The new fridge went into the cabin last weekend. It was pretty simple and straightforward, with the most complex part finding which orgami-like orientation would get it through the cabin door. It fit, but I mean barely.
It also fit the cabinet opening...kind of. Width and height wise it was a perfect fit, however it's "too deep" by about an inch. The fridge ships with flanges meant to secure it to the cabin opening (the parts saved from the old fridge were not needed), and these stick out about an inch, maybe a little less. I just used longer screws to secure it for now. I will probably make some kind of trim pieces to fill in the gaps.
What's annoying about this is that there doesn't seem to be a standard for marine appliance sizes. The old fridge (Norcold DE0051) had a sloped bit at the back of it, and it's like Sea Ray designed the cabinet to fit the fridge, taking into account the slope, as if all fridges ever made would have this kind of unusual shape. It'd be nice if Norcold recognized this kind of variation and made the flanges adjustable in some way front-rear to take into account variations in depth.
Anyway, at this point EVERYTHING in the boat works, with the caveat that we haven't used the hot water heater and my son broke the coffee maker carafe. How long will this last?
Anyway, now I can move on to either just using the boat or tackling some other more minor items.
- Replacing the factory CO detector. It's expired, and while I have two home models in the boat, the factory one needs to be replaced to be legally compliant and for general good sense. The cover comes off easily, but's not obvious how the rest of it is removed. No visible screws or attachments.
- Need to get the all-around light fixture bulb replaced with an LED so we don't drain the battery if we anchor out all night. This will require a ladder or collapsing the bimini to get to it, or maybe both.
- The stereo needs some investigation. Previous owners added some weird dimmer control that does some weird fading which I think has altered the stereo output, and a side effect is that aux in doesn't play in the cockpit. This is a big job involving pulling out the stereo and sorting out the outputs.
- TV reception is pretty crappy. Need to sort out where any amp is, is it working, and other mysteries of RF cabling. Like the stereo, this may involve MCP loosening and pull out to see what's behind there.
The electrical front specifically:
- Still dreaming of Balmar Smartguage battery monitoring and possibly ammeter setup. I think the wire route to the cabin goes through a PVC pipe (helpfully foamed up with expanding foam). Need to confirm this (and the viability of punching through the foam without wrecking anything).
- I'm feeling newly enthused about adding solar to the top of the bimini, with a partial attachment for structural integrity to the radar arch. Some challenges include the right panel with the right dimensions, enough output to be worthwhile (I'm thinking 5 amps), how messy wire routing would be, panel weight, and the Lego mess of mounting frame and hardware.
Fantasy projects -- these are things that I'd like to do, but complexity and cost make them more challenging:
- New MFP/chartplotter and sonar. Found a local guy who knows it all and have talked to them. Need to narrow down brands and how much junk I can afford to add. I will probably be selling off my reloading gear to finance it.
- Tapping the air conditioning raw water supply and adding a washdown pump plumbed to the fresh water spigot. This would make a lot of boat washing tasks much simpler. The challenge is finding the right fittings to split the supply.
Mechanical projects:
- I think I really do need the prop and skeg work MarineMax recommended. I find that my steering isn't as true as it could be, although some of this may just be never being able to perfectly balance engine RPMs. It's not really an issue until you get to planing speeds. I'll wait on this until the off season.
Anyway, I guess we're never done with stuff to do. I'm sure the cockpit fridge will eventually crap out, for example.
It does highlight my bargaining problems. I probably should have bargained higher when I bought the boat, asking for another $10k in concessions to offset the $7k I put into it and the other unexpected stuff (most of which has been relatively cheap and easy). Live and learn, I will add this to my book of knowledge if there's a next time around.
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