ShaneO
Active Member
Since my chart table electrics panel is a bit of a victim of age (1990) and multiple previous owners (plus myself) with multiple brainwaves about old kit to bin and shiny new kit to install, I’m considering starting it from scratch, and this leads me to wonder about the thinking behind that setup in the first place. Perhaps the clever people here have ideas. 42’ centre-cockpit boat usually short-handed. Batteries under the bed in the aft cabin, chart table by companionway; cable routing between the two is a pain in the botty.
First, there’s the big 1\2\both\off knob (I know, I know) on the panel. It doesn’t get used very often, so why not be on the side of the bed? There’s a dedicated knob for the fridge there that a predecessor installed. Running a big fat cable all the way to the chart table before it even begins to distribute power, some of which will be going back aft again, seems peculiar. Solar comes in from the aft and is currently not involved in the big knob.
Nav lights! Almost every time I want to turn those on or off requires a dedicated trip or yelling down below. Why not have those on the similarly veteran instrument panel in the cockpit?
While we’re at it, I almost never need to make a radio call while down below. Sometimes it’s nice to be out of the weather for noise reasons, but just as often it’s a bother to be right beside the engine. I could put the radio up in the cockpit too. Any ideas on how to avoid it getting nicked?
Quite a few of the switches on the electrics panel don’t seem to be particularly useful except as fuses. Do we really benefit from dedicated master switches for cabin and saloon lights (each of which is individually switched too), aft heads shower tray pump-out (again, on its own switch in the heads), etc.?
First, there’s the big 1\2\both\off knob (I know, I know) on the panel. It doesn’t get used very often, so why not be on the side of the bed? There’s a dedicated knob for the fridge there that a predecessor installed. Running a big fat cable all the way to the chart table before it even begins to distribute power, some of which will be going back aft again, seems peculiar. Solar comes in from the aft and is currently not involved in the big knob.
Nav lights! Almost every time I want to turn those on or off requires a dedicated trip or yelling down below. Why not have those on the similarly veteran instrument panel in the cockpit?
While we’re at it, I almost never need to make a radio call while down below. Sometimes it’s nice to be out of the weather for noise reasons, but just as often it’s a bother to be right beside the engine. I could put the radio up in the cockpit too. Any ideas on how to avoid it getting nicked?
Quite a few of the switches on the electrics panel don’t seem to be particularly useful except as fuses. Do we really benefit from dedicated master switches for cabin and saloon lights (each of which is individually switched too), aft heads shower tray pump-out (again, on its own switch in the heads), etc.?
