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
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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