Friday, January 24, 2014

Keeping Spray Charged

Spray has 2 large 4D 12 Volt batteries. The house battery is #1 and the start battery is #2. The start battery is only used to provide juice to start the diesel. It only gets used for a few seconds at a time (although many amps for those few seconds) and easily stays fully charged. The house battery supplies juice to everything else: the fridge, lights, water pressure pump, etc.

 

When we are traveling the house battery stays pretty well charged by an alternator driven by the diesel, but when we sit at a mooring for a month (as we are now) we need other means to charge the house battery every day. We have 2 systems for that - solar panels and a small gasoline powered generator.

 

Three years ago I mounted 3 solar panels to the front of Spray's flying bridge. When these are in bright sunlight they provide enough power to run the fridge plus some leftover to charge the house battery. The idea is that the hotter the sun is, the colder the beer gets. Here's a shot of the solar panels :

You may notice 2 problems here. The solar panels are in the shade and one of them is missing. They are in the shade because we have north winds today so Spray is pointed north while the sun is to the south. Since its winter, north winds dominate, which is a problem. This explains the missing solar panel, which I recently moved to the aft end of the flying bridge :
See how its in nice bright sunlight? This helps but can't keep up with the fridge as its only a 40 Watt panel best case (which means when aimed exactly at the sun, at noon, on the equator, on an absolutely clear day), and the fridge draws about 50 Watts.
 
Which brings us to charging device no. 2 :
 

Many of the boats here in Marathon have a small Honda generator just like this, unless they have a 'real' marine generator built in. We run ours for 2-3 hours per day, usually while we are on shore walking the dogs so we don't have to put up with its noise. It's actually not that noisy as nearby boats can barely hear it (and we can hopefully barely hear their generators). It lives outside in the cockpit so that any possible gasoline fumes don't end up in the bilge creating a possibly explosive situation.

The Honda makes 120 V AC power and we have a battery charger that converts that to 12 VDC to charge both batteries.
 
We haven't gone for the 3rd possible charging option which is a wind-powered generator. Many sailboats here have them and they must make good power in these winter winds. Many of them make noticeable noise.
 
Anyhow, between our modified solar panel setup (replacement panel for up front is on order), and our Honda generator, we can reliably make enough power to run the fridge 6-8 hours per day which keeps things cool enough (we keep a few beers in the freezer so they are nice and cold), plus all the power we need for lights and other things.
 
We monitor the battery charge states with this little number :
It monitors Voltage and current for each battery. As seen here it is telling us that the starting battery (no. 2) is fully charged, and the house battery (no. 1) is about half charged, and is charging at 1.8 amps. (from the aft solar panel).
 
If we want to be able to power the fridge 24/7 we need 2 upgrades : more house battery capacity (add a 2nd battery in parallel with the existing one), and a more robust battery charger. Maybe someday.
 
By the way, 4 years ago when I was here, there were no solar panels nor Honda generator aboard. This meant warm beer plus every few days a short journey around Boot Key to let the diesel do some recharging of the batteries. So the setup we have now is a great improvement.

 



 

Monday, January 20, 2014

The Keys!

One of the goals of our trip has been achieved, as we arrived in Marathon last Wednesday and dropped anchor. This will be our home base in the Keys for the next month.
 
It took us 4 days to travel from the Miami area (Coconut Grove) to Marathon. We left last Sunday and traveled 30 miles down Biscayne Bay. We had to cross to the outside of the Keys at Caesar Creek, and it was low tide, so we ended up polishing Spray's keel to get into the channel there, as you can see by the stripe of sand we kicked up.
It was another 20 miles travel out in the Atlantic before we turned off into John Pennekamp State Park on Key Largo. We rented a mooring from the park in Key Largo Sound and spent 2 nights there which let us enjoy some of what the park had to offer:
- nice shower facility shared with the RV park there.
- walking trails and boardwalks.
- on Monday we signed on to a snorkeling trip where they put 40 people onto a fast catamaran and run them 5 miles offshore to a coral reef (Grecian Rocks in our case) for 1.5 hours of snorkeling. Lots of fish including many barracuda.
- dinghying around in the mangroves :
On Tuesday we made a 25 mile run farther down the Keys to Islamorada, home of Lorelei's. This run was partly on the outside (Atlantic side) of the Keys, then through Snake Creek to the inside (Florida Bay or Gulfside). The inside section was in water typically 5-6 ft. deep. We dropped anchor off Lorelei's in time for lunch there (with the pooches) and later we returned for dinner too. They had a pretty good singer that night and were doing good business.
 
Wednesday's 37 mile run had us crossing back tot the outside at Channel 5 Bridge, and arriving Marathon mid afternoon after a somewhat bouncy ride. We wanted to rent a mooring here from the City Marina (they maintain 226 moorings in protected Boot Key Harbor) but they were full up so we signed onto the wait list and anchored on the fringe of the mooring field that night.
 
We now had access to the City Marina with its 2 large dinghy docks, showers and laundry, and nearby park. On Thursday we brought our bikes to shore and made a quick ride to Home Depot for a few supplies. While there we got the call that a mooring was available so we moved Spray onto ball P4 which is where she'll be for the next month.
 
Since then we've taken the dogs on many walks and romps, including at the nearby (20 minute dinghy ride) Sombrero Beach, biked to Publix for groceries, rowed the dinghy around the lagoon checking out all the boats, attended a pot luck dinner, had lunch at Burdines Chiki-Tiki bar, and participated in the daily 9 am Cruisers Net, which is a moderated discussion done via VHF radio. The weather has been great with coolish sunny days. Many of the boats here have stayed for years and you can see why.
 
For us the month will pass quickly (we've almost been here a week already) and then we'll be moving up the west coast of FLA.
 
 

 

Friday, January 17, 2014

Fuel Filter Mystery - The Answer!

What was the cause of the periodic RPM drops we've seen on 2 occasions this southbound trip? Seemed like it could be due to a clogging fuel filter, especially since changing the Racor primary filter element apparently cleaned up the first occurrence near Charleston SC.

 

There were some good guesses, both via the blog comments and via emails. Some suspected the secondary fuel filter and others noted that both occurrences had similar weather conditions, with strong winds that had us piloting from the lower helm in the salon. Those who thought that the weather was a factor were on the right track.

 

Did you notice that the symptoms were similar to what I had seen 4 years earlier with a clogging Racor, but not identical? With the clogging Racor the RPM would dip for a bit, and then resume back to normal for a while. The occurrences this year had dipping RPM but I had to manually bump up the throttle to restore normal RPM.

 

Here's a picture of Spray's flying bridge helm, where we weren't driving from when these RPM drops occurred:

You can see the engine controls at left, with the black knob for FNR gear shift and the red knob for throttle. Of course on the windy/rainy days in question, the upper helm actually looked more like this :

When we are piloting from down below the upper helm is protected from weather by the green canvas cover shown above.
 
So there we were last week, anchored in Lake Boca Raton, listening to the wind howl as we pondered the issue with the fuel filter. In strong winds like that Spray makes a variety of sounds from creaking anchor lines, and whistling mast stays, and flapping canvas. Flapping canvas?

That's when it hit me. Maybe the problem wasn't fuel filter related at all but instead the flapping helm cover was bumping the throttle lever (you can't tell in the above photo but the throttle lever is a bit taller than the gearshift). I checked the blog from the run into Charleston to confirm that we had strong following winds that day too.
 
We decided not to change the Racor element the next morning but instead to experiment with the flying bridge canvas as we traveled. Sure enough we confirmed that simple flapping of the canvas against the throttle lever was the source of the RPM dips, which I would then correct by bumping up the throttle from below. Doh!
 
Changing the Racor element in Charleston seemed to fix the problem only beacause our next travels didn't re-create the canvas flapping condition, until last week.
 
So now I'm hunting for just the right cover for the upper controls that will prevent this. Sorry for dragging you needlessly through the finer points of fuel filters (no I'm not). The good news is that I'll be ordering one of those nifty Racor vacuum sensors that Jeff Siegel suggested, so next time I'll know if the Racor is at fault.

 

Monday, January 13, 2014

Fuel Filter Mystery - Solved!

Spray is powered by a single diesel engine. Specifically a Ford-Lehman 135 horsepower, 6 cylinder, naturally aspirated diesel engine. That engine must run reliably, not only to get us where we are going but also to keep us out of trouble. An engine stall at the wrong time (like when the wind and surf are towards the rocky beach) could be catastrophic.

 

Fortunately, Spray's diesel is a simple and robust design. To understand the simple part you need to know how a diesel differs from a typical gasoline engine. In each cylinder of a gas engine a mixture of vaporized gasoline and air (mixed in a carburator or more recently in a fuel injection manifold) are compressed by the rising piston, and when the piston is at the top of its travel, and the fuel/air mixture is fully compressed, a spark is emitted by the spark plug which explodes the fuel/air mixture to create the downward power stroke on the piston.

 

In a diesel there is no spark plug and no 'premixing' of fuel and air. Instead only air is compressed by the piston, and really compressed a lot, such that the air instantly heats to over 800 degrees F when the piston is at the top of its travel. At that point diesel fuel is injected at super high pressure into the cylinder and as it hits that hot air it immediately explodes to create the power stroke. Simpler, as it needs no electric system to fire spark plugs (no ignition coils, no distributor, no spark plug wires, no spark plugs), but the diesel fuel injectors, and the fuel pumping system that creates the high injection pressures needed, must be well designed and built.

 

It's an old saying for marine diesels that the 3 major sources of problems are :

1) Fuel

2) Fuel

3) Fuel

 

This is because the diesel fuel injectors shoot the high pressure fuel through a very small hole (essentially invisible) into the cylinder, and if that hole gets plugged, then that cylinder won't fire and the engine runs poorly, or not at all. So any contamination in the fuel such as sediment or water can cause problems. Mariners cruising under diesel power worry about contaminated fuel, and take steps to both prevent contamination and to filter out any contaminants that do exist.

 

Spray is typical in that she has both a primary fuel filter that filters the fuel as it exits the fuel tanks, and secondary fuel filters that re-filter the fuel after the primary and after a stage of fuel pumping. The primary filter gets the most attention. By far the dominant brand of primary diesel fuel filter on boats is Racor, so its common to hear a boat owner say 'its time to change the Racor' or similar when the replaceable filter element in the Racor filter becomes clogged with contaminants.

 

How do you know when to change the Racor element? The best way is to install a gauge that measures pressure drop across the filter. A new element allows easy flow of fuel so there is little pressure drop, while a clogging filter will have the pressure drop increase. When you see that happen you know 'it's time to change the Racor ! On Spray that means 1 hour labor and $10 for a new element.

 

But Spray lacks the pressure gauge needed for detecting a clogging filter, so what now? We have 2 options :

1) We can replace the Racor element periodically, hopefully before any clogging occurs. Spray has an engine-hour meter so we can replace the elements after every say, 200 hours of engine operation. This method usually works but it means you probably change filter elements more often than needed.

2) We could continue to run with a given filter element until a problem occurs. This happened to me 4 years ago as I (and BIL Dennis) were heading into Lake Okeechobee from the west. The symptom of a clogging Racor started about 100 run-hours after changing the element, and was as you might expect : RPM would drop periodically, then resume to normal. It occurred more often at higher power settings than at lower. the diesel was not getting reliable fuel flow. We ran in that mode for a couple hours until we stopped for the night. Changed the Racor element the next morning and then continued across the lake without incident. [I later figured out that the problem was using a too restrictive 2 micron element. I now use 10 micron.]

 

It looked like a similar thing happened twice on this southbound trip. The first time was the day we approached Charleston SC. It was a cold day with strong NE winds so we were driving from the enclosed salon. Very now and then the RPM would drop and I would bump the throttle up to restore the desired speed. This happened several times but we made it to our destination marina in Charleston OK. Since the Racor element had almost 200 hours on it I did change it and the problem did not reoccur ..... until last Wednesday when we were traveling southwards through the Palm Beach area. If you check the blog entry for that day you can see that it was a nasty day, with rain and high NE winds. The RPM drops were same as in SC, and bumping up the throttle again fixed things for a while. We made our goal of Lake Boca Raton without incident.

 

So I figured it was again time to change the Racor element, but I'd wait until morning to let the engine room cool. Checking my logbook I noticed that this element had only served for 90 hours of runtime, which seems too low for clogging the filter. So what was going on?

 

Later that night as we swung at anchor in the still strong winds, an idea came to me. We left the next morning without changing the Racor element and did some tests that showed everything running fine with no RPM drops.

 

So what was the problem? Why did we see symptoms similar to a clogging Racor twice on this southbound trip?

Any guesses?

I'll post my answer in a day or two.

 

 

 

 

Friday, January 10, 2014

Challenges of SE FLA

We've decided to head for the Florida Keys, continuing on the ICW through the most densely populated part of the state. The weather has been dicey. It's been challenging but rewarding, in a way. One of the best tools to deal with the challenges has been a credit card. Here are the details :

 

On Monday we left Manatee Pocket, near Stuart FL, and had an easy 25 mile run down the ICW. We needed to replenish some supplies, and upcoming weather looked bad (the 'Polar Vortex' would yield colder temps and strong N winds), so we pulled into Old Port Cove Marina in North Palm Beach for a 2 night stay. This is a very deluxe and well run marina. On Tuesday they gave us a ride to a nearby Publix for grocery shopping. We then enjoyed lunch at their restaurant, and we watched the screaming N winds and periodic rain from our protected slip. Very civilized.

 

We had a tricky time getting out of the slip on Wednesday due to strong NE winds, and those winds and periodic rain kept things interesting as we travelled further south. This was a day of dealing with drawbridges. The ICW divides the densely populated beach areas here from the mainland, so there are many bridges, probably averaging one every 2 miles or so. They all operate on schedules, opening every half hour or so, sometimes on the quarter hours. If you cruise at 5-6 knots they sort of synchronize so you don't have to wait too long. Thus it makes no sense to hurry. We communicate with the bridge tenders on VHF channel 9, which is full of chatter from boats ahead of us and behind us.

 

Wednesday's 30 mile run left us dropping the hook in the NE corner of Lake Boca Raton, a wide spot in the ICW surrounded by condos. The NE winds were screaming at 30 mph so we were glad for the relative protection. We were able to dinghy back up the ICW a bit to a park where we could walk the pooches.

 

Thursday was our big run to Miami. This longish 38 mile run had loads of drawbridges, and both sides of the ICW had luxury homes with sea walls, so any boat wakes bounce back and forth forever. It was lucky that it was a weekday with sketchy weather so there weren't too many other boats, plus the many manatee zones kept boat speeds down. Even at our stately 6 knots I was startled to notice a manatee right in the channel center, about 50 ft. ahead. The manatee dove, and I quickly took Spray out of gear, and we coasted by without incident.

 

Another near miss : I am reading that sections of Palm Beach County (just north of where we were) had some serious wind and rain on Thursday, with 20 inches (!!!) of rain and very high winds seen in some areas we had traveled through on Wednesday. Lucky for us that we didn't wait another day at that comfortable marina.

 

Thursday afternoon we arrived at Miami and turned left to follow the Venetian Causeway to Miami Beach, where we dropped anchor near Belle Isle. There was a dinghy dock there, next to a police station and a park for the dogs. The winds died down and we had a balmy (high 70s) evening. We hung out there Friday morning, walking around the South Beach area some. After lunch aboard Spray we made a short 9 mile cruise Bach to Miami, then south to Coconut Grove, on the west shore of Biscayne Bay, where we now hang in the city mooring field. Renting a mooring here entitles us to shoreside showers (yay!) and water taxi service between Spray and shore. The mooring field is rather exposed which provides a nice breeze to keep us cool, but its a bit bouncy too. Here's a shot of the mooring field :

We plan on 2 nights here at Coconut Grove. We'll visit some dog parks today to reward the pooches for all of the boat traveling they have had to endure lately. Tomorrow (Sunday) we have moderate N winds predicted which will be perfect to push us down Biscayne Bay and into the Keys proper. Stay tuned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday, January 5, 2014

Decision Point

Tonight we are anchored in Manatee Pocket, a busy harbor near Stuart FLA and also near the St. Lucie Inlet. Because of the inlet, this is sportfishing boat country, where they chase sailfish and other gamefish.

 

When we leave here tomorrow we have the option of turning left and heading west and across Lake Okeechobee to Florida's west coast, or turning right and continuing on the ICW southwards towards Miami and the Keys. When Riggs and I did this trip 4 years ago it was very cold, with nighttime lows in the 30's and daytime highs in the 50's, so the decision was easy : Go South!

 

This year it's different. Temperatures in Florida have been cycling up and down, with occasional cool days interspersed with plenty of warm days (today was 80 and humid). So there is no big drive to push farther south for warmer weather (I may feel different in a couple of days).

 

It's a little odd having no fixed schedule or pressing appointments. Our main goal is to get back to Maine sometime in May. Other than that we have had only two loose goals : to spend some time (probably a month) in Marathon (in the Keys) and to visit Sarasota (west coast) to touch base with some Castine friends who winter over there. Until now we weren't positive as to which we would do first, and by tomorrow morning, we must decide.

 

We're going to stick with Plan A, which is to head south to the Keys first. While we hang out there we can do some scraping and painting on Spray, and we'll keep the bikes on shore so we can use them easily. January is the coldest month in Florida so well spend later January and early February in the warmest part of the state. Then, in mid February we'll head up the west coast of FLA to Sarasota, visit there until we are thrown out, and eventually cross Okeechobee west to east and then turn northwards towards Maine.

 

So that's the future, what about the recent past? We have moved from Florida's Space Coast to its Treasure Coast. This past Tuesday we cruised from Cocoa to Melbourne, with a following N wind. At first we anchored south of the Eau Gallie bridge near Melbourne, but the bridge causeway didn't block the waves as we had hoped, so we moved Spray into a small anchorage up the Eau Gallie River a bit. That was very well protected and surrounded by many splendid homes, 2 small marinas, and a county park for the dogs (and for storks as you can see above). It was here that we spent New Years Eve, and some of the neighboring homeowners provided some fireworks off their docks (or so I was told by Sheila - I was asleep).

 

On New Years Day we cruised down to Vero Beach and by mid afternoon we grabbed an open mooring in their mooring field, which is run by Vero Beach Municipal Marina. Cruisers know Vero Beach as 'Velcro Beach', because staying there is addictive and it becomes hard to leave. They have a large dinghy dock, a nice shoreside facility with showers, a lounge, and laundry, and adjacent dog park (yay!), and free town busses to take you shopping or to the beach. Also, to stay on one of their moorings in a protected lagoon costs less than $15/day. So we did much dog play at the park, took many showers, did laundry, joined other cruisers for the Thursday pot-luck happy hour, and took the bus to grocery shopping. As a special treat, our Castine friends Gene and Kathy Spinazola, who winter here, came for lunch at nearby Riverside Cafe and we swapped cruising stories.

 

We stayed at Vero Beach for 4 nights, and it really was tough to decide to press on. It was the gnats that clinched it. The well protected mooring field there is surrounded by mangroves, and when it its warm and winds are light, the 'noseeums' come out at night, and are nasty. We made some new screens for Spray to try to keep them out, but it was only partly effective. Since today was going to be warm with light winds, we decided to get the holding tank emptied, water tank filled, and to cruise on.

 

33 miles later and here we are in Manatee Pocket. Today was flying bridge weather, hot and humid, and my sunburn is refreshed. We did see a line of storm clouds ahead and just before we arrived we transferred downstairs and arrived to on-and-off rain, and its still hot here, and yes, there are a few gnats. From what I see on the weather report, its going to turn quite cold later tomorrow and through Tuesday. That should knock the gnats back. We will be somewhere south of here by then.