Bit chilly Now!

Well here we are halfway through November and its just getting chilly enough to put the heating on. We haven’t done bad, although we didn’t really have a scorcher of a summer, the weather has been kind to us by staying warmer much longer.

We getting ready now for our lift on the 1st December, this will be our last lift before we leave, so we have to make sure we get everything under the waterline done in those two weeks.

We have our trusty team primed and ready for action! Bobs ready with antifouling, anodes and polishing. Daves fitting the underwater lights (i know what your thinking…very motor-boaty, but these are white ones for fishing honestly 😉 ) and of course the forward facing sonar (FFS) transducer( another hole in the bottom!). (for reefs, underwater obstacles and the the like).

We looked at various different types of FFS, disappointingly, our set-up is Raymarine and unfortunately they aren’t covering this feature at all in the future or their latest kit, so we had to look elsewhere.

 

The Echopilot FLS 2D was very basic in its interpretation.

 

 

 

And the Echopilot FLS 3D was just way too expensive at around £7500.

 

 

 

Simrad, Lawrence and B&G all do a very similar model, and because of the additional features on their plotters (their sender units only work with their plotters, so we needed a whole new plotter) we plumped for the B&G model.

 

As with all things boaty, its never as simple as just adding another plotter, both our binnacles were already fairly full of kit, so to enable us having the FFS on the Portside binnacle (where the throttle control is!) we needed an extra pod, trouble was it would fit the rail, so new rail and additional pod later (from the US) we now have a decent arrangement for the kit, including a little Maretron NMEA 2000 monitor just to fill the gap!

 

 

 

 

So hopefully the two weeks were out will get all this work done, ready for the onslaught of decktop and rigging for the final prep before we leave.

5 Comments

  1. Phew loads to do!!! Is she still floating? We are now in Brittany (well we left the boat there) so will be just ahead of you on the way South. Enjoy the winter break.
    Out of interest, didn’t you fancy the Dragonfly? I just got one and it seems pretty good – time will tell…

    1. We should be near you in June/July 2018. When we did the Raymarine upgrade last year, i fitted the chirp sensor so i get the down-vision on the plotters. The forward facing sonar is for objects underwater 300 ft in front of the boat, reefs shoreline, containers!

      1. Never saw one on the way across – doesn’t mean they weren’t out there though!!!
        Did see some lovely constellations and phosphorescence…
        Good luck with the fit out and see you in June/July.

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