On this week's episode of Onboard Lifestyle we get back to "basik's" and knock out a project from our list of things we want to do before we enter Mexico. Solar will be our main source of energy from now on so it feels real good to more than double our production to 1.1 kilowatts! Come back next week to see what the crew is up too...see you then!

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Closed Captions (CC) :
[Music]

previously on onboard lifestyle we have

a good run from morro bay to san luis

obispo bay and set the anchor right off

avila beach

the girls take the kayak to shore well

that was a complete fail

we tried to kayak to shore and i timed

the sets

wrong

we meet some generous local fishermen

i have it there you go i have it look at

that oh yeah oh i'm excited thank you so

much guys

lynn prepares one amazing meal after

another

i should have gotten another dozen

the crew kicks it in high gear and makes

a run down the coast hitting four stops

in four days

you know we have a punch list of

items we want to take care of before we

leave the states

and the list seems like it's it's grown

quite a bit but there's some key ones

that we definitely have to get done

we need radar we need to get the water

maker going we have to get

the autopilot going we need to add the

solar we want to install the the servo

gx and the gx touch 50 to give us more

information from our lithium battery

bank

and time's running out we only have

just weeks before we're entering mexico

that's a big reason why we came into

santa barbara

we just want to just kind of stop

traveling for a week or two and just

buff down a couple of these projects

that we need and i'm going to start with

the solar and for a big reason

we bought these solar panels months ago

back in richmond and

they've just been sitting in a state

room in storage so it'd be nice to get

these installed we've collected all of

the right components to to make this

happen i think it'll go pretty quick too

because we've had a good jump on the

installation by having that solar frame

welded up while we're in richmond

how's it look perfect look

are you happy with it i'm happy it's

the right dimensions the right material

well i hope it fits on the top

oh it should

so it's just a matter of

installing the panels into the frame now

the frame's got some hardware on it so

i'm going to modify every one of these

panels to make them fit and then onto

the electrical once

the solar install is complete i think

it'll go pretty quick too because it

mirrors our our other

panels the the components are the same

it's the same mppt control unit all the

switching and

fusing will be identical so it'll be two

separate systems running side-by-side so

it should be pretty straightforward once

that's installed we'll go on to the the

servo gx and the gx touch 50 and that'll

give us good information about our our

solar and our lithium systems

so let's be exciting

i'm uh

i'm actually looking forward to this so

let's get busy

[Music]

so

[Music]

modifications are done on these panels

most of them just i had to drill this

three quarter inch hole

so it gives me a little clearance around

some of the hardware up in that frame

but every one of these panels needed

between one and three modifications

some of them even needed notches uh

here's a hole

grooves for wire harnesses things like

that i did it all off measurements

one thing i'm a bit concerned about is

you know that's a big rectangle up there

and we have six smaller rectangles that

need to fit into it if

any one of these are racked out of

square

it's gonna be a tight fit so

i think it's time to dry fit these to

see how i did

[Music]

[Music]

do

okay those fit perfectly real happy with

that

you know we're gonna have a little bit

of shadowing here and there i mean it's

impossible to get around we're a

sailboat we have a mast and boom and

sails and lines

but we're gonna wire these panels

so it's gonna

give us the most efficiency out of them

i'm going to wire them all independent

so

if this panel here is shadowed the rest

of them are putting out their full

capacity and we'll do that with this

bank as well

besides that we really are starving for

solar we can swing our boom back and

forth and give us a hundred percent

coverage

okay

we have to do a few more things before i

start wiring

a couple modifications to this structure

here

you need to be able to get wires down to

the control units

so i'll do that next

with that hole drilled i put a rubber

grommet in here i didn't want the wires

chafing on this sharp edge

and i threaded a messenger in

goes in here and all the way down

into

the chase down here okay here we are in

the starboard hole

lynn has cleaned out the closet give me

a little elbow room in here

because i need to go back

into this electrical chase here

uh and mount a few of these components

okay here is the first array we put in

each panel is individually fused on this

fuse block

the mains come in i switch it here so if

i ever i want to work on anything i can

turn off the power coming to the rest of

the unit

and this goes to our mppt right here

which is 150. so it's a 100 volt it can

handle up to 100 volts and 50 amps of

power

from there

i have a circuit breaker

so if anything happens with any of these

components it interrupts it before it

hits our system

so i'm going to mirror this

exactly i'm going to put another unit

another fuse block here switch mppt and

then run it down into our system

i need to get these in first so it kind

of gives me my wire length if i put this

block in first actually it goes right up

here

i'll be able to start wiring that and

pulling the wires nice and tight

make sure i don't waste anything

so while teal does all of his wiring

i'm going to be making covers for those

wires so that they're not exposed to the

sun or uv damage and it's so great i

always save all of our remnants and

because i know that we're going to use

it for something and this is a perfect

piece for

all the wires coming from the hard top

down into our

our debit

i am officially now frustrated because

my trusty sewing machine is no longer

trustworthy because this thing has

jammed on me for one little project i am

just

oh i'm just about to lose it so i'm

going to take a little break

and see what teal's doing he is down in

our stateroom

it's torn apart

but it's good news because that just

means

our solar is coming in so let's see what

he's doing i'm doing solar

are we running wires yet

i am

literally one minute away from starting

really it looks good teal

look at that oh

it looks like it's a duplicate of what

you did before well that's the idea

so

actually

is emma available she could help me run

some wires yeah she actually volunteered

to do that so

okay i'm i'm really frustrated with my

sewing machine i know you are

but you know what christmas is coming

christmas okay

your birthday maybe that's the same time

as christmas

well we can bundle together because it's

an extra special gift

you're very um efficient that way aren't

you husband i'm thoughtful

yeah it's just not cutting it because

even with

three layers of sunbrella it's jamming

up

we will uh

let me take a look at it first

i know that's not what you want to hear

but

well i don't care as long as it gets

done

but could have whipped through all these

covers

pretty fast and

now it's just

not working out for me

i'll go get emma okay

okay the girls are outside feed me wires

i have now wired in panel six five and

four

next one i'm wiring is number one

then i'll do two and i finish up with

panel three

okay

okay as lin's been stuffing these wires

up

these are the three panels that are

wired in now

this is the next one to wire in

i'm using uh these little solar

connectors they're waterproof

they have a nice little

waterproof o-ring on them

just a matter of prepping the wires

stripping them crimping them and put a

little touch of solder on there

last wire

thank you

all the way through

okay

they're all in wired to the panels

look at that

even emma

labeled that out for me already

[Laughter]

okay i just have to make the last

connection

on the last panel up top

and i'm calling it for the day

i'll get up tomorrow

and make all these final connections

then these panels will be active

and here it starts

theo likes to create

a little path of where he's been

look at this

wires

equipment i don't know breakers lights

everywhere it looks great in here

nothing different from usual really

because this is normal right

there's more gear out here

shrink wrap zip ties

and then this one

wow this just looks awesome

i'm gonna go see what teal's doing

i usually try to stay out of his way

because this just gives me

too much anxiety having things all

everywhere

okay

here's the culprit where are you

what

i give you anxiety

no you don't give me anxiety your

projects sometimes do oh come on this is

nothing

almost done though yeah about another i

don't know about another hour got a

couple connections down here and then we

can put everything back to normal

um i can start now no no no no just wait

everything

is out for a reason

is it just hold tight hold tight

i think i'm going to hang out in the

cockpit for a little bit

until you're done

because there's no place for me to sit

there's stuff in the cockpit too just i

know but at least there there's a spot

for me to sit okay

i'll be uh i'll be out in a little bit

looks good

it's getting there

i hope it works

it's gonna work

[Music]

[Music]

okay it's exciting everything is wired

in i feel pretty good i've double

checked everything everything looks good

i've put each individual panel is fused

seven and a half amp

fuse on each one of those

everything's in the off position right

now i also have a circuit breaker here

that breaks at 72 and a half amps so if

anything is uh

not producing the correct

amount of flow it's going to pop the

circuit breaker so let's fire everything

up here's our first set this was our 500

watt uh array

shows that it's uh

going straight into bulk mode that's

good here's our new one

circuit breaker

on we're now feeding this system with

both sets of uh panels

okay

everything looks good so far

nothing's popped everything's uh

reading correctly

we'll now check out how much uh uh how

many watts and amps are flowing through

each one of these units

after that if i feel good about it it's

time to secure those panels down and

just button up a few things outside of

this project's done

[Music]

[Music]

uh oh

okay now don't look too carefully at

this okay the details are not there

it was a struggle it looks perfect what

are you talking about

it was a struggle

oh my gosh you know what i think this is

going to work just i mean look at this

you got the diameter

exactly on

velcro's on

stitching looks good

the length looks correct i don't know

what you're complaining about

look at that this would be awesome it

was such a

be proud be proud it's not bad it was

just it took so long to do one little

cover what okay you got one down and

like 13 to go

well i'll do those when you get me a new

sewing machine i know there's my

incentive right

content

well you know if you want me to do it

right i gotta have the right tools right

yes you do

let me get this tucked in here as you

use a

popsicle stick or a craft stick it's a

tongue depressor

it's a

multi-functional tool i want to tuck in

to the grommet here

and i don't want to damage your

beautiful work

i think it's perfect look at this

i do like having covers for

for all this stuff though

look at that

let me tuck this in a little better

right here

tuck it

oh you've got to be happy with that you

got to be happy are you i am it looks

good

that's all that matters

i like it

well

i have put spaces around every one of

these panels there's basically a

two tongue depressor distance between

the frame and the panel in between each

panels

i left that little gap so water could

flow between the panels and not get

caught up in between air flow can come

through

and

mostly for expansion and contraction if

this top is twisting or bending a little

bit i don't want to flex these panels

and crack them if they're packed in here

tight

so once i i'm drilling these out and

tapping in hardware to secure the panel

once that's done i'll pull these out and

these will be floating nice and evenly

spaced throughout this frame

well that feels good

this project now is 100 complete with

the addition of this 600 watt array that

gives us 1.1 kilowatts of power

and i'm liking it everything's operating

smoothly and i can't wait to jump onto

our next project

i wonder what it'll be

thanks for watching this week's episode

of onboard lifestyle if you liked our

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we now have enough solar to be off-grid

indefinitely and it feels good to finish

this project we have a few more to

complete before we venture into mexico

come back next week to see another

awesome new video see you then