Charge controller

As promised, the solar panel charge controller arrived today, along with a 30 Amp fuse/circuit breaker and some cable cut to size and with some lugs attached.

Also included, though not in the photo, was several metres of 6mm cable to connect the solar panel to the charge controller. Those nice people at Bimble Solar had attached the necessary MC4 connectors. Still to come is the meter which is the sensible interface to use for setting up and monitoring the controller.

I'd decided on the new 30 Amp Tracer BN series controller as having the right performance/price combination, though it's a bit annoying to have to pay extra for the means to configure it. It will fit in a cupboard next to the Stirling alternator/battery gizmo, with the cables running to the gizmo's output lugs, from which heavy cables run to the battery bank.

So now we just need to order the solar panel itself. We've delayed on that until we can ensure we are on Erin Mae when it's delivered, in a couple of weeks.

Brackets

Today it was the turn of the brackets for the solar panel to arrive. It's amazing how exciting you can find the presence in the post of four pieces of stainless steel and a few nuts and bolts.

They'll fit neatly on top of the magnets that arrived yesterday, allowing for adjustment in the positioning. It will lift the panel up neatly to clear the curvature of Erin Mae's roof and provide some ventilation underneath, though it might need just a bit of extra packing.

We'll have to experiment, once everything has arrived, to see which of the panel's mounting holes the four brackets should be attached to, to give the best stability. I think we should be able to fit them so that the magnets are largely out of sight and away from feet, underneath the panel.

Progress! And today I've had an email promising more goodies tomorrow.

Magnets

After what seems like years of deliberations, I've taken some final decisions about solar power for Erin Mae and started ordering. The first bits arrived today – four of these:

They are car-roof magnets, normally used for attaching signs to a car roof, but I did my calculations and reckon they should do just fine for attaching a hefty solar panel to Erin Mae's top. Each is 53 x 79 mm, with an M6 bolt. The 12 mm magnet is covered in polyurethane, which both protects the paintwork and increases shear force.

From the start of this project I'd been nervous about drilling the roof to attach the panel, even though many boaters will have done that with great success. When I mentioned to a solar panel supplier what I was hoping to do, he expressed some surprise, because he'd never heard of anyone doing it before. I hope eventually to report that the experiment has been a complete success.

We shall see! Meanwhile it's nice to have my hands on the first parts of the system.

Easter moments

There were several memorable moments over the past weekend.

A 7 a.m. Easter sunrise celebration on the beach at Steamer Point near Highcliffe for 50 or 60 of us, followed by hot drinks and bacon butties from the beach hut of one of our church families. An opportunity to use my piano accordion for the singing, even if we surprised a few early dog walkers. Then back to our village for 10.30 service to continue celebrating the resurrection in an all-age-friendly format. It rocked!

A despairing tugging-of-the-hair moment as I read David Cameron's re-working of the Easter message and the real meaning of the Christian faith, miraculously filtered and re-interpreted to sound just like Tory election sound-bites.

An even louder gasp as I read the Guardian's response to our dear PM. I have never seen the Guardian quite so on the ball about anything Christian. The Guardian! I don't think Polly Toynbee could have got anywhere near this article.

And then, today, we went over to Studland Bay for a walk up to Old Harry's Rocks. We ate our sandwiches looking across the bay from above Middle Beach.

The stacks were looking great in the sun, and the boats were all rather different to Erin Mae.

Then we walked down and around and up and joined a good many others enjoying the splendid, dangerous scenery from much nearer. On top, but a few feet back from the edge.

This really is a spectacular spot. I lay on the grass, on my back, in the sun, closed my eyes and re-worked in my head the calculations about how many Amp-Hours my new solar panel for Erin Mae might deliver under radiation like this.

Then it was time to leave. We decided to go home via the Sandbanks ferry, and sat in the car-queue for about an hour before it was our turn. It was still probably quicker than negotiating the roads out of the Studland peninsula and round the north perimeter of the Bournemouth conurbation. As we waited, we got to listen to an anniversary edition of Radio 4's "PM". To make our day, they played the old signature tune that they ditched a decade or more ago.

A good weekend.

Fauré

At the end of a quieter, more reflective day yesterday, I was reminded again why Fauré is one of my favourite composers. Drinking a cup of tea before bedtime we listened to a wonderful CD of Pascal Rogé playing a selection of his solo piano music. Fauré has an incredible knack of making melodically, harmonically and technically complex music sound simple and straightforward, and an absolute delight to the ear. He ranges across the whole of the keyboard, and creates some wonderful effects without ever showing off. He has a particular skill in getting three things going at once – a lower part underpinning it all, a top part rippling around the upper octaves, and something in the middle that is integral to the whole, complementary to the other parts, and shared between the two hands of the pianist. Rogé's skill in making completely transparent the transitions between the two hands takes my breath away. I know how difficult it is because I've tried it. Fauré's genius lies, at least in part, in writing music in which a trained ear can relish the complexities, while the less trained finds something supremely enjoyable without necessarily understanding all that's going on.

When we were buying Erin Mae, we found the original owner had specified some extras, including a semi-decent sound system. What we didn't know then was how much power such luxuries consume. With battery charge an issue every cruising period so far, electronic pleasures have been limited. This year we have hopefully sorted out the batteries, and are about to treat them to some solar-derived power – the planning is done, and we're in the process of ordering the bits. So when we're up on the Leeds and Liverpool, and at a polite distance from the neighbours, we may find we've enough electrons left over to provide us with some auditory wonders from time to time.

Flowing water

We'd set aside these two days for de-winterising Erin Mae. It wasn't our fault (I don't think!) that the sky was throwing out rain and sleet and hail, and the wind, up at strong gale force, was trying to tear the curtains of the pram cover from their stitched moorings.

Re-commissioning the water system after the winter break was straightforward, partly because of the notes I'd made as Anglo-Welsh Keith had winterised it in November. So we had flowing water inside as well as outside and all the noises seemed normal. I now feel confident about looking after the whole process myself, which will save a good number of pennies next winter. The only issue will be thinking how to empty the calorifier (the hot water tank). When Keith did it, he took off the pressure-release valve, poked a hose down inside and sucked out the water with a convenient spare water-pump he happened to have. I don't have such a stock to draw from, so may have to call upon Messrs Heath and Robinson to offer advice when the time comes.

Meanwhile the gale was separating some of the Velcro fastenings of the curtains on the pram cover, which were then thrashing around in the middle of the night. I had to get out of bed, out of the back of the boat, and fasten them in their rolled-up positions. This morning's inspection showed a slight tear in the fabric where the strain had been strongest, so I may have to go back to Wilson's for advice on sorting that out.

Last of all, I did the measurements for setting up the solar panel we're hoping to install. More power equals a larger panel, and I needed to check that the one we have in mind will leave room for me to walk around it when I'm on the roof as we negotiate locks. I also needed to decide on the position of the charge controller and measure up the cable lengths.

The appalling weather meant we decided to come home again as soon as these jobs were done. Neither of us fancied another night under those conditions. But it's nice to be starting the process of getting Erin Mae ready for some cruising.

Renewal

It's just over four years since we bought Erin Mae, and four years since we last got her safety certificate done. Since her licence is also up for renewal at the end of February it was important to get the new BSS certificate in time to qualify for the discount for paying your licence fee on time. Wouldn't it be nice if the road fund for the car worked in the same way!

So we arranged for the examiner to visit on Tuesday, and drove up to Great Haywood on Monday. We travelled via Evesham marina battery centre where we'd dropped off Erin Mae's batteries for testing in November, ending a long saga of "Have they failed?" / "Will Numax acknowledge that they've failed within the warranty period?" / "Will Numax or the centre pick up the tab for replacing them under warranty?" In the end it was Yes, Yes and Yes and we came away with four new batteries. Who knows why they hadn't lasted the 3 years that were promised. Numax claimed we must have been abusing them terribly, but we most certainly hadn't. It seems that if you have a faulty one in a pack, it can lead to all the others failing – I suppose by an internal electrical leak discharging them unduly.

So I fitted them on Monday afternoon, replacing the two loaned to us by that nice man Keith at the Anglo-Welsh yard round the corner. It was an unexpectedly painful process, revealing a disturbing lack of current fitness in the ol' body. Partly having to kneel down on the boards to do the work, partly having to shift these very heavy blocks of lead around. I was also surprised by how hard it was to get the clamps down onto the terminal studs. Anyway, in they went, in time for the examination the following day.

The next 12 hours saw us eating far too much. We needed to eat out, so we visited the Ash Tree in Rugeley who, we found, do a 2-for-1 on main meals. Since we hadn't properly celebrated on Saturday our Valentinian attachment to each other we plumped for port-and-stilton sirloin steaks. We weren't in any hurry to leave so after a while they were followed by a rather delicious thing called mocha-misu. For once, the mouth-watering description in the desserts menu was reasonably well matched by what arrived on our plates. It had absolutely nothing to do with the rather unsettled night we then both experienced in the motel. But we'd already decided that the following morning we would visit the restaurant attached to the local Premier Inn for a full English. If you're going to pay for breakfast, it might as well be a good one. And you can eat as much as you like. Which means rather more than you need, or should.

Ah well, it did set us up for the day and we didn't need anything else until we eventually arrived home on the south coast late afternoon. Meanwhile we met Dave Freeman at Erin Mae for the examination, which she passed splendidly.

Battery renewal? Tick. BSS certificate renewal? Tick. CRT licence renewal? Can now be paid – ouch! Bodily renewal – think we have to get back on that cross-trainer!