On Mon, Jun 01, 2009 at 01:31:02PM -0400, Skip Gundlach wrote: > Hi, Ben, > > I thought you'd sourced motors in Saint Simons Island??
Unfortunately, that didn't work out. I ended up trying to salvage one of the old motors by replacing the "lay-down" style brushes in it; buying and modifying alternator brushes, which have a similar composition and shape worked for a while but failed eventually. Today, with extensive help from a very knowledgeable fellow named Hoyt at a HobbyTown here in Charleston, I did manage to find some motors of a similar size and correct voltage, as well as gears that actually fit both the shafts on those motors _and_ the gears in the autopilot housing. The only possible problem, oddly enough, is that the motors these days are of much better quality than they used to be: the original ones put out about 150gf/cm, which was about maximum for this size of motor back then, whereas the new ones put out about 3 times that much (finger-in-the-wind estimate based on perceived torque while holding the motor as it cranks up.) The run current on both is about the same, perhaps a little higher on the new one... but the starting current may be a problem. I can only hope that the driver transistors in the head unit survive the testing phase; I'm not a big fan of replacing those things. :) > Hand steering aside, I hope your trip was fun. Still I NGA but > leaving to be back at the boat next week... Oh, it was fun indeed; it's all good fun, although it may not seem like it while it's actually happening. ;-> Kat learned to steer downwind at night - quite an achievement, that! - although the constant gybing while she was learning wasn't a particularly relaxing experience for me. Good thing that it wasn't blowing any more than a steady 10kt, and that we have a fairly strong boom. By morning, she was steering like a pro, catching it as soon as the jib started to luff and skating off to windward immediately. Baby Michael contributed his share during the day by staying underfoot as much as possible, squealing with delight at the waves, and in all other ways acting like a perfectly normal boat kid. This being his second passage, he's getting to be quite the old hand at this offshore sailing business; even during the first one, which was quite a bit rougher, he filed no complaints or formal protests with either the captain or the first mate (the Super Sekrit Capn's Log for the day reads "Still keeping all firearms under lock and a strong guard, but the possibility of mutiny by our junior crew now seems less imminent and perhaps avoidable.") Tomorrow, there will be much installation, repair, and maintenance, all liberally lubricated by grumbling, muttering, and an occasional "Ouch!" Much like computers, boats demand a regular blood sacrifice, and will refuse to work properly unless they get it. Our supply of Band-Aids and NuSkin dwindles, but we shall persevere. -- * Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://LinuxGazette.NET * _______________________________________________ Liveaboard mailing list [email protected] To adjust your membership settings over the web http://www.liveaboardnow.org/mailman/listinfo/liveaboard To subscribe send an email to [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected] The archives are at http://www.liveaboardnow.org/pipermail/liveaboard/ To search the archives http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected] The Mailman Users Guide can be found here http://www.gnu.org/software/mailman/mailman-member/index.html
