Category: Electrical & Engines
Vetus already had wireless remotes for its thrusters and windlasses, so why not develop a Bluetooth hardware interface and an app that can do more than even a wired control head using the smart phone many skippers already have in their pocket? I can’t find anything about this Remote Monitoring and Command app online but Vetus was showing it off at IBEX and it will probably be officially launched next month at METS. I understand that they’ll also have a new rim drive thruster there, and at Newport they were demoing a 4- and 5-cylinder diesel design that can supposedly benefit from its turbo at any rpm…
As illustrated above, the fuel cost for cruising Gizmo varies enormously with speed. It’s fortunate that we like poking along at 6 to 8 knots in most conditions because knocking off miles on a 16-17 knot semi-plane is 4-5 times more expensive. But as suggested by the lumpy lines, those fuel-flow versus boat-speed numbers are not necessarily precise, and since I was only able to collect them on one day, they definitely don’t reflect changes in vessel trim, bottom cleanliness, engine condition, etc. I’d love to have accurate real time fuel flow data flowing around Gizmo’s NMEA 2000 network and thus am excited about Maretron’s FFM100 system, which was recently introduced with bold claims…
I’m especially pleased to have discovered the Weld Mount system of glue-on cable and hose mounts because much of Gizmo is balsa cored and thus I’m darn hesitant about penetrating a fiberglass skin with screws....
About two months ago I received a Torqeedo Travel 1003 for long term testing, I’ve used it almost every day since, and, well, the title tells the story. I simply adore this electric outboard! Admittedly certain personal traits may be in play. Historically small gas outboards are a significant exception to my generally high success rate with mechanical boating issues; possibly related is my annoyance with the smell and noise of the damn things (and the hearing aids don’t help); and, finally, a faulty shoulder makes starting even a lawn mower somewhat painful. But then again I did not fall so hard for the original Travel 801 model that I tried in 2009…
So maybe this is an all-about-Gizmo week. Given her multitude of electronics partly described on Monday, and the fact that the boat rarely sees shore power, plus how helpful readers were in spec’n out the ChartTable21 discussed yesterday (and yet more strain on the 12v bank), I’m keen to add some solar panels and I again seek advice. Oh, and while Gizmo does have a 6 kW generator, I don’t like running it, and would enjoy removing it altogether. I created the drawing above (PDF here) in an effort to explain to a solar salesman in Arizona what I was up to, but I haven’t purchased anything yet…
Maretron’s new DCR100 DC relay box will not create a true distributed power system because it doesn’t replace conventional circuit breakers. But it can give you some of the features — like extending switching...
Thanks to Panbo reader Jeffrey Schwartz I just learned about the Mas-Technologies M200 system, which looks like it can neatly translate analog sensor data from Yanmar model JH, YM and LP diesel engines into NMEA 2000 PGNs that can be read by many displays, including its own. The system — which starts $1,469 — can also read four analog tank sensors and a rudder indicator, dual engines are supported, and Mas-Tech also offers start panels and even a wired shift-and-throttle remote. But something seems odd…
When Westerbeke developed a NMEA 2000 monitoring and control head for its generators way back in 2006, I thought the other generator manufacturers would follow right along. The approach seemed to simplify cabling and make it possible to at least monitor a generator from other displays if not actually go to the next level where, say, a NMEA 2000 inverter could turn the generator on and off as AC loads changed. To my knowledge that sort of advanced control has not happened yet, though in fact a check of NMEA’s database of standard PGNs suggests that it is possible (look in the “power” category). One problem is that so far only Northern Lights seems to have followed Westerbeke’s lead, with the WaveNet panel seen above…
Boat juice — the 12 volt kind — will be a big subject on Gizmo this season, and hence on Panbo. Designing and installing a solar panel system and experiments with various battery monitoring and distributed power technologies are all on the list, but step one is getting the Prestolite Leece-Neville 130 amp alternator that charges the main bank up to snuff. Last summer I needed help from Panbo readers to figure out that this alternator was actually working pretty well despite the large (and erroneous) amperage deficit shown on the Link 1000. But it began behaving badly toward the end of the season, sometimes refusing to charge, and besides I’d been persuaded that a more sophisticated regulator would be a good investment…
That’s a recent picture of Bob and Elaine Ebaugh’s Defever 44, Mar Azul, and I’m jealous on two counts. The obvious one is that beautiful clear-blue-sea-over-white-sand experience they’re enjoying in the Bahamas (where I’ve not been in some time). The other is that virtual engine gauge panel seen on the laptop, which is giving the Ebaugh’s a better sense of what their relatively old diesels are up to than many of us power cruisers get the comfort of. You may recall that Bob already did some cutting edge work with Ethernet and NMEA 0183 conversion which he wrote up for Panbo last year. Well, he’s done it again, thoroughly describing what it took to adapt a Chetco Digital engine monitoring system to his boat, and how it’s working…
