Sally’s mission on Wednesday involved being put ashore by dinghy near Indian Point to retrieve the car, drive it to Lower Sackville, hand it back to Entrrprise, take the bus into Halifax and then, eventually, the bus to Mahone Bay where I collected her off a different beach. Dressed all in black with red Alpkit waterproof rucksack she lept from dinghy to shore ready for all the many challenges her day would bring.
I, on the other hand, had boat problems to ponder whilst at anchor surrounded by warbling loons. The loons and a passing eagle distracted me from the many tasks in hand and I ended up recording a loon chorus which I will try to post.
First up was the backfilling heads which was easily fixed by a change of valves. Messy work but satisfying though it would have been more pleasant with a pair of marigolds! Staysail on, headsail on, liferaft stowed, gas locker hatch re-fitted and gas pipe re-routed, windlass solenoid and switch replaced, deck-wash pump condemned (as it crumbled into rust when I touched it). Two jobs remained in the ‘difficult’ box and they were left to the end as they were well beyond my skill set and I hadn’t a clue where to start.
The inverter appeared to be dead and our 24 volt alternator stubbornly declined to send any electrons to the battery bank. Both expensive and hard to procure items that had lots of wires and huge amounts of current to intimidate a nervous bodger..
Eventually, and with some trepidation, I lifted the floorboards to investigate with no real hope of finding solutions. More a matter of ‘going through the investigative motions’ before attempting to track down an elusive marine electrician or two.
Eureka moments are few on Shimshal but they do rarely happen. The big blue Victron inverter / charger box looked just as intimidating as I had remembered it. But then I noticed that it had a toggle switch and a vague decommissioning memory stirred from 2 years ago - I had turned the bloody inverter off and left it on ‘charge only’ to protect the batteries if shore power were interrupted through the winter. Sensible at the time but, two years on, it was a detail buried from sight in the bilges and completely forgotten.
With the inverter ’fixed’ I tackled the alternator having first done some YouTube revision to remind myself how the darned thing was supposed to work. First I checked the external regulator and fumbled with the multimeter checking the integrity of the loom as methodically as I could. All ok. Belts were good too and no signs of burnout. Then I remembered there was a relay that controlled it so I went back to YouTube to figure out how to test a relay. I’ve no idea why a 4 pinned device should be labelled with numbers such as ‘89’ and ‘30’ but Mr YouTube made the job look simple. And it was! With the relay sorted amps gushed into the thirsty batteries and the ‘eureka 2’ moment felt oh so sweet.
By Friday Shimshal was declared ‘ocean ready’ with all systems working (apart from the deck-wash) but by then a thick fog had descended and we motored in flat water onto a town mooring to check out the coffee shops and retrieve our bikes from their first professional service in 16 years.
Though we are ocean ready we cannot depart for our voyage to international waters as Canadian regulations insist we undertake a private PCR in Halifax (next Wednesday) before departure. If we don’t do the PCR we will not be allowed back into Canada upon our return from the 12 mile limit. The return trip to the horizon is a journey forced upon us by another Canadian rule that says if we don’t leave and come back we will have to pay import duty on the boat. A set of rules and regulations dreamed up in COVID times that make even less sense than the arcane workings of a 24 volt alternator!
PS: On reading this Denzil sent me the rationale behind the DIN system used for labelling automotive parts which neatly explains the numbering on relays: http://www.e38.org/understanding%20euro%20wiring%20diagrams.pdf