Pit Stop in Oxnard

By Aaron

We’ve been in Oxnard at Channel Islands Harbor Marina for about a week now.  Kind of a long stop for us but the weather has been fantastic and it’s a good location to work on boat projects. 

There’s been a definite change in the flora compared to only a few months ago

The project list and status looks something like this:

Oil change – done (At our old marina in Seattle you just take your old oil and dump it in the recycling tank.  Similar here, except that it’s witnessed by a harbor patrol officer who also logs the amount of oil, boat name, hailing port, etc.)

Fuel filters change – done (the inept mechanic that changed them last time actually put the Racor housing back together without putting a new filter in!  Fortunately the secondary filter was in and still relatively clean, but I changed them both.  Oh, and the inept mechanic was me.)

Fix wiring problem with %#!$&*# starter (Again.  I’m going to have to run a new, heavier gauge wire and it will be a pain)

Install fresh water foot pump (This, like many boat projects, involves making a big hole in a perfectly good piece of teak so I’m procrastinating)

Fix problem with autopilot hydraulic arm connection to rudder post radial  - done (Third time’s the charm I hope)

Wire up NEMA 0183 connection from plotter to autopilot (Currently only steers a compass course and we’d like it to steer through a series of waypoints – so we can just go to bed on our next overnight passage.  The GPS is so accurate we’ll just wake up in a new slip the next day.)

Connect this:

Itty bitty screws to hold down two little wires, so far so good.

To this:

This is the NMEA 0183 wiring bundle coming from the chartplotter.  You can see part of our NMEA 2000 network in the background where you just connect the T pieces together.  I much prefer  the Tinker Toy like NMEA 2k installation. 

It was my first time doing any NMEA 0183 wiring and In the end connecting up the plotter to our old autopilot turned out to be simple to do.  I wish we had done this a long time ago!

Replace masthead anemometer – done (Warranty exchange with Garmin – the old one was giving temperature readings high enough to put it squarely in Hell and could not be corrected with an offset)

Replace SPOT messenger – done (Warranty exchange with SPOT – old one starting randomly sending HELP messages all by itself)

Get our mail forwarded – done

Varnish – done (We didn’t get as many coats on as we would have liked, but with rain in the forecast we’ll have to take what we can get)

Replace jib halyard shackle – done (had a snap shackle on there before and we weren’t quite getting a full hoist on the sail)

The projects are going well and we should be getting out of here in a few days.  One thing I like about Oxnard is there’s a donut shop on practically every block.  And I’ve got a thing for donuts.

Boat projects are hard work.  Cruiser TIp: To burn calories you gotta eat ‘em first!

Nicole pretty much does all the varnishing on the boat, and she does a really nice job.  Last year we removed the Cetol and took it down to bare wood.  We built it back up with Epifanes Wood Finish Gloss.  We’ve been very happy with that and used it again for our maintenance coats.

Putting on Bella Star’s makeup