Cherry Floor in the Galley!

Now that we are caught up a little on the topside construction, it's finally time to concentrate below deck!  Diane is a happy camper!  We got started yesterday with laying down cherry vinyl faux wood flooring in the aft section of the boat.  We went with this floor for its superior durability ... and cost ... we think it looks GREAT!

 I cleared out the old tired carpet revealing the partially painted concrete floor.

This area serves as our stateroom, pantry and nav center.

Then the same in the galley area.

We had to move the refrigerator into the salon area...along with everything else we own!

And it begins......

And then final result.  I love it!

Uh, oh...looks like the steps need to be refinished and replace the non-skid pads on the steps. 

That will be a project for me in the very near future.

Today Carter will focus on putting the galley back together but first he has some prep work behind the refrigerator for the water filtration system.  After that he will get back working on the salon area.  Then I will sew new covers for the settee.  My material order from Sailrite arrived yesterday!

The Archimedes Flap Tracker !

  Photo op of the Flap Tracker! 

Who Hoo!!!!

The Sun Canopy Position
(Panels are flat for max shade and clearance on deck)

Close Haul on a Port Track
(Panels facing port side)
 

Close Haul on a Starboard Track

(Panels facing starboard)

Rain Catchment Postion

(Panels position to catch the rain in the center, this system is still under construction)

Hunker Down Position

(Panels in their most stable position for stormy weather with all

the edges inside the gunwhale for docking and lock passage)

We don't have actuators on the aft array but Carter has three sets of struts. Pictured above the panels are set for use as a handrail for the sun deck. They can be manually lowered to a midway position or to lay flat on the deck for better energy collection during the day.

Tuesday, February 19

We continue to work feverishly completing projects so we can shove off by March 1st.  Carter cut the masts down above the panels, finished installing and fine tuning all of the linear actuators and then cut the posts on the superstructure down low to convert them into handrails. 

Carpenters have plumb bobs...sailors have plumb buoys! 

It works! 

We are confirming that the panels are inside the gunwhales in the down position.  This will be important when going through locks.

All the linear actuators are installed and functioning!  But Carter still has to wire the switches. It never seems to end!

Carter cut down the posts from the original canopy structure to make handrails for the deck.

And here is how it turned out.  The idea is to take the 4x4's from the gangplank to the boat and use those as the rail for a place to store them.  Then whenever we tie up to bank along the shore like we are now, we'll have them.   We spread the slats out in the cockpit as wood flooring and that will be where we store them.

Today, I'm going to work on staining all the new construction and Carter is working on prepping and  painting the sundeck. Tomorrow will be an exciting day as we have an appointment to get new flooring installed in the galley! The carpet that looked so good when we installed it is getting tired and was only meant to be temporary anyway. Yea! Cherry flooring! Pictures will be coming when that project is complete.

 

I can't have a post without my wildlife photo.

Yesterday, I caught a couple of manatees cruising across our bow.

Cool photos I think.

 

 

Thursday, February 13

The last set of panels are up!  There is now a total of 5 kW on the Archimedes. 

We still have a little more work to do up top before we seriously clean up the deck.

The next project is to cut off the masts since they are no longer needed because

most of the bracing is installed and the linear actuators are working good.

1st Carter had to relocate the TV antanae.

And then the anntenae for the VHF had to come down.

Then Carter installed bracing on the main mast.

 

 

I've been hanging onto the guts of one of the beds we took out

when we opened the salon. 

Today I began repurposing these into settee cushions. 

The seat cushions got about 1 1/2" rise.

The top to the mattress will be used to give extra cushioning to the seat backs.

This guy is always around.

 



Saturday, February 9th

Because our battery bank was a piecemeal collection including batteries that survived the flood, Carter decided to upgrade the whole pack. 8 brand new Trojan T-125 where the biggest batteries that would fit in compartment.   Once he got all the old ones out of the battery compartment below the flooring in the hallway, we cleaned up the floor, and repiped the water supply from the port and starboard bilge tanks. The pipes were very deterorated so he epoxied new PVC connections right to the concrete bulkhead. This also gave us several more inches for the battery compartment.

Then he began planning a better setting for the batteries.

Eight batteries in the salon and Radar is not happy. What is all this stuff doing in my playroom?

Carter layed down a layer of 40 mil PVC liner followed by cedar shims to level the batteries.

Then he changed the layout of the batteries to get them all level and space them out as much as possible o help them cool off quicker.

 Then wired them up with all new terminal connections.  Nice job.

 

Meanwhile, Radar entertains himself by scaling the bank trying to get to some invisible...something...in the water.  He got seriously dirty this day which required a bath.

He actually did fall in once!  He's such a clod!  LOL

But we love you anyway!

While Carter worked on his battery project, I began setting up my sewing center on the settee in the corner of the main salon.  It's cramped but works.  My plan is to start my own little enterprise making personalized tote bags.  Between the Sailrite sewing machine and my new Husqvarna sewing/embroidery machine I can make just about anything from covers for boat accessories to purses, to totes...and then personalize them.  PS...I'll be taking orders soon!  LOL

I've also been working on a storage system for provisions. 

This is extra food storage under the bed.

With the installation of the heavy duty actuators, all the original canopy posts are pretty much obsolete so today we cut the last one down. Carter and I are discussing how we can use the stubs for handrails.  This was an exercise to see if we like it.  We will definately lower the rail and we'll see how this turns out in the end.

I'm going to end this post with a picture of an osprey perched atop his newly constructed nest

high up in the trees in the woods behind the the boat.

 

See you again soon!





Thursday, February 7th

More progress. The never ending gas tank is almost finished.

Carter has completed reworking the sundeck to get the last 4 solar panels mouted.  The panels will lay flat on the deck during the day for collecting while we are underway and they will lift up to form handrails for the sundeck when we don't need the extra propulsion energy. We now have a total of over 5000W mounted on the boat. In the full sun that is about 100amps at 48V which we have learned will push the boat pretty good, even into a moderate headwind. Since it takes less than 1000Watts to meet our house power needs, we have more electricity than we know what to do with when we're not moving.

Carter is going to paint the deck for a nice finish.

Laying out the panels and checking to see that we can still get through the opening!

Carter can squeeze through but I'm betting this will be a job for the 1st Mate!

A view from the shore with the panels in side rail position.  Still just testing everything out with only the starboard side up. The deck seems to be sturdy enough to support everything but Carter is still going to beef things up a little with some additional columns on gunwale.

Below is a view from behind the panels up on the sundeck.

I thought I would add pictures of the finished head with all the handrails, towel racks, etc. back in.

I freshened up all the teak with teak oil and shined up the stainless railings.

The shower floor and seat.

 

The very nice teak shower cady that we lucked into at the flea market

 down in Fort Myers for $2..

We are loving the clean, bright white, freshly painted walls in the head!  :-)

And to finish off this post, here are a few pictures of our livaboard life at the marina.

 

The Captain and his dog...

Sittin on main deck under the solar canopy winding down after a hard days work.

There are always manatees in this basin sunning themselves. 

We counted over 60 of them last week. 

Here is a pretty good shot of a mamma and her calf.

The end of another day watching the sunset from sundeck with Radar on patrol!

Radar continues to amuse us with his antics. 

He has to bury his rawhide bones before chewing them.

We find them everywhere.  Poor guy...forgets where he's buried them! 

This pelican and his mate dive for fish all day by our boat.

It drives poor Radar into a frenzy sometimes.

I don't see many of these!!! 

Sunrise this morning taken from up on the sundeck.

And we are heading into another busy day.