If you do decide to go for the redundancy, just don't install iOS 8.3, if possible.
You have been warned.
The Official "What Did You Do To Your Mac Today" Thread!
- Thread starter Sock Puppet
- Start date
You have been warned.
yesterday we took the Egret out for the first time under our ownership. I have an iPad 3 tethered to a Bad Elf Bluetooth GPS and the Navionics US and Canada App. All three performed extremely well. At the end of 8 hours the iPad battery was at 65%! The accuracy of the bad elf/ Navionics combo was truly a remarkable 3 to 5 meters ( measured from fixed landmarks on the seaway channel) so that I could issue helm commands to my wife to avoid the many shoals that pester Lake St. Louis near Montreal. another bonus is that BadElf will tether to up to 5 devices, so that you can use the iPad in the cabin for plotting and the iPhone velcroed to the cockpit or to the top of the lazaret for real time steering. You will need some sort of sun shade and a waterproof case, make a simple shade one out of plasticized cardboard.If you do decide to go for the redundancy, just don't install iOS 8.3, if possible. You have been warned.
Though new to sailing, I have been an avid canoeist for many years ( I build my own cedar strips as a hobby) and I'm very familiar with navigation both manual and with GPS so when I say, that I'm truly impressed, I mean it
Excellent battery life!yesterday we took the Egret out for the first time under our ownership. I have an iPad 3 tethered to a Bad Elf Bluetooth GPS and the Navionics US and Canada App. All three performed extremely well. At the end of 8 hours the iPad battery was at 65%! The accuracy of the bad elf/ Navionics combo was truly a remarkable 3 to 5 meters ( measured from fixed landmarks on the seaway channel) so that I could issue helm commands to my wife to avoid the many shoals that pester Lake St. Louis near Montreal. another bonus is that BadElf will tether to up to 5 devices, so that you can use the iPad in the cabin for plotting and the iPhone velcroed to the cockpit or to the top of the lazaret for real time steering. You will need some sort of sun shade and a waterproof case, make a simple shade one out of plasticized cardboard.
Though new to sailing, I have been an avid canoeist for many years ( I build my own cedar strips as a hobby) and I'm very familiar with navigation both manual and with GPS so when I say, that I'm truly impressed, I mean it
What OS is on your iPad 3?
iOS 8.3
Sometimes issues are caused by third party apps that need to be upgraded, I have had some issues with some magazines (Sail) but then they cleared up.
Navionics has had some quitting issues and with the street map overlay, but I am happy to say that since the latest upgrade all the issues have been cleared up.
Sometimes issues are caused by third party apps that need to be upgraded, I have had some issues with some magazines (Sail) but then they cleared up.
Navionics has had some quitting issues and with the street map overlay, but I am happy to say that since the latest upgrade all the issues have been cleared up.
Got a fantastic little Bluetooth GPS device that feeds the pad and works like a charm. I'll check the particulars when I get back.
I was getting glitches with the google satellite picture overlay on Navionics too. I just turned mine back to normal yellow = land. I run it on a GPS enabled iPad and it works really well. Though I need to figure out why it wasn't charging the other day. I have it plugged into a 2.1amp 12v socket adapter in the boat, but that couldnt keep up with Navionics and music playing. I think it wasnt charging at all. On the way back to the ramp I turned off navigation so we could at least have tunes.
I had a busy day. The mast crutch I built about a thousand miles ago sheared its eye bolts that held it to the rudder pintles on the transom and shattered onto the street as we were going to the boat ramp. Pulled into a parking lot, scratched my head for a minute and came up with this:
Admiral asked if we should just head back home... But after seeing the weather and wind forecast, there was no way we were missing it. And, thanks to Boy Scouts, my lashed on cooler was just as solid as any mast crutch. Here's the new one, with 2 stainless steel 3/8" eye bolts holding on this time. Light bar connects with male/female quick-connects to an extension cord off the trailer lights
Then I got inside and installed up the panels I had been finishing in the garage. The Electrical panel has been there for a year, just sitting in place between the fiberglass and cooler. I got 2 of these, and thumb screws to fit:
I installed them backwards using epoxy putty behind the fiberglass:
so they sit flush in the holes:
I screwed a piano hinge to the bottom on the panel, and the 2 black thumb screws hold it in place:
So quickly - and without tools - I can take out the thumb screws and drop the panel open to access the back of my electrical panel. And before anyone says anything about electrical safety, I couldn't find 10ga red wire when I was starting this install, so there are 2 big thick yellow 10ga wires that I will never confuse for safety-wire-color ground. And I don't see a need to ever have AC power on board, anyways:
Made one for the other side to complete my stereo install that I started a couple weeks ago. And gave one of the extinguishers a permanent home:
Next up is storage next to aft berth
Admiral asked if we should just head back home... But after seeing the weather and wind forecast, there was no way we were missing it. And, thanks to Boy Scouts, my lashed on cooler was just as solid as any mast crutch. Here's the new one, with 2 stainless steel 3/8" eye bolts holding on this time. Light bar connects with male/female quick-connects to an extension cord off the trailer lights
Then I got inside and installed up the panels I had been finishing in the garage. The Electrical panel has been there for a year, just sitting in place between the fiberglass and cooler. I got 2 of these, and thumb screws to fit:
I installed them backwards using epoxy putty behind the fiberglass:
so they sit flush in the holes:
I screwed a piano hinge to the bottom on the panel, and the 2 black thumb screws hold it in place:
So quickly - and without tools - I can take out the thumb screws and drop the panel open to access the back of my electrical panel. And before anyone says anything about electrical safety, I couldn't find 10ga red wire when I was starting this install, so there are 2 big thick yellow 10ga wires that I will never confuse for safety-wire-color ground. And I don't see a need to ever have AC power on board, anyways:
Made one for the other side to complete my stereo install that I started a couple weeks ago. And gave one of the extinguishers a permanent home:
Next up is storage next to aft berth
we had some of those charging problems with our iPads, the guy at the Apple Store blamed it on the charger... "Yeah sure" I said, I had a third party charger and wire. To prove his point he plugged it in to an original Apple charger and wire and voila! It started charging. sold! Buy a cheap inverter and plug the original charger into it. Apparently the Apple Charger has some intelligence built into it to sense the charging state.
Also... GPS enabled iPads, like iPhones, whenever you run any chart or map will drain your battery in no time especially if you keep the screen on to track. That is why I bought the Bad Elf bluetooth unit, it has its own battery to power the GPS chips and will last a couple of days without draining the iPad. It's not an expensive unit and has the added bonus of a display showing your speed and track.
Concerning Navionics, I hardly ever use the satellite view, I find the overlay confusing and it does displace things occasionally, like rte 30 in the middle of the lake. The map overlay is actually quite good and they fixed the overlay problem. But, unless you need to sight on objects not shown on the chart, it's not really all that useful. I use the Google Maps app for that and it also works with the bad elf GPS.
The pleasure is mine. It's a little rubber gasketed box made by an outfit named "Dual", and the model is: XGPS160. The gasket bit is probably mostly silicon, and it will not slide off anything until almost inverted, which for the Mac guys is handy. It's got a usb plug, and seems to last quite a few hours before needing attention. It's also got 5 bluetooth lights, so that would indicate that it can feed most of the marina. :dance:
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Ronnie's Mac got the first test of the top down furler today. What started with a little Ronstan 60 series furler which got transformed into a top down unit, some previously untried Marlow anti-torsion rope that required a whole lot of guessing (and a whole lot of awl needles) a custom bowsprit and some other stuff, including the learning curve of how to do useable butt splices without large shop tools.
The boat was on the lift, we didn't have the cycles to go out (although we wanted to!) so the quick furl, unfurl, repeat testing was done and then we ran away, but not before getting some pictures. Here's one.
The boat was on the lift, we didn't have the cycles to go out (although we wanted to!) so the quick furl, unfurl, repeat testing was done and then we ran away, but not before getting some pictures. Here's one.
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Today, I trailered Sovereign back up to the Ranch from Puerto Penasco, MX.
I'll give her a good going over.
Customs and Border Protection gave her a good going over, to boot.
I'll give her a good going over.
Customs and Border Protection gave her a good going over, to boot.
More photos please!!!
I've been working on how to do this, including some mast mods.
Any help would be appreciated!!
Jeff
Yeàh. What he said. If it ever stops hurricane season, we can get on with the chase boat and drone video that's been in the production planning stages forever. There's a tiny video on the meriachee tube channel.Did you check his website?
The Catalina version build details (virtually the same) at. Meriachee.wordpress.com
Hey! I'll take that as a compliment. The furling hardware for a top down rig is somewhat prohibitively expensive, and it does not include the torsion rope. What I built, was done for less than the cost of a cheap furling drum alone, including the Marlow rope. The installation on Ronnie's Mac used a much simpler pole, and that may, or may not get modified as time reveals how well the setup works. We're not far enough along the road with either setup to understand how well it works, but the initial trials are very encouraging.Oops. Yes, I just did. You are impressive with tools!
The thing about this crowd is that we're not afraid to see something blow up, that's engineering. The furler drums had a fatal flaw, that became apparent right away, and was a pretty easy modification. I'm sure that's not the end of it before these things are running reliably.
Here's the pole end of the "lower halyard". A nice loop containing the quick release, and a ball to stop the whole works from going into the pole.
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Jeff, the Mac bail got moved up the mast something like 16", which makes sure the furler clears the ff2 on the forestay. The pole was strategically engineered to a length allowing the furler to clear the bow rail. Then the Marlow line got tie wrapped at about the right length, the lawn chairs were employed to be comfy while evaluating the situation, and watching the neighbours wondering what the sam-heck these guys were up to raising masts in the parking lot.
Then the Marlow line got sewn, and the dimensions were gathered for the sail, which got ordered.
We went through a bit of 1/4" line learning how to do a butt splice, which turned out to be fantastically easy, and after much waiting for the sail, here we are. It's been a combination of monsoon and hurricane season with one exception ever since.
