New year, 48 months until we leave, new crew!

Happy 2017!
Here we sit in St Augustine FL, our prison for 48 more months.
We have been here 3 years now, never thought it would take us 7 years in total to leave. Here is the scoop thou, if we finish this 48 month stretch, we will be leaving with enough resources To stay out between 10 and 40 years. Yes, we could be out, for 40 years!!!!

Welcome Amelia to the crew of Union Pacific!

One upset baby at the one month point. She will make a great member of the crew and will be staying for about 18 years :P  We are blessed to have her after our losses that came before her.

One piece of bad news is we lost a crew member, Velma.

She is going to be missed. She was put to sleep in late 2016.
I personally miss her very much, she was my cuddle dog, my soft loving dog.

Tons of projects are underway. Here is the current list of to be started
Rigging - needs a complete rerig.
Keel - needs repair on the bottom from grounding on soft soil
Thru-hulls - remove them, most likely replace only about 3, the rest will be gone.
Generator - finish sound shield, repair the starting solenoid.

The ones that need finishing:
Need to install another new AC unit. This time we got the best money could buy.
kitchen - needs redone, need wood veneer, and to remove a sink.
Running rigging - just needs finishing.



So that's it for now. Not many updates coming to this blog, again check out youtube out at one world expeditions

Taking the ceiling down daily

.... or so it seems. All the electrical is in the ceiling, and you must remove the panels to get to it.
As I add more and more wires to the system, I find myself with no less then 4 panels down at any one time. They are very long, and take up a ton of room on the settee. Alas, projects are going forward.
The NEMA 2000 network is coming great. I have a forward line ran for the heading compass for the autopilot, and the wind heading and speed sensor. On this drop leg I will also be able to add a depth/speed water sensor. This would give me this information at both the helm and below decks on the other devices on the Garmin NMEA 2000 network. This runs back to the second half that connects the GPS sensor, GHC wind display, autopilot control head, and the main 4212 chartplotter.

With all of these combined, wiring can get confusing. Labels are important.

When I got the boat I had not a single clue as to what went where.
Wires ran every witch way. I found out that about 10% were no longer in use, or for accessories that the yacht did not have. One was a prep for wipers, lol. I had to trace them thru the boat, then find the ends were just cut off...

Well this ends now.
Everything is getting labeled as it gets installed. not just in one place, but if the run is long, at some place in the center of the run. So both ends, and also a middle mark. The ends are labeled with where they go and what for. Or where they came from.

The one in the photo will also get a second leg for an autopilot control at the chart table, as well as a second GPS display at the table.

We also received our watermaker! Details and more posts on our facebook page www.facebook.com/svunionp

Ceiling work

   So it has been a while since I last posted here. Projects are going well. Most of the updates can be found on our facebook page, www.facebook.com/svunionp and our youtube page, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5S6DveWyvRafPz5FOCUubw.

Well the ceiling of the yacht has been in poor nick since we got her. She was smoked in, the decks leaked, and it was 32 years old. Now on the second year of the restoration, we are very far into the big projects. The ceiling has been one of the longest, besides the deck.

The ceiling was so bad I avoided taking photos of it, and I was embarrassed that our new yacht had such glaring ugly marks.

It has come so far.

Two years ago today I actually had to make the choice between two boats. Man I am glad I chose the UP over the powerboat.

Some days I wish I had chose the powerboat. It would have been roomier, easier access, less draft, faster on the ICW. It would have also cost us over $5000 in fuel to bring it to Florida. The UP only cost us $500 in fuel, and our next trip I hope to use under $40 in fuel when we head back north to visit family before the big trip of "who know whats year".
The issue is our jobs are going very well, and while I am retired, I enjoy my job. If I can manage to keep it, I would like to stay a while and work before we take off. It would be nice to turn our planned 5 year trip into a 10 year trip.This could be done with 2 years of work. Decisions, decisions.


Find us on Patreon, www.patreon.com/one Thank you!

YouTube and us

We have another video up on youtube, as we try to record our activities.
Its our dive trip, and our repairs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVbNalG5cSY
Enjoy, and Subscribe!

A lot closer, 14 months to go

Sorry it has been a long while. I have been busy with a hurt back, but now I am back in gear, and getting back to repairs.


The mast was stripped and painted up to the first spreader, along with the boom.

 Steps were installed on the mast about 6' up.

Our New dinghy!!! It is a walker bay super tender, in Hapolon. 

So whats done.
The windlass is upgraded, machined, and switched. Its now a push button retrieve.
The dinghy is here, and purchased.
The boom is painted.
Deck is 90% done.
Sails repaired.

What's left to do? lol A lot.
Finish interior refit
Install additional bilge pumps
Install new batteries
Install hard top enclosure on cockpit
Change rigging bolts
Buy new anchor
Install new inverter/charger
Install new wind vane system
Install new chart plotter
Haul out and repaint
New thru hulls
Paint oil pan and add oil change pump
Finish generator installation
Finish engine refit
Install water, fuel gauge senders
Mount lower GPS
Buy new radar
Install new forestay wire
Finish aft head refit
Buy new Air Conditioner
Buy refrigerator unit, and install
Buy freezer
Finish mast painting, and step install
Hang new halyards
Install audio system.

I know The list is long, but I hope to start ticking off boxes as we go.
I hope to have at least half of those done by Christmas.
We leave April 2016*

*as long as neither of us are promoted to a job that pays $50,000 a year, then we will stay one more year.

Picking a date

Aside from many minor projects you can find on our facebook page, updated weekly,
https://www.facebook.com/svunionp
We have been busy earning money for our trip. We have had a few bumps in the road including 1/4 of our cruising kitty going up in flames. We had our RV for sale in New York when a guy parked next to it, and went off to work. Only a few minutes later the truck caught fire. He had Geico insurance that called it an act of God. Do not buy Geico please. I filed a complaint with the state, but that could take ages.
HOWEVER. We have picked a departure date.

April, 2016.
 All we can say for sure is the first stop will be New York. After that, who knows.

The boat is getting ready, we now have our second sail in for repair, and the only major repair yet to be done is a haulout. The engine is in top form, and the generator only requires final tweaking. The rigging is really good, and only needs the thru-deck bolts replaced. The running rigging is in the process of a complete change out, and the deck is nearly finished. Most of whats left to do is pure cosmetics.

 

Even the stern deck is looking awesome now.

More news to come.

DC upgrades

   We are in the process of beefing up our DC system. I am doing an entire rebuild of the system, and when we are done, we will have between 600AH and 1000AH. Union Pacific had 400AH in the original design. However the boat also has a 4D starting battery. This is overkill. I will be switching this out for a deep cycle battery in its place, giving another easy 200AH. I am debating adding two more to the lazerette.

   The alternator was rated at 50-60 amps. Ratings are a funny thing, and once the alternator warms up, it puts out even less. I have purchased a 105-110amp balmar. The biggest issue was installing this huge beast in the spot of the old tiny one.

So the bracket that came with the unit did not work. I ordered the one from balmar, that did not work either.
It was down to me and my brain to make it work.

I set off and made a cardboard template for what would work. After asking around, I found a marine welding shop, just across the river from me, so off I went, cardboard in hand.

After a week I went back, and alas, I had it in hand.
It did not fit. What a bummer.

Before I left New York I had to decide what to bring, and what to throw away. One item I did bring was a battery angle grinder. So I set off to grinding. It took me 4 batteries to get it to the point that it would fit. I must have made 10 trips in and out of the yacht to test fit it.

Installed, very cool. The old red one is to the left, still hooked to the tach.
While I was in there I had an enemy. right above the water pump is a 24 year old hose. It was old and very frail. Replacement is a bugger. Unless you take off the pump, you have to work it in, without tearing the new hose. Well it took me about 30 min, but problem solved for another 30 years. The cost of this little hose from NAPA was $14 a foot. This is the highest quality hose they had, so I went for it. 1', with some left over.

I hooked up the balmar 612 regulator. Nothing, no charging. A bit of trouble shooting told me a fuse holder was corroded. I cleaned it off, reassembled, moved the wire a bit for a good connection, and wala!
She charges.

There are still items to be done. The regulator needs mounting, the tach needs to be hooked up, we need a few new hoses, including raw water hoses from the pump to the engine. I also will install a new fuse holder, I don't need to be messing with that at sea. I will be keeping the well working alternator, in a vacuum sealed bag, in a bin. It will be an at-sea replacement, and is internally regulated, so that covers a balmar failure as well.
I also converted the cooling system to water only, for now. I will be adding some safe anti-freeze soon, once I flush the system a few more times.

Next up on the project list is cleaning the bilge again, yuck, and painting the bilge in this area. I will also be installing more bilge pumps. Right now we have a 360GPH @ 6' head pump, and a 150GPH @6 head pump forward. I will be adding a 600GPH to the engine room, a 5000GPH to the engine room, a 5000GPH to the forward bilge, and a spare 8000GPH pump, with hose, and cable, stored in its own box, for big emergencies. One year into our upgrades, I am very happy with the progress.