Old rudder with severe osmosis

I know it’s a bit early to be thinking of fitting out, a task usually reserved for the European Spring but with Temptress out of the water, rudderless, we asked the yard to look into obtaining and fitting a water maker. Like all big boat purchases, the Skipper has spent a long time pondering what was needed, asking fellow cruising sailors what they think of their model, where such a beast might fit and putting off the acquisition until we are closer to needing it.

Now we know exactly what model we want, what power it will consume, what quantity of water it will supply and that it will fit mostly under our bunk making use of the seawater inlet for the galley. Or at least we thought we did until we had an email from the yard informing us that the object of our desire had been discontinued as “more efficient models are now available in the market”.

So now we are back to researching and pondering. If the unit is size x will it still fit in the space we have? Come to think of it how big is that gap under the master bunk behind the drawers? Did we ever write down the measurements? Should we try another little-used space aft behind the fuel tank? What size are the other components? Where could we fit them? What power consumption? How much water do we really need to produce each day, which really equates to how long do we want to run the engine for each day?

Power toys!

Meanwhile the Skipper has been doing a little bit of shopping himself and purchased a couple of Chinese 100w solar panels, a regulator plus a few other bits and pieces. The intention once Christmas and the last of the transitional rains are over is to attempt to power our balcony pot watering system with the kit. A trial run if you like towards adding some extra generation capabilities to Temptress, complementing our 2001 wind generator and the most recent addition to our charging systems, a heavy duty Balmar alternator. The latter ensured we could remain at anchor most of our summer holiday. The motoring we did into and out of ports keeping the batteries more than adequately topped up no plugging in to mains electricity required but diesel costs and has to be sourced when you are cruising out of the way places so an alternative is needed.

So it seems we really are doing some long distance fitting out. Happy Christmas!