Fresh Water Gauge

If I remember my elementary science, a piece of hose spliced vertically into my water line should show the water level in the tank. This bit of hose, T-couplers, and  several hose clamps costing less than $10 will eliminate that empty feeling in my stomach when the faucets start blowing air.  In the picture, the water tank is to the right with tank outlet below and air vent line above. The tank is nearly full now, so I'll be monitoring the water line in the clear hose over the next couple weeks

ASUS T200TA Tablet/Notebook Computer and OpenCPN 4.0

A couple months ago I got the 64gb ASUS T200TA off Amazon for $459. My girlfriend has an iPad and I had an ASUS T100 before some creep broke out my car window and ripped it off... anyway I got another ASUS because I wanted the USB and HDMI ports that many tablets lacked. I also knew the keyboard on the transformers were pretty good, I get about 10 hrs battery life, and the T200 can hold a drive in the keyboard. I wanted a Windows machine because of work and open source software such as OpenCPN and Audacity. Although the T100 was very good to me, it lacked screen real estate, a second camera, and GPS. The 12"x8" T200 has proven to be an improvement on all those fronts, although the GPS chip may not be as helpful as I expected. There are plenty of reviews, so I won't repeat them and will focus more on my use on the boat.


I installed OpenCPN 4.0 and it is working fine. Following the instructions in the online help to get setting tweaked to the windows tablet made the driving experience smoother. I also downloaded GeolocationTCP and configured OpenCPN to get the GPS signal through it. GeolocationTCP worked flawlessly, displaying my coordinated accurately whether on WiFi or satellite... but despite help from the writer of GeolocatorTCP Petr and RhythmDoctor, I just couldn't get a feeling that my onboard GPS chip was supplying a reliable signal to OpenCPN. I could not find a way to control whether the signal came from router SSID broadcasts or from satellites.

And it seemed I needed WiFi turned on, but not connected to a network, in order for the onboard GPS to work. I had a BU353-S4 dongle and installed the Win 8 compatible driver... go to the USGlobalsat web site and make sure you download the right driver.

Using the external receiver on the T200TA, my OpenCPN tracking is working great. Zooming and changing scale is seemless whether using keyboard or tablet.








The two finger touchscreen zoom is a little touchy and I'm still adjusting to the sensitivity.
The extra screen real estate is very helpful.







Although some criticize the almost 1" wide margin around the tablet screen, I like it... I'm able to hold the tablet in my hands and avoid touching the active portion of the touch screen by mistake. I only have NOAA raster charts loaded at this point. I also got a micro HDMI cable for my 24" monitor, mostly for movies, but the T200's 11.5" diag tablet and adequate built in speakers have reduced my use of the big screen.





So far I'd say the T200TA with OpenCPN 4.0 is a good package...

Coffee

I noticed that the longest Threads on the sailing forum concern wine and coffee. No question sailors need a good shot of Joe to clear out the cobwebs, and I thought I had the perfect solution with my french press and hand grinder until...











One day last year I walked into a Starbucks store and voila there it was an unbreakable french press.









Here we have my French Press and coffee grinder.  Even when I don't buy Trader Joes coffee, I empty my bags into the can.












So now I have the perfect solution until something better comes along...









(I should add that while fishing in Alaska last summer I used Starbucks Instant (VIA) Coffee while camping. I think 8 single serving packets cost $3.95 at Safeway)

Cordless Tools

I use mostly hand tools... saws, planes, rasps, sandpaper, screwdrivers, wrenches, etc. for projects on the boat.  I gotta say tho, I love this Ryobi cordless tool set. 18V seems powerful enough for most jobs.  

The drill is two speed and adjustable setting for drilling and screwing.  

The saw is amazingly effective.  The 5 1/2 inch blade is smaller than a 7 inch AC circular saw blade, but will cut through a 2X4 and rips through most plywood easily.  

The tools came with a bag, one battery, and a 
charger.  I bought an extra battery so that I could charge one while using the other or have both tools loaded at the same time.  Because the battery charger does not draw as much as an AC powertool, I can plug the charger into my DC to AC inverter when away from the dock.

Following advice from Raindog, I purchased the zenon spotlight.  The size of the lens is much larger than a standard flashlight putting out 8X the light.

The little blue squeeze generator flashlight never has dead batteries and, although not comfy, can be held in my mouth during those challenging situations. 

Sedna's Sunroom

Full Enclosure Canvas

Being a member of the under 40 crowd, LOA not age, it seems every square inch of room on-board is valuable.  

One of the nice things about Sedna is her fully enclosed center cockpit with hard windscreen. 

In the wet and cold PNW winters I am able to sit in the cockpit and enjoy the light and openness... 

On sunny cold days it is easy to flip the south facing isinglass panel over the bimini and enjoy the view even more.