Month: October 2020

I ordered a bunch of components this weekend for revising my battery systems, and have finalized my heater order. Progress. And solar panels are coming this week.

First, the heating system: I am getting a Hurricane Chinook diesel boiler, with thermostatically controlled fan heaters in the two cabins, head, pilothouse and salon. This will replace the existing water heater, and will mount in its place in the engine room. Lots of room and easy exhaust straight out.

This gives me pretty much my dream setup. The boiler has 3,000 watts electric and a heat exchanger loop with the engine to scavenge waste heat. Lots of flexibility.

For the DC system, I had an ideal, and in the end I followed it. The boat has bow and stern thrusters, both about 7 hp. The 12v bow thruster currently runs off the house bank, and the 24v stern thruster off a bank of batteries that is in parallel with the start batteries except when switched over to 24v.

I have ordered five new Optima Red Top AGM batteries. Two to form a 12v bank supplying the bow thruster and windlass, two to form a 24v bank supplying the stern thruster, and one to start the main engine.

Each of these banks will be charged by a dedicated DC – DC charger that will draw power from the house bank. These chargers are highly configurable and communicate by bluetooth to a phone app. Pretty neat stuff. I’ll be able to monitor bank health through those tools.

The generator has its own starting battery as well. I’m not planning at this point to connect it to anything else.

Since the engine starting battery will be charged from the house bank, all charging will go directly to the house bank – solar, alternator, and AC charger supplied by shore power or generator.

I’ve also ordered a Smart Shunt to monitor the house bank.

That leaves the house bank. Lead acid batteries scare me a little, but I have four brand new 6v golf cart batteries and room to add a few more. I think that’s what I’m going to run for now.

I’m still chasing the idea of having air conditioning underway without running the generator. I have a 2500w inverter and a 18,000 btu unit that I’m planning to install in the pilothouse/salon. Will experiment once it’s installed and running.

I’m going to be busy when all this stuff arrives! Will try to take some pics.