Technical Archives - Sailing SY Liberation

Anchor Issues

July 23, 2017 Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

The Rocna anchor is a disappointment – it came loose several times in the storm in Skiathos in conditions we would never have expected to have a problem. After significant research across the Facebook forums and the internet, the conclusion is that buying the Rocna was a mistake (at least for us)! There are many yachts owners out there who swear by Rocna – so publishing our issues, certainly caused a heated discussion. What WE found on Liberation was that the Rocna sets very well in mud and sand but does not set in weed. Of course, weed is the worst substrate you can possibly have – and there aren’t many anchors which will set – but are used to …….

Installation of a Lithium Battery Bank

April 30, 2017 Commissioning, Equipment Specs, New Stuff, Technical

COMING SOON The original Rolls AGM battery bank is beginning to die – although it could last another season or maybe two, the power is definately waning. After a lot of discussion, we decide to install a state-of-the-art lithium battery bank. The bank is made up of 8 x 3 volt cells, clustered in banks of 4 – the system is managed by a REC battery management system (REC provide the battery systems for the Greeline electric yacht and have customised the management software for a sailing yacht application). Advantages and disadvantages of lithium? Risks and dangers Charging patterns Cost benefit analysis

Thinking about the location of equipment

April 28, 2017 Commissioning, Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

Relocating You would think that after so many years cruising, it would be obvious where to put equipment – and that the installers would also just know instinctively what to do as well. However, what seemed like an obvious location when we were planning and designing the boat turned out to have a lot of disadvantages so we decided to do some changes. First of all, we relocated the through-hulls for both the generator and the water maker …. they were not installed wrongly in the first place but they were not installed in the optimum location. Coming from a motor-boat background, we didn’t really think about heeling at the start and it turned out that when we were sailing aggressively …….

New Rocna Anchor!

April 13, 2017 New Stuff, Technical

During commissioning this year in April, we decided to replace our anchor with a new 33kg Rocna – after years of swearing by our Jambo and being one of it’s loudest advocates! We came loose a few too many times last year with side pulls and sand, and for us one of the most important things is being able to sleep comfortably at night and not to worry about our anchor. We’ve had many really good experiences with the Jambo – particularly in weed where we have watched all the other boats in the bay come loose, but we stay steady as a rock. Serifos was a great example of this last summer, where we lay at anchor in …….

Water maker … the story continues

June 13, 2014 Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

In June 2014 the water maker was re-installed in Preveza by the Greek installer and by taking videos of it operating he noticed that the water discharge was a trickle and not the flow it should be – he agreed the problem was the pump but in Greece the only available replacement was very large and delivered three times more time water than water maker could process – so now we’ve gone from one extreme to the other!! The replacement pump is the maximum pressure the water maker can cope with at 60psi – it is a self-priming pump which would hopefully avoid the air bubbles. Due to much higher power demand, he also installed a relay so when the pump …….

Water maker won’t run

October 17, 2013 Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

Our water maker was installed in Isola – not a factory option but one of our own additions – it is a big machine with high capacity. We want to use water the same as we do at home and we consume about 100 litres a day at least, without washing the boat or doing the washing. The installation in Isola seemed to be fine – the machine ran on the way to the customs pontoon in the sea trial – and we made water. However, this was on a completely flat sea with nothing else running on the generator. The machine sat idle all the while we were commissioning in Umag – it had been “pickled” (a process of running …….

Garmin autopilot doesn’t want to play

August 2, 2013 Repairs and Breakdowns

When Liberation was launched in Isola, one of the things which needed to be done as part of the first sea trial was calibration of the auto-pilot. Calibration involves putting the the system into setup mode and following the instructions on the screen – you drive the boat in large circles in one direction, then you turn and drive in circles in the opposite direction, followed by turning left and turning right and zig-zagging. When the programme is complete the unit confirms the calibration and it is then capable of driving the boat as it should. During the sea-trial this calibration failed and Keto were unable to achieve a working auto-pilot – Ed crossed the border into Croatia with manual …….

Furuno Network Commissioning

August 1, 2013 Commissioning, Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

As I wrote earlier, the Furuno TZT14 MFD has an issue with serious delamination of the screen and we have been in touch with Furuno to negotiate an exchange under the warranty. This is not quite as simple as it should be – of course we purchased the unit from a bulk distributor instead of directly from Furuno – and we installed it ourselves and didn’t have it done by a qualified Furuno installer. In addition, the unit is outside of the UK where it was purchased – all of which made the situation more complicated. Of course Furuno have “worldwide warranty” – but there are lots of conditions attached to this. First of all, for the warranty to be valid, an …….

Electrical problem with the invertor …

August 1, 2013 Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

We discovered very quickly while underway that the invertor was only supplying power to half the sockets on the boat – and also the immediate switch in when mains power was disconnected was not working as anticipated. We gave our buddy Toby a call at Keto and were very impressed when he said he would jump on a plane and come over. Toby flew over and reconfigured the 220v circuit by installing an additional relay allowing switching of both circuits from shore power to generator to invertor. The switch in was then immediate and the microwave doesn’t even lose it’s time setting when we switch between power supplies. It was quite a simple thing but immediate response from Keto! Toby …….

Moving onboard with our custom mattress

July 12, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

Today is the day we are finally able to move onboard – a major milestone as this means that we will be able to leave the marina very soon. The trailer is almost empty now – which means that nearly everything is fitted and there’s not TOO much more to do. It’s time to take the custom made mattress out and make up the bed. The mattress for the forward cabin was specified and supplied by Clipper Marine, through a partner supplier – and we had also had custom bed linen made by Nauteriors to fit both the aft and forward cabins based on the mattress specifications. The mattress comes in two halves – to make it easier to manoeuvre …….

Woodwork – we don’t like grey teak :)

July 10, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

There are many boat lovers out there who adore the look of real teak – the greyer and older it looks the better! We’re not among that crowd ….. teak is lovely when it’s new but after a very short time of exposure to the air it turns grey, and looks (in our opinion) disgusting! For this reason, we specified DuraDeck from the standard list of Bavaria options – this is artificial teak which has been laid on the swim platform, cockpit floor and seating, side decks and forward deck. This came already fitted on the boat from the factory. However, the cockpit table, foot retaining blocks at the helm, swim ladder, helm seats, pulpit step, shower tray grid and …….

Floods …. and discovering bilges

July 8, 2013 Repairs and Breakdowns, Technical

A few days back we decided to take a day out and go on a shopping trip into Slovenia and to Trieste in Italy with a rental car – we had a great day, found a lot of parts we needed and stocked up on supplies – and even had a McDonalds (long time ago!). We came back to the boat late in the evening at around 9pm and we discovered the fresh water pump running, but it was running dry. Ed was convinced I had left the tap on (no idea why I would have done that – am I REALLY that stupid????!!!!!) and I was getting a lot of stick before he realised that the taps were closed …….

Electronics installation … the biggie!

June 30, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

It’s taken us a month to complete the installation of the electronics from start to finish of course with lots of other jobs in between as it made sense doing several things at once while we had bits of the boat open. Some of the items had not arrived when they should have – for example the Bullet WiFi booster had been shipped from the US to our office in France and for some reason UPS had decided to send it back to the supplier as duty and VAT was due to be paid, rather than delivering it to us and asking for payment. With a lot of backwards and forwards, the unit was re-delivered eventually – but too late …….

Karcher jet-wash built in … yes REALLY!

June 22, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

Normally, when a yacht comes into a marina one of the first things you do is to spray it off – sailing covers EVERYTHING in salt and rails, decks, windows and even canvas are disgusting to touch. Even just sitting gently on the water without spray eventually gives a salt cover to everything from the sea air. The usual issues of properly cleaning the boat are shortage of water and shortage of power – with many marinas understandably frowning on excessive use of scarce fresh water for boat cleaning and sometimes water pressure being so low that it’s hard to do a good job. We have always had the luxury of a Karcher jet-wash on our boats – normally a …….

Tender to Liberation and Inox engineering!

June 16, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

We have some beautiful davits on the boat now …. but we need a dinghy to hang in them and that is not a simple job! Back in April when we did our flying visit to Umag, we went into the Novomar factory in Slovenia where we had looked a few years before for a dinghy for our last motor boat. Novomar is a local Slovenian brand which is great value for money – the factory seems a bit odd at first as you think you are going into a deserted old warehouse, but the owner has stock of all types and sizes of boats – some beautiful luxury ranges which were not feasible for us, and some basic models …….

Installation of Davits …. OH what a job!

June 6, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

Keto returned to Croatia on 2nd June to finish off the outstanding works – mainly for the installation of the davits but also to repair replace the custom floor panel which had been delivered in the wrong colour and to deliver a few odd replacement bits. Daniel came out again with his assistant James – and what a horrible job they had to do! By way of introduction, here is the end result of the davits … just so you know what we are aiming for! The davits are very unusual – and we have never seen them installed on any other boat, although they are a standard “off the shelf” product. They are produced by Simpson Davits, made by Cooney …….

Liberation has landed in Imola!

March 30, 2013 Commissioning, Technical

After months of anticipation Liberation was delivered to Isola in Slovenia in the middle of March 2013 and commissioning by Bavaria takes place as well as the addition of the factory fitted options and the dealer options we have requested including the canvas, auto-pilot, additional winches etc. Ed had already decided he wanted to be present to supervise the commissioning and drove from the Alps to Isola with our camper for the duration of the project and to take official handover and sail her to Croatia when she was ready. Commissioning consists of fitting all the bits and pieces which come separately packed the most complex of which is the standing rigging. The mast was stepped and all the standing …….