Saturday June 27, 2015

Yesterday we had a slow trip up to Haverstraw, the current was against us all the way. We did get in by 4:00 PM making it the easiest day in some time. We went to the restaurant and everything went well until a waiter mistakenly brought us an order of calamari. It smelt so good both Trish and I had to have some. It came with our meal and was delicious.

We have had continuing problems with our auto pilot. It appeared that the flux gate compass was not working. Just before we entered the marina we tried once more to set the compass to no avail. Raymarine make their connections very easy to install. If there is a red and blue wire the connection is one red and one blue. I was pretty sure I could connect a new compass if I could find one.

You would not think a flux gate compass would be stock item, but let's try. Before I called West Marine I went to the office to pay then to the restaurant to see if they had anything for Kelly to eat. On the way I passed the little marine store I had forgotten was there. I went in and asked if they had one and sure enough they did. There tech guy was standing right there and told me that all flux gate compasses where the same. It was dusty but I bought it for $190.

I did not want to destroy the old compass since I was not 100% it was the problem. Trish and I set out to tread the new wire through the boat. We got about half way and ran out of wire. I went back to the store but they did not have extra wire. They did have a connection bar perfect for connecting small wires. Our only option was to cut the old wire. Since the old wire was already threaded and connected to the computer all we had to do was connect the two wires.

We cut the wire and found that the old wire had red, green, black, brown and white. The new wire was red, green, blue, yellow and silver. Oh no! What could we do. At the other end the wires connected to the computer were the same as the new wire. There was a simple solution. Get the multi meter out and check for continuity. First check the red and green they matched. Once we knew which wire was which we uses the connector bar and we're done,maybe.

I turned on the auto pilot and at least the power was correct. The final test would come in the morning.

As always Trish and I were up at 6:30. By 7:30 we decided to get moving. Later in the day it is suppose to rain, we are not use to rain. We also wanted to test the new flux gate compass. Off we went to do our circles. It took three turns which got me a little nervous, but finally it flashed deviation 1.

We may be in business. As we headed north I turned on the Auto Pilot and IT WORKED!!!!!!!!