Slight priority change

We are still gradually moving to be more "off-grid" (already we have no plumbing attachments to the "grid", just one electric cable remains. Our priority remains to get our solar connected so that we can remove that last tether (and save money) but on boats everything affects everything else. Then there are the external factors.

One external factor is our boat insurance. The key complication is that insurers are paranoid about Lithium Batteries (for which we owe a debt of thanks to Elon Musk for shipping vehicles that catch fire and crash a lot). That means we have complicated options to get our electric motor and its batteries installed. One possibility is to get a professional to install the parts we have already bought. We are exploring that at the moment.

Both the interconnection of things and the insurance mean that to get the solar installed we need to do a lot of work around the motor compartment as that is where all the electrical stuff comes together.

To start that, yesterday, I routed the two mizzen mast antenna cables correctly by fitting watertight glands for them.

The immediate impact is to move the 12V house battery from balancing on top of the electric motor (where it was powering the WiFi booster) towards its proper place at the outside of the corridor.

Then I started installing the 12v switch panels. I removed the existing cosmetic plywood panel, fortunately it was hiding a gap which is the raised edge of the cockpit (the "coaming" or seat back that stops water flowing from the deck into the cockpit). The wiring of the switch panels can just fit into the gap.

This is what the panel looks like now.

Despite appearances, it is the only thing that is actually vertical there.

Next steps with this "side" project are to add two "master" switches, one per panel, two circuit breakers and (on the critical path to solar) the Victron Ekrano display that displays everything about all our Victron systems (solar, inverter etc) and allows us to control them.

Then I can properly connect the 12v battery, and WiFi booster. I can work to moving the WiFi router to run off 12v and also the Raspberry Pi running Home Assistant to 12v.

Today is going to be mostly wet, otherwise I could be working on the legs for the side solar and the waterproof deck glands for their cables. I could also start on the work in the motor compartment (but that needs it to be dry to life the motor our and open the cockpit floor to give me room and light). So I'll continue with this 12v stuff which is still needed.