I’m still alive, just buried!

Sometimes scheduling doesn’t work out like you plan. If you check Panbo periodically to see what’s new, you may have been disappointed recently. That’s my fault. I have over-committed and under-delivered. Recently, I’ve taken on a lot of consulting projects and a major installation. I’m almost the other side of the installation and excited to sit down and write about what I’ve been testing. Unfortunately, I’m still a few days away from that and so things will remain a little quiet at Panbo far longer than I would like.

About a week and a half ago, I started a full electronics refit on a Maritimo 48. The owner of the vessel decided to make a major investment in outfitting the boat for all cruising conditions and challenges. So, I am mostly done with the installation of 2 Garmin 9200 series MFDs, a new radar, new autopilot, two GMI-20 instruments augmented by two Maretron DSM-570s, two Icom M510 EVOs, four cameras, a Sionyx NightWave Digital, FLIR MD-625, and more.

Fortunately, Maritimo builds a good boat and thought about upgrades and modifications. So, the work has progressed nicely and the project is nearing completion. But, in the meantime, I’ve neglected many of my other responsibilities, including Panbo. I hope you will forgive me as I have a lot to tell you about.

I’m currently knee deep in testing a ton of interesting products including a Sionyx NightWave Digital of my own, Vanemar’s boat monitoring system, Garmin’s Quatix 8 and GPSMap 9213, SiTex’s Sirius 12 stabilized binoculars, and a Q-Experience chartplotter, and an embarrassing backlog of products.

This entire post is a long winded way of asking that you please bear with me while I finish up some on boat work and have the opportunity to tell you all about the products I’ve been trying. I truly believe I write better reviews and have a better sense of the industry by dabbling in all sides of owning and maintaining a boat — including as a service provider — but that comes at the expense of time.

I’ll be back soon and ready to tell you all about what I’ve been doing.

-Ben S.