Solenoid and Visit

Arnold and I had a very successful day with the rewiring of the starter switch.

We were surprised and delighted to learn that the "battery" cable to the solenoid does not come directly from the starter bank of batteries but first passes through the master switch. This solved our "consistency" problem of how to power the starter switch from the "stater" bank of batteries under the control of the "starter bank" master switch.

Our plan immediately became simple: run a wire from the heavy gauge battery connection on the solenoid back to the switch and from the switch run a wire back to the smaller post on the solenoid where the activation takes place. We took great care to make the wiring as resistance free as possible. Arnold used his soldering skills to make make a good and very direct connection between the new 12 gauge marine grade wires and the switch wires. At the engine end I put on "yellow" size crimp on connectors which Arnold finished off with solder. I took pains to sand paper the posts on the solenoids and the nut and washer fasteners.

Another thing, and this may be important. A knurled nut is used to hold the push button switch in place. Arnold discovered that there was a second nut inside the flexible rubber covering. It appears that that second hidden internal nut would have inhibited full depression of the starter button, which could have been the source of our problem. I reassembled the starter switch with only the one nut and the action of the switch was ... well ... in the class of "I never knew it could be like this!"

We fixed in the new wiring and tried the starter and it worked with no problem. We read 10.7 volts going into the solenoid while the starter was turning, which was not quite the 11 volts that Mark would have been happy with, but was according to Arnold significantly better that the 9V+ that we had been getting before. The "battery" cable voltage at the solenoid read 12.6V static but we didn't think of checking it when the starter was turning. Arnold thinks that there may be a voltage drop associated with routing of the cable from the battery to the master switch to the solenoid.

Anyway, Arnold and I had worked slowly, patiently, and methodically and we were confident that we had done as good a job with the rewiring of that starter switch as possible. Time will tell if that work solves our solves our starter problems, but we are confident.

At 3.15 PM Arnold and I went ashore for showers and to purchase some wine in preparation for a visit to Peter and Cheryl Ainsworth aboard their S%S designed Hylas "Stolen Kiss". Peter and Cheryl are old hands at the Western Australia sailing scene and are long time members of the Fremantle Sailing Club. They knew Pachuca and one of her previous owners, Gavin Abbott, very well. Fortunately for us Peter and Cheryl anchored their boat only a few hundred meters upwind from us so the Zodiac ride to their boat, though choppy and a bit wet, was mercifully short. We arrived at their boat at 5 PM and had a wonderful two hours discussing a wide range of issues over nibblies, beer, and wine.

Thanks to Peter and Cheryl I KNOW WHAT THE NAME OF THIS BOAT "PACHUCA" MEANS. Gavin Abbott, the owner of Pachuca previous to the partnership of 3 who owned her for 6 years and from whom I purchased her, was a mining engineer. In mining, a "pachuca" is some sort of blower-equipped device that is used to separate dust and other material in the processing of gold ore. Brenda and I had been aware that a "pachuca" was used in the processing of gold, but now we know for sure that this is what the name of this boat actually means.

It is fortuitous that the name "Pachuca" is very favorably received in the Mexican world, being both a city in Hidalgo province and a female member of the "zoot suit Spanish American subculture of decades ago. But if I am asked by my Mexican amigos I will have to be honest about the real meaning of the name.

Peter and Cheryl plan to set off in a few days to explore the Sea of Cortez to the north which is precisely what Arnold and I plan to do. We hope to see them again before either of us depart, and we hope to see them during our journey to the north. But regardless, we'll have each other's blog addresses and I am looking forward to seeing them in Fremantle in April 2011.

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