In a few days, Sabrina will go into Washburn’s boat yard for winterization and some off-season projects. Unlike last year, she won’t look very different when she emerges in the spring, but she’ll undergo some changes to make it a bit easier for us to cruise and maintain.
The biggest change we plan is to move the generator, which is currently in the bilge under the galley floor. This bilge holds a number of valves and strainers that, among other things, provide sea water for the air conditioning units and control the flow of fresh water from the two tanks. Access to it is via a small hatch in the galley floor, and having the generator right inside that hatch makes it hard to get into and move around the bilge. (I’ve never been down there because the access is so tight – won’t have that excuse once the generator is moved!) The generator will move to the bilge under the cockpit floor near the stern. In addition to freeing up space in the midship bilge, this will make the generator easier to access for maintenance. A few of our fellow Manatee owners have made this move – it’s costly but they are all pleased with the results.
We are also going to replace the existing bow thruster with one that is a bit more powerful. We’ve thought about adding stern thrusters, but we’ll hold off on that for a while.
A few other projects we are going to explore this off-season:
- Dining table – the current dining table is on a fixed pedestal, and is often in the way when we want to access the engine room and battery bank. I want to replace it with a movable table. This will help with engine room access and also make it easier to move the table out of the way for getting around the salon, as well as allow us to move the table out to the cockpit for outdoor dining. (The current outdoor table has to be attached to the cockpit door, which I don’t find to be very functional).
- Navigation – the heart of the current system is a Garmin 4612 chart plotter which, among other things, does not have touch screen or point-and-click capability. I’d like to move to a PC-based system. From what I can tell, having a PC-based platform vs. Garmin-based (or some other brand) is a matter of personal preference, but I’ve used PCs for most of my work career. I like the idea of doing all of my navigation, route planning, maintenance record-keeping and even personal record-keeping all on one system.
- Snubber eye – this is a metal eye attached to the point of the bow about a foot or two above the water line. (A snubber is a hook and line device that transfers the strain of the anchor chain from the windlass to a cleat). The windlass and cleat are seven feet above the water line. Moving the attach point from seven feet to two feet, when using a 5 to 1 scope, takes 25 feet off of the chain length needed and greatly reduces the swing radius.
We’ll have a few other maintenance items taken care of – normal stuff for a boat.
MV Sabrina goes ... 