“Year 1 Problems — Part 2”
I wrote these problems and solutions after about a year of boat ownership. These were written stream of conscious, all in one long day. I’ve left them as a snapshot for what boat ownership is like, and as a fun time capsule.
For current updates and technical solutions, go to paperwing.dev. There have been many iterations since these solutions, and more thought went into writing them.
11. How Do I Cook Without Electricity?
When we first started, Korinne was convinced that she wanted to start from zero before eventually scaling up and seeing what we needed. This sounded insane to me, but all the electric components I need for the system I designed were not yet out (the right battery, the correct DC to DC Charger), and I was hopelessly behind in getting the boat ready to move in. So for the first 6 months we lived with 90 watts of solar (more like 50 produced), and only the small starter batteries that were installed on the boat to run the critical systems (lights, radio, AIS — things like that). And strangely, this was totally fine. I wouldn’t say comfortable, but that little amount of solar and battery charged up all our laptops, powered our T Mobile Home Internet, phones, lights, and whatever else.
I’m twisting it a little bit as I did expect this work based on my calculations, but I was surprised more how the battery was always nearly at 100% instead of being run down and having to figure something out. At home for the last year we had been calculating how much power we used (about 1/2 kwh per day cooking with electric), but even that small amount was going to be too much for cooking. The builders of the boat had experiment with expensive kerosene stoves, before eventually just buying a cheap kerosene burner. Their expensive Taylor burner didn’t work (based on emails included in notes). This cheap burner used in developing countries all over the world and impossible to buy replacement parts for here in the states, actually turned out to be a really good solution. Our heater is also kerosene so we had a lot of it on the boat, and it’s always felt like a safe easily available fuel which won’t blow up the boat. I know propane is even more common all over the world now, and most people go with propane for cooking, but that introduces even more humidity, the chance to blow up your boat, and is difficult to store. Kerosene on the other hand is probably less clean, but has none of those issues.
To learn to use the Kerosene stove is a bit of a prayer to the gods, but once you get the pump and priming ritual down, it creates a very hot flame where the fuel lasts for a very long. There is a smell from it of course, and I’ve read reports from the World Health Organization about how it’s not great for you, but for the first 6 months we had no problem with it. We still use it to cook whenever something needs to be on the burner for a long time. Eventually however, we got tired of using the kerosene stove and wanted to try out things like the Instant Pot that we would often do at home. Stuff that I already had realized used an incredibly small amount of energy. In order to run this before installing an entire electric system, we simply got an inverter for our trolling battery and would run the instant pot off of it. This was charged through the DC to DC converter in the car which gave us unlimited power in a small (though heavy) backpack that we were already carrying back and forth everyday.
One fact you may notice is that I never discussed a fridge. We’ve found a fridge to be a luxury, and even in our new electricity rich reality, we are still choosing not to have one due to the draw and potential for things to go wrong. The constant load they pull will really eat through our 1/2 kwh a day budget, and we still don’t really have the room or energy for that. To get around a fridge, you simply have to change the kinds of foods that you eat. We took a lot of inspiration from other cultures that didn’t get refrigeration till later in the modern age (Korean for example), and only have things like root vegetables on hand and lots of cabbage. These things can keep for weeks, and in our make shift “root cellar” that’s below the waterline, it almost feels as if we do have a fridge based on long things last. Cheese, butter, many vegetables are no problem at all for a few weeks.
There are rules about how you keep foods lasting a long time of course. The food must never have been refrigerated previously or it seems to lose it’s will to survive, so we are forced to go to farmers markets and pester the vendors with questions about “has this really never been refrigerated and when was it picked”. Also if food goes rotten, you must quickly get rid of it and pick through all your foods.
We have endless amounts more to say on this subject and I’ll discuss it a bit more later, but another liveaboard with our exact same boat and similar philosophy named “Annie Hill” wrote a book where she talks about what foods works and doesn’t in great detail.
12. Old Anchor Sucked — New Anchor Just Gashed The Boat
Finding the right anchor seems to be a subject of great debate and I am in no way an authority. There is a great guy on youtube that makes a rubric of them, but everyone seems to swear by a different kind. However the consensus is that the new crop of “modern anchors” are much better than the past and I chose not even to fool with the CQR anchor that came with the boat. “Attainable Adventure Cruising” (dudes very rigid but a great community hangs out there), loves the “Spade” anchor which I was going to go with. However I couldn’t find it for sale anywhere in CA. Eventually I went with the “Vulcan” anchor because it was way cheaper, and I could buy it on Amazon. We’ve deployed it a few times, and even in an emergency situation once where I’ve read it’s not supposed to be great. It stopped immediately and we’ve had no issues. We took the “Attainable Adventure Cruising” advice and decided to size up and that decision has felt good to me. This section is going to need to be updated once we’ve had more anchoring experience.
As mentioned previously, we don’t keep the anchor on the bow roller because that’s where the mooring pendants now go and the anchor lives on the deck. It used to live down below, and that was very difficult to lift the heavy anchor without hitting anything. One time I was trying to put the heavy anchor on the bow roller in the rain, and I slipped and put a sizeable gash into the “lip” going around the boat. This was the first major damage I caused to the boat and sparked learning about various epoxies and how easily things could be repaired. For small gashes, we found “Marine Tex” to work really well as it’s white and comes in a small container. For large repairs, I’ll cover all the various epoxies later.
13. I’m Scared Sailing, And Need to Climb Mast To Install Wind Sensor
After doing a lot of sailing on boring days, we finally felt comfortable to push it and go sailing when the conditions were more difficult. We choose a day which was supposed to be about 15 knots, didn’t really look at the wave height because it’s always about 5 or 6 feet, and then went out. We got absolutely crushed and once again, terrified. It was very much not a 15 knot day as the fisherman told us when we got back in, and as we knew as soon as we pulled out of the harbor. We’ve since gotten pretty good at feeling the wind and watching what the waves are doing, and it was easily sustained in the low 20’s with wave heights of 7 - 8 feet. Nothing too crazy, but enough that we were the only ones out there and pushed beyond our limit. We went out there for like 1 hour, then turned around (thankfully able to ride the tide in) and then couldn’t make progress with the engine at full throttle against the tides and wind to get to the mooring ball. Eventually we inched along, made it to the mooring ball, and with both our strength pulled the pendant over the samson post. Then I think we just got drunk and fell asleep in the afternoon exhausted and thankful for no disaster this time.
After this simple but scary experience, we realized things had to change if we were going to start pushing it. We needed to at least know the wind speeds. This kicked off a long process of figuring out how to build a wind sensor because I couldn’t find one that didn’t need a cable for power, building a prototype, and then finding a product with my specific requirements here. As their tagline says, it’s the “first solar wireless fully portable ultrasonic wind meter” and I’d rate it at just ok. The bluetooth connection isn’t great, the app is garbage, but it gives me a platform to build off of, and is small enough to not get in the way of the other instruments up there.
The next step was to figure out how to actually install the thing, and this meant climbing the mast without dying. To secure it, I looked into just using adhesive like 4200. Eventually decided that I would drill holes in, put some thickened epoxy in the holes, and then screw everything down as described here. When testing it on the ground it was pretty easy, and I felt good about the solution. For actually climbing the mast, I don’t feel comfortable offering advice beside saying to use a real harness and get modern ascenders. I spent a few days testing out little solutions based on pictures of the previous owner up there, and eventually figured out how to use ascenders and halyards for the sail to slowly hoist myself up there with Korinne holding onto the a safety line.
On the first attempt of mounting the wind sensor, I gave myself 30 minutes to get up there before the epoxy would “kick” which should have been plenty of time. However, I didn’t realize that the epoxy that I had placed in my backpack would get really hot because of all the exercise that I was doing. This caused it to “kick” before I made it up there. Instead of being smart and getting a new batch, I tried to rush because I was so nervous of the height. I ended up doing a really poor job, and got globs of epoxy on top of the mast and just made some holes for next time. In my haste, I also got epoxy on my face, and had to quickly repel down and run to the shower to get it off my hair and face.
The second time went much better thankfully. I mixed the epoxy up there which was tricky, but instead of having all my tools in the backpack, tied them with rope to my harness which was much easier. Also recommend wearing glasses in case epoxy goes flying. In retrospect this was all pretty easy and the answer was simple (just sheet much further out), but that’s the price of learning.
For a resource on this look here. I went with the classic “froggy” pattern of a hand ascender for the foot loops, and a chest ascender for the bosun chair and climbing harness. Again, I don’t feel qualified to offer any research on this.
14. My City Is Trying To Kick People Off Moorings
This one is a sad problem, and eventually lead to the city making people that had lived on their boats and owned their moorings for 20 years homeless. A new harbor director came and left over covid, and passed a one sentence change to the rules and regulations with city council that opened a loophole. They then tried to claim total autonomy to kick people off their moorings for any reason. We read about this, were very saddened that this was being introduced, but weren’t going to fight it until others asked us to. This then lead to months and many meetings fighting the city trying to get someone to listen to us as a group. We meet privately with city council members, thought seriously about running for city council, helped someone file a lawsuit, and eventually after enough pressure, the city relented.
Of course this was all short lived, and 6 months later they started it all again but discreetly. Fighting it the first time was scary and exhausting, and we all collectively gave up. This time people ended up homeless, and still are to this day. This is a story happening all over the West Coast, with liveaboards (and regular land communities) being decimated by new wealth coming in and changing the community. At the end of the day, every beautiful thing has a time and place and can’t last. Part of choosing this lifestyle is knowing that, and enjoying the good things while they last. Still, we made some of our best friends through this experience, and at least we can pop into community dinners, the church, and the bar to hear about the “good old days” and support each other. Being a boater is a beautiful community.
15. I’m So Tired From The Boat, That I’m Camping All The Time
At this point we were pretty exhausted from all the day to day learning and legal stress, and took to camping in order to not have to worry about something for a little while. We also were going to a wedding on the east coast, and decided to take a trip hitting the national parks, going to more weddings, and visiting friends we hadn’t seen across the country. So I’m going to include a bonus boat problem in the form of making a “Prius Dwelling” campervan build.
In college I had lived in my car for the last year because I was broke and had no more loan money to tap. The experience actually wasn’t that bad if you can find a place to park. That was part of what made us even consider the boat in the first place — it just seemed an easier version of living in the car. So with that in mind, we saw one of those prius builds on the internet, ripped out all our seats, and built a shoddy version over 3 days while camping with a circular saw, drill, and staple gun. It actually turned out pretty nice with a basic raised platform that was based off the build from here. We built ours higher for more space under the platform for storage of things we used frequently with the boat. For instance, our shower bags, running stuff, urine container, and various tools and batteries.
So would I build it again? Eh no, probably not worth it for the sleeping portion. It’s really nice to have everything covered and it was nice to avoid the snow and rain when camping on that trip, but most of the time I’d rather break out my camping tent and simply move around less frequently. Initially I hoped that stealth camping would be easier in the prius, but getting in and out of the sleeping platform meant getting out of the car and hopping in the backseats. Not very conspicuous. Also, even with a 3 inch memory foam topper and full pillows, it wasn’t very comfortable.
What did work well, was cooking with the same trolling motor charged by the DC to DC charger that we used in the boat. I also liked being able to store so much stuff under the platform with less fear of people trying to break in. I’ve also gotten way more compliments from random people in the parking lot than I ever expected, so that’s been kind of fun. The big issue is that I have so many large things that I use the prius to haul around, and having this platform completely kills that. In the future I hope to build a system where the entire “trunk” is free, but the seats are still taken out and I add some shelving where they used to be — still with a flat surface for larger items.
TLDR: Without a van and with two people, don’t recommend trying to make the car a second home. It’s just too small and needed for other stuff.
16. Ok, Would Really Like Electricity Now
For this project I was lucky, as I had been thinking about it off and on since I had first gotten the boat. The previous owner had built a great (though very minimal) electric system and documented it well. Even still, it’s a mess to rip up and understand someones else’s system, and I wanted to add “house” batteries and extend where I could instead of replacing. As stated in Problem 11, we wanted to have .5kwh per day so that we could live as if in a minimal home. To get by the first 3 months, we used all kerosene and minimal power. The next 3 had been lugging around a 1kwh trolling battery, and plugging it into an inverter for cooking with an Instant Pot. The battery charged quickly via a DC to DC converter in the car, I already had to bring it in and out of the dinghy, so why not run out lives on it. This actually worked pretty well. In the summer I didn’t even need to use the power due to solar. Still, lugging this around was incredibly annoying, and we wanted things to be seamless.
First for the voltage, I originally wanted 24v as the middle ground between 12v and 48v. The idea was to get one 24v battery and then be able to add a second 24v battery if I wanted to move up to 48v at a later date. The usage pattern would be a little damaging of course, but this was a price I was willing to pay as battery tech seems to keep evolving. I would then charge these batteries through separate temporary foldable solar panels that would only be taken out while at anchor. These were just house batteries after all. The problem with these higher voltages, were that I could not fit any 24v solar panels, much less 48v. That lead me to deciding on 12v, which then got me thinking that it might be easier to just make the “starter” battery larger, and not have to mess with temporary solar panels. I could just run a cable to the inverter in the galley. The problem with this, is that Lithium batteries should not be used as starter batteries. For some reason I never had even heard of that, but as I read somewhere in my research, lithium batteries have a “computer” (BMS) to monitor everything, and that’s not something you want to rely on. I write this whole thought process on what doesn’t work, just in case others are building similar systems.
Eventually, I landed on a much more elegant solution that I saw in a “Marine How To” blog. Unfortunately, I can’t for the life of me find it, but know that there is a whole layout out there if you search online. Maybe look under his other sites. The idea was to use the just released Victron XS DC to DC charger to transfer power from my golf cart starter batteries, to my lithium house battery. Previously this solution would have been too great a loss in efficiency, but the new DC to DC charger runs cool in my testing, and boasts a 98.5% efficiency in transferring power from one battery to the other. The benefits of this approach were that I got to keep the solar panels as they were, I can still use my old AC to DC charger which goes to the starter battery, and starter batteries would be less likely to fail for critical loads (no BMS). I have 2 linked though totally isolated systems where excess power flows from the starter to the house batteries.
The downside was that the DC to DC charger only supported 12v to 12v, with 12v to 24v coming later in the year (it never did come), and I needed something now. The Epoch 460 Apm Hour 12v battery was getting rave reviews at the time (people have since soured on them), so around 5kwh was what I decided to have for battery storage as I wanted to be over provisioned on something for once. The only other components that were needed were an inverter, a smart shunt (due to issues with the Epoch battery not tracking small loads), and a Victron Lynx distributor for safety. For inverters, I initially looked at an all in one from Victron, but then decided that the best combo was a cheap inverter from Amazon with high capacity but low efficiency, and a second Victron Phoenix Inverter 12/1200. The low efficiency inverter is both smaller, lighter, and cheaper which works great for loads that are never more than 15 minutes (ie electric cooking). For loads that are continuous (dehumidifier cycling on and off), the Victron inverter can stay running with a minimal idle watt usage.
The only other things that were left to do we wiring, drilling lots of holes from the galley to the v berth, epoxy all over the holes, adding cable glands where needed, getting the really heavy battery into the boat and then firmly secured down, adding a bunch of relays and switches, hooking everything up to run from a Home Assistant/ Zigbee server, add another 12v distribution panel — ok there was a lot to do actually. Compared to most boat work it was pretty straight forward however, and I did things in sections over months. I would do a poor first draft of most projects, and then whenever it bothered me enough, I’d go back and do a clean job. Some things I’m still changing out. For instance I’m eagerly await new Shelly Relays that are supposed to be coming out 1st quarter 2025 that should work with Zigbee. This will allow me to program the heater, the dehumidifier, the fans, the internet router (that 8 watts adds up to quite a bit), without having to handle it all manually.
All said and done, adding a house electric system completely changed the boat into a home. I suppose that should have been obvious, but don’t underestimate the difference that lights, outlets everywhere you need them, and easy cooking can make to the live aboard experience. And most importantly, not lugging a 25 pound battery backpack up and down every day.
17. My Prop Fell Off
Ugh, this one sucked and was my fault. I was showing off to a boat neighbor about my clever mooring pendant floating system and how I could go straight without fowling the prop. We were at a specific tide change where going straight would be much easier than reversing, and the pendants should just float to the side of the boat. Of course, it didn’t work that way, and I ended up fowling the prop and needing to emergency anchor. Humiliating, but you know, not the end of the world. I put on my wet suit and free dove down only to find that the prop was just gone. All the bolts and washers to keep it attached were still there, but it was gone. On closer inspection, the prop wasn’t gone so much as the metal propeller portion was gone. The “rubber bushing” was still firmly attached, and the prop itself had spun right off. This kicked off what would end up being a 5 month process without the ability to move the boat, and endless diving below. This was frustrating, but in it’s own way it was a relief. We were drowning in work for both the boat and programming, and taking the pressure off of getting better at sailing at least, made it easier to move forward on other projects.
The first step to fixing this was to learn how to dive. To clean the boat I had hired a diver, but that was quickly getting expensive, and I wasn’t convinced he was doing a good job. Nice guy, but the price kept changing after the fact and I wanted to know what was going on. I quickly decided that I wanted to go the Hookah route rather than actually learning to dive with a tank. Storage is already quite limited, and I didn’t want to go through the work or expensive of going through a class. I also had decided on electric instead of having to manage yet another engine. However, with something where my life is on the line, I wanted to be very certain that I got the right tools. I had seen a number of devices that floated above the water with an internal proprietary battery. These seem to have fine reviews, but it’s another battery to manage, bespoke components that can break, and I wanted to be able to do my own work on it. There is a user on Cruiser Forum that’s a diver who recommends a DIY setup named fstbttms, and that seemed a good way to go. The gold standard for these kinds of systems is by Air Line by J Sink which seems better than any proprietary system you can buy, and makes one of the well reviewed proprietary systems. The most expensive part of the DIY system is the compressor, with the individual components for the hoses and regulator still being important, but something you can get piece mail. I ended up just getting all the other components from Air Line by J Sink in a kit, but they seem to have removed that kit from their store. This kit is close, though you’ll be missing the “Heat Transfer Hose”. Not sure how needed it actually is.
The actual compressor is much more difficult to source. I’m not going to suggest a specific compressor (I don’t want to be responsible for that), but on this listing they give you the specs of their compressor and the “Thomas” brand. You’ll probably need to call some industrial type stores and see what you can work out. For the horse power, I was initially very concerned that 1/3 HP wouldn’t be enough as one of the Air Line’s models is .75HP and the other is .33HP. In practice 1/3 HP has been totally fine to run through the 60 feet of tube, and dive as deep as 6 feet. I’ve never felt like it’s running out of air, and even if it did feel that way, you have easily another breath left in the tube. As far as diving technique, I try to “breath out” as I rise, but at these depths, I don’t know if it matters. Again, do your own research, but I was very nervous the first few times trying this and it ended up being fine. I previously had Korinne watch me for instance, where now I’m comfortable diving without her there. If you get your own compressor, do make sure to look at more stats than just horse power. You need to understand the CFM and psi numbers as well.
For some other tips, as far as electric usage, around 1/3 HP uses very little electricity. I haven’t benchmarked in a long time, but maybe .2kwh in an hour? Maybe more maybe less, but it’s certainly not the large electric draw I was afraid of. For mounting, I mount it horizontal to a shelf with a switch to turn the compressor on and off. It shakes a bit but the motion isn’t too violent where I’m concerned. If you’re anchored in a place with tides, I’ve found it easiest to go 30 minutes before high tide, and stay down for around an hour. Going any other time will mean exhaustion from swimming against the tide, and possibly not being able to see clearly. For scrubbing the bottom, you will need a weight belt and it’s not worth trying to scrub with a large broom in the dinghy or something. Been there and tried that. In cooler waters you should scrub every 2 - 3 months to keep it manageable.
Returning to the prop, I now had the ability to work under water for long periods, but my initial attempts at getting the “rubber bushing” off weren’t going well. I had ordered the exact same prop as before to keep things simple (someday I’d like to experiment with 3 fins instead of 2), but none of the videos I watched on changing the prop for my sail drive lined up. Even the manual for the sail drive had a totally different process than what it ultimately ended up being. I must have gone down a dozen times, most of the time getting nowhere, other times getting one nut or bolt off. One time in particular, I needed Korinne to keep the engine flywheel from spinning, so that I could push the opposite direction underwater. I gave her a large wrench that I had available, and while I was down there pushing against a washer, her hand slipped and her finger got caught inside the engine pully. Underwater I couldn’t hear her screaming, so she had to yank my breathing tube mostly out of my mouth. We then left everything in disarray and unlocked, as I sped to the urgent care 30 minutes away in my wetsuit with her crying and unable to look at her finger. In the end all she lost was a finger nail and not a finger, but it was distinctly not fun.
Eventually after trying various gear pullers and other devices, I realized there was no way that rubber bushing was going to come off in the water. And without being able to remove the rubber bushing, there was no way to change the prop. In the background I had been trying to haul out for nearly a year which leads to the next challenge.
18. How On Earth Do I Haul Out?
Originally I scheduled a haul out in February, for a facility that was a day-ish sail away. We were supposed to get pulled out in April, then that slipped to July. In August I began calling every few weeks, with the facility promising that it would just be a week or two more, and we were next on the list. In September and even October I began calling weekly, still thinking that I could crack the code of changing the prop in the water, and fearing the changing weather. The facility said I would only get a day or two to arrive, and then I would go to the bottom of the list. I had heard from others that this facility no longer accepted boats, and that people were sailing much further for haul outs. Without a prop, I was extremely nervous to make a long sail, and quite stressed on what to do. There was one other haul out facility close to where we were moored, but they had told us that our boat was too big when we had talked to them back in February. The owner also had a poor reputation.
Out of options, we talked to the local facility seeing if our luck might change. I had noticed several boats close to our size and thought it was worth a shot. We showed up to a trash can absolutely full of beer cans, and a giant Trump flag waving in the background. I alluded to this experience in “Boat Problem 2”, but this guy ended up being amazing. We had to talk to him a few times, but there was a point where we noticed there were no boats hauled out, and we just called him up and were in that week. He was fair in pricing, let me do much of my own work (even though that wasn’t supposed to be an option), and was full of helpful advise. He also handled all of the prop work, which required a torch, and I think quite a bit of time puzzling out how to get the thing off. There was no way that I was going to change it in the water. After all the drama, we were finally able to move under our own power again.
19. In Winter, I Can’t Make Enough Power
As I’ve said before, we have very little solar. Whatever we have seems to be fine in the summer with the extra hours, but in the winter we were quickly fighting a losing battle. The winter also tends to be when we want to consume the most electricity for lights, making tea many times, and extra cooking. The real solution to this is solar panels, figuring out relays, and making a bunch of holes in the deck. I’ve begun working on all of this and have all the components, and have studied all the documentation from the original builder. However, sometimes you just need a quick win, and you don’t have time to figure everything out. Enter the .5kwh battery that is 15 pounds and fits in a small camera case. I got the idea from watching a trolling motor battery tutorial on youtube, and it’s worked perfectly for charging in the car as we do with the trolling motor battery, and being able to bring that power into the boat.
In theory I could do this with the trolling motor battery, but that’s 26 pounds, the wrong voltage (24v vs 12v), and it’s much easier if it can stay in a locked door inside the hard dinghy. While 26 pounds is tiring and hurts the back, the 15 pounds and smaller size of this extra 12v battery are just another chore to take in and out of the boat each day. It’s also not an every day thing because though we may use around .5kwh on the heaviest electricity days, we are still getting solar. I find in our 5 kwh house batteries, I normally gained about 5% per day in the dead of winter using electricity liberally. It doesn’t take too long to top of the house batteries with this routine.
While the extra portable battery is great for topping up, it only works if you’re driving a lot or have a reliable place to charge. That’s not sustainable when cruising, and is annoying. We’d like to have a little bit more solar to run things like the dehumidifier automatically, but we don’t want so much that we need to build a solar arch or anything that adds weight and mass to the stern. While we will no doubt add more solar (I already have all the components and a plan), another way of tackling the situation is to find another way to cook.
I am strongly against propane as it’s dangerous, I need to find a place for the tanks, and it adds more condensation. Kerosene has worked well for us, but it leaves a smell that I can’t help but feel is not healthy. We’ve also had a flare up where there is too much pressure a few times, and in general I notice that we prefer electric cooking with the Instant Pot and Air Fryer. What we are now considering as the perfect solution is a diesel stove. They are expensive, but our galley is right next to the main tank, and we have problems with being cold even in the summer. A diesel stove also helps with humidity as it takes damp air from inside the cabin, and expels it out while it’s running.
The downside of a diesel stove is that they always generate heat. In our current climate that’s a positive all year long, but we aspire to travel to the south pacific where it would be miserable. In those circumstances we should have plenty of solar however, and can get by with our Instant Pot and Air Fryer combo. Will report back on how the diesel stove and extra solar additions go. They are both getting installed after 6 months of thinking on them.