Frugal Boater: Porta-Bote Refit

Why a Porta-Bote

We love our old Porta-Bote dinghy. She folds flat so we can store her against the lifelines if we don’t want her on the davits. She’s done everything we’ve asked, and we’ve asked a lot. More than once she’s delivered us safely through small craft advisories and four foot seas. She carries amazing amounts of groceries, water and equipment. While her speed isn’t on par with the 25hp dinghies, she does pretty well with her 6hp and uses less gas. But at 10 years old, and after four years of hard daily use and abuse, she was showing her age.

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

 

Frugal Boater: Keeping it Cool

Although we have air conditioning on Pearl Lee, being a Frugal Boater, we don’t often go to marinas and don’t want to run the generator and air conditioner 24×7. Any HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning) professional worth his salt will tell you that three factors effect our comfort. Air temperature, humidity and velocity. Without running the air conditioner we can’t control the first two, so let’s work on the third, velocity.

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

Frugal Boater: Pearl Lee Solar Power 2.0

Frugal Boater Solar power 1.0 SV Pearl Lee
Davit mounted panels

On Pearl Lee we make our own electricity, mostly from solar power. Occasionally, after Pearl Lee Solar Power 1.0, we found ourselves falling a bit short of our needs and supplementing our solar power with a generator.  This was mainly during the short days of winter, but also during periods of high use. We don’t have an “electricity budget” as many cruisers do. My goal is to have enough solar power without any worries. Hence, Pearl Lee Solar (PLS) 2.0.

Our PLS 1.0 configuration consisted of two  Hyundai 280 watt solar panels wired in series and mounted on our dinghy davits (hanging over the back of the boat). Power from these went through a Midnite Solar Classic 150 controller which charged our eight golf cart batteries with nearly 900 amp hour capacity.

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

 

 

Frugal Boater: Batteries Replacement Day

Today, we replaced our “house” batteries. These batteries are to us, what the electric company is to “normal” folks. They store all the power from our solar panels, and supply ALL of our electricity for lights, information, entertainment, and even cold beer.

What does this picture represent?

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

Frugal Boater: A Household Refrigerator For Our Sailboat

old boat refrigerator
Old and busted

Our old Norcold 6.5 cubic foot front load refrigerator was slowly on it’s way to the graveyard. Mind you, it was at least 10 years old, so it’s hard to blame Norcold. The 12v board burned out, so we were running it on an inverter. We couldn’t get parts for such an old model. We noticed the seals were leaking causing excessive frost build up. It was using at least double the power it should. We determined it was past due for a replacement.

Finding a Frugal Boater alternative

The new hotness! Coolness?

After looking at direct replacements from Norcold and others we found it hard to justify $1400 – $2500 for a 6.5 cubic foot refrigerator. It was time to get creative.

After lots of measuring and internet shopping we found that 9.9 cubic foot home refrigerators had a pretty standard form factor and would just barely fit the space we had. We spent a lot of time measuring, planning and calculating.

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

 

 

Frugal Boater: Pearl Lee Solar 1.0

In order to maintain our independence and lifestyle, we added a solar power system to Pearl Lee. While solar power can make us more independent, you must consider power generation, storage and consumption as a complete system.

LED Light Bulbs

Warm white LED bulbs

We started by cutting our power consumption. We found LED bulbs for our original interior light fixtures on Amazon. These use less power, and give off less heat, a real win-win for us.  We wanted to keep a warm glow similar to incandescent lights, so we stuck with “warm white” or 2700k color. You might notice one bulb is brighter than the other. That’s no accident, it allows us warm, soft light when one is lit, but nice, bright light when both are lit.

Read more at Frugal-Boater.com

 

New Sails from Mack Sails

Since purchasing Pearl Lee we have been in a whirlwind of boat activity. She came without sails, so first on the agenda was a new set sails. After contacting several lofts we decided to go with Mack Sails.

Mack Sails in general, and Travis in particular, have taken wonderful care of us. They rushed our order to meet our schedule and when UPS made multiple mistakes getting our genoa to us, Travis Mack Sailstirelessly tracked the package down, badgered UPS to ship it various ways and to various destinations. He simply would not give up. When I made an error slider size, Travis cheerfully offered both a temporary solution for the remainder of the season as well as a more permanent solution once we wrapped up our sailing for the year, all at no additional charge.  For sails done right, these guys deserve your business.

Colin and Travis at Mack Sails
Colin and Travis at Mack Sails

When problems arose, no matter who’s fault it was, Mack Sails and Travis were willing to go the extra mile to make it right. The sails fit as requested and have excellent shape and workmanship. We also ordered Mack Packs for our main and mizzen. We’re glad we chose Mack Sails for Pearl Lee’s new suit.

By the way, this is NOT a paid advertisement, just us giving credit where credit is due.