Day 411

As most of the past few days has been woodwork, I see no reason to break the chain of good luck! Today I built the framework for the aft entry, and a sliding door for under the pilot seat area. As can be seen in the above photo, I just made a frame for the ply and attached ball bearing style drawer sliders. What a great idea! When fully extended, there is a back plate to offer support against prying feet, and is 24" from closed to open.

Shifter / throttle in place

It went in quickly, was easy to position, and slides very nicely. I may remove the sliding door track on the other side of the pilot house in lieu of this method. A snap latch will hold it closed.

The wonderful entry surround was started. The angled piece overhead will aid in head-banging prevention. Lord knows we've both acquired a number of dents in our heads from this horrid arrangement. If we could go back and do it again, the coaming over this doorway (and the other side to match ) would have been widened so it could be used for headspace here. A nice padded bar will be installed as soon as I figure out what to make it out of.

Framing for entry is multi-functional. Sloped panel to reduce head banging,
hides hydraulic fill & lines, engine heat vent, locker space.

The framing in the corner is for the engine heat exhaust. There is a big hole in the floor that will allow the heat to be pumped out through this, then into the dorade I made above and out, and through the coaming and 4 Vetus vents on the aft of the coaming. A vent with flapper will be installed so we can recover some of the hot air in colder weather.

Day 411 :
12 hours + 2 for me- Constructed frame work for aft entry lockers.

	The fuse panel is looking very congested as more and more wires are run in there. Gena spent part of her day running wires up from all of the engines sensors, then up to the gauges. I had already run illumination power to the gauges, but she still had to run power from the ignition for the gauges themselves. Deciding whether or not to add the engine related gauge illumination to the non engine related stuff was a bit of a conflict between us. I would like everything to light up because rigging the dimmer will be easier. ( also because I love lights! ) Gena would like the engine ones off if the engine isn't running as it is a waste of power and may cause blindness at night. I argue that everything can be so dim it won't cause blindness etc etc...
Today wasn't all smooth. Gena requested I drill a hole for the ignition switch as well as the pre-lube, gravity tank fill solenoid, and the stop solenoid. I started the hole and realized the switch wasn't around. When I found it, I noticed it was much larger than I remembered, so I drilled the hole bigger. Upon trying to put the dash panel back in, I saw I had drilled too close to the edge and the switch over lapped the side frame by 1/2" ! I was trying to saw it out and became frustrated as it wouldn't chisel straight. I went off in a huff and Gena cut the thing out.
All of the ignition wires were connected as were the others ran. Now all we need is oil in the engine, water in the cooling system, some fuel, and, of course, the battery.	*Gena wiring up the engine gauges*