Cleaning the bilge, making plans...
Well, my projects for the last week have been finalizing the electrical plans and cleaning out the bilge. Cleaning out the bilge has been a satisfying, albeit disgusting, job. Years and years of engine oil coating the inaccessible spots and gluing the dirt to the fiberglass presented a challenge. I put on a respirator, gloves, yellow tyvec suit, and armed myself with various scrub brushes and green scrubbie pads. I started out with Simple Green, as I wanted to avoid the more toxic products if possible. Simple Green actually did a great job on the dirt, but couldn't cut the engine oil stains. The Stanley "Dirty Job" gloves I bought, which were supposed to be chemical resistant, disintegrated after 3 hours. The next day I tried a degreaser called Greased Lightning. Good stuff. Spray it on, let it set a few minutes, scrub it around a bit, then rinse it off. The bilge is lookin' good.
My electrical schematics came back this morning from the marine electrician who had proofed them. Now we're almost ready to order the cable and start the installation. However, I have spent about 2 hours so far today trying to figure out the cable we need for the mast circuits. We're using Aqua Signal products: a Series 40 Tricolor/Strobe/Anchor light and a Series 20 Deck/Steaming combo. Everybody (West Marine, Sailnet, Hamilton's) carries these products, so presumably they are pretty popular and have been installed many times. However, the cable Aqua Signal specifies in their difficult-to-decipher instructions, while readily available in Europe, is nowhere to be found at these same suppliers. The tricolor needs round 14/4 of a specific O.D. I can find 16/4 to fit (a special order) but I am concerned about the voltage drop. The steaming/deck combo needs 14/3 or 16/3 no larger than .276". Smallest I can find is .333". The tech support guy at Aqua Signal was no help at all. Can you believe this? How can stores sell the light but not the cable needed to wire it? Aaaaargh!