and Tim) when I get some actual water and plumbing onto the boat some provision for water heating from this beastie is a definite must, I reckon we will need all the choice we can get for the various systems on board (heating, lighting etc).
The plan behind radiator cooling was that we're on a seriously drying mooring, therefore no raw water cooling possibilities, and I was looking for a simple solution, dunno if I've done right as I reckon this is the beginning of (yet another) new learning experience.
cheers, S
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