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Larry's LogAfter finishing there, we went shopping and then back to the boat, had lunch, put up the main awning and I started equalizing the batteries. Steve had gone over the chart with me about the voltages and the times for this process and so while I could turn everything off (like lights), I started the equalization process. Many people mistakenly think that AGM batteries shouldn't be equalized, but they should although using a different procedure from "traditional" wet cell batteries. The purpose of this process is to reduce the lead sulfates on the battery plates, thereby reclaiming some of the lost capacity that occurs naturally as the batteries are discharged but not "fully" recharged. I monitored and wrote down volts, amps and temperature every five minutes for an hour and 45 minutes, and at that point, I brought the batteries back down to the float voltage. While it was turned off, the temperature in the refrigerator went up slowly, but not so much as the food would spoil before the equalization was complete. The equalization went well although I wouldn't know if it really helped until I got away from the marina. Steve and I talked about it and I'll probably do it again before we leave the dock. I'll know if the batteries are healthy again if the voltage stays higher than before after a charge. It was going down to about 12.1 volts after a load of 5 amps for most of the night. We'll see. In the meantime, we have to wait for the alternator. The next day we heard from our friends on Mima, Tom and Stephanie. We had planned to see them in Venezuela if we went there, but now they were coming to Martinique. Unfortunately, they had a rough trip from Margarita and the bow anchor broke free and caused some damage in the 10-foot seas they encountered. It was really a shame because they had just had painted the boat in Puerto La Cruz. They stopped in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia to make some repairs to the windlass and maybe get the boat short-hauled and the paint touched up. Hopefully they could make the last 23 miles to Martinique early next week. Steve, Connie and Mike came over in the afternoon to say they were leaving tomorrow, probably for the Virgin Islands. Funny, we had said that the reason they were coming over was to say goodbye; they had been in Ste. Anne for about 6 weeks now. We had a nice visit and said we would hopefully see them again as they came back down the islands. There was a festival in Marin that weekend and we thought we would go to some of the events but it was such an overcast day that we basically stayed on the boat most of the day. I did though, fashion a mounting pad for the windlass switch from a piece of 1/2" marine plywood that I carry. The original teak pad had split and I decided to replace it. After cutting out the pad and making the hole for the switch, I sealed the wood with epoxy. We went to see the local boat races that afternoon and it was really interesting to see the crews rig the masts before the race. The start was from the beach after all the boats were ready and waiting in the shallow water. An air horn blew and the crews quickly pushed the boats off the beach and jumped in before the wind capsized them. The boats had only a small keel and depended on the crew of 8 or 9 leaning out on long poles to keep the boats upright. The start was a reach bearing off to downwind towards Ste. Anne. One boat did capsize just after the start. The boats are much too heavy (made of wood planking) to be righted in the water so it was towed back to shore. To their credit, the crew did get the boat ready again and continued on the race. We stayed around the beach/starting area until the boats came back to watch them turn around the marks that were laid out. Unfortunately, I didn't bring my camera since it looked like rain but the larger 10-meter boats were going to race next weekend and hopefully it wouldn't rain then. The rest of the day I worked on the windlass, getting the connections clean and epoxied the bottom of the new mounting pad for the switch. Hopefully I could finish it soon. The next day was windy but sunny and I managed to finish putting the switch on. Hopefully it will last another year or so before I need to do that again. In the early afternoon, just as I was finishing, Diane heard our friends Mima on the VHF. They had come up from Venezuela a few days before and were doing some repairs in the Rodney Bay Marina. We didn't expect them to come up to Marin for a few days yet, after the wind died down a bit, but there they were. They were coming into the fuel dock so they could check in. They asked if we would meet them and of course we said sure, and off we went. As we walked down the dock, we saw another sailboat already tied up. We said that it would now be a little tough for them to come in but as we got closer, we saw Stephanie on the dock! That sailboat was Mima, in a different color! We gave Steph a big hug and kiss and then saw Tom still on the boat. We greeted Tom and then went aboard. It was great to see them again. They got fuel, checked in, (Tom and I started on the rum and Coke) and then they decided to come into the marina for a bit, to do some shopping, etc. We had them over for dinner that night and had a wonderful reunion. The next day, it was sunny again so I started to finish the staysail chainplate. I removed the tape residue (not too bad with acetone), made sure the remaining balsa core was dry by digging out some more and testing it and then using my heat gun. I then used plain, unthickened epoxy to wet the core and then thickened epoxy to fill in the cavity between the deck skins. It was nice and sunny that day so the epoxy dried well without putting any plastic over it to keep out moisture. After that, Tom and I continued from the previous day and we went to Mima for dinner. The next few days were occupied with checking on the status of our alternator parts, and doing a few odd jobs. We heard the weather in the morning and it seemed that the winds were really going to pick up and make many anchorages pretty uncomfortable so we weren't too upset about being in the marina. Tom and Steph had also decided to stay in the marina because of the bad weather and probable rolling in the Ste. Anne anchorage. At least we would have good company. In the afternoon, Tom and I went over to the shop and checked on the parts. It seems that our parts had seen more of the world than we had. FedEx really messed up - they had gone to Illinois, Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and finally wound up in St. Lucia. Hopefully they would get here tomorrow, Thursday. The next day, the parts did finally arrive. Bernard was not around but the manager, Jean-Louis went to find him so he could install them. But, of course, true to form, they were the wrong parts. We were all upset, and Jean-Louis almost as much as me! He had been very nice about follow up with the distributor and Federal Express. He had tried to track the package but was unable to because the distributor had given him the wrong number! Well, he offered to put the alternator back together and get it mounted so we could at least move the boat but I declined, as I still couldn't charge the batteries with just the solar panels and wind generator so we would have to stay in the marina a bit longer. I did tell him that I would go back to the boat and get the contact for Amptech directly. Tom drove me back to the boat in his dinghy and I got the email that Jack Rabbit Marine had sent me while Tom got some winch parts he wanted replaced. With the Amptech contact name and telephone number, we went back to the shop where Jean-Louis kindly let me call the manufacturer from his phone. He wanted to get us our parts and eliminate any confusion from the language problem. I spoke to the contact and we straightened out what was needed. Norma, from Amptech, described what the proper diode assembly looked like as I looked at the one inside mine, and they matched. OK, so I ordered the right assembly and gave her the address of CS Services in Martinique to send it to. She very nicely gave me the dealer discount and hopefully it would arrive in 3 days; sent overnight from Texas. It seems that of the two alternators they make, one is internally regulated and the other is externally regulated. I knew mine was externally regulated but there was no way to tell from the one-page document I had what the model number was supposed to be. I believed mine was a 120-amp unit. It turns out that the 120-amp model is only internally regulated and the 125-amp model is the externally regulated one, so we had ordered the wrong part because of that confusion. Hopefully now at least the right part was on order. Jean-Louis handled the situation extremely well and said he would keep the wrong part in his inventory, something he didn't have to do at all, particularly since it was ordered because of misinformation from me. But he was great and I said I would check back in a few days to see when the part came in. Well, now we just had to wait some more. Since we would be in the marina until at least Tuesday, I went over to the office and asked about staying until a month from when we came in, that would be February 8. It would be a cheaper daily rate so that the total cost would be about the same for a month as it was for 18 days. The clerk said OK but Diane went back the following day and spoke to Eric, the manager, and it turns out that she hadn't changed our rate to monthly; but he did that for us. The following day was a quiet one, except that Tom and Steph left Clem (their Beagle) with us for a few hours while they visited some friends of theirs out in the Ste. Anne anchorage. Clem (Clementine) was fine with us and we all had dinner that night on Mima with some steak Steph had bought in Venezuela. Pretty good. Saturday I continued the staysail chainplate since it looked like it wasn't going to rain. I cleaned the area and the chainplate itself, filed the now hardened epoxy until the plate fit well and then used some polysulphide caulk as a sealant. I put the bolts in and the top cover plate bolts and let it harden before tightening. It forms a seal that way and hopefully won't leak again (at least not too soon). |