Soooo Cold in Birch Bay, Wa

Maggie Anne

Well-known member
Joined
Apr 15, 2017
Messages
279
Location
Birch Bay, WA
Website
www.youtube.com
Fluid Motion Model
R-43 CB
Vessel Name
Maggie Anne II
I was down at the boat at 3 AM this morning since my bilge temperature monitor had been dropping precipitously overnight from 45 degrees to 35 degrees, I suspected maybe the breaker on the dock pedestal had tripped. At the time it was 7 degrees outside and the wind was (still is) howling. When I got on the boat all the heaters were working though, one in the bilge and two in the cabin. The cabin temperature was 29 degrees, the bilge was 35 degrees (I guess the engine compartment is more insulated, smaller space to heat, and less exposed to air temp than the cabin). The two Caframo heaters in the cabin were set to mid level heat settings, which I think pull about 1000W each, the Xtreme bilge heater is 800W, so I think that’s about as much as my 30 amp power pedestal can supply, which at the moment is about 3000W. 30 amps x 100V (actual measurement, I guess it’s not 120V since a lot of boats might be pulling power also).
 
Hi Maggie,

Do you have the Camframo heaters on a "freezing" setting to only come on at a certain temp, or just on mid level all the time?

I have a Camframo on the "freezing" setting at full heat, but I wonder if I need to have it constant at mid-heat. Thanks.

- tom
 
I normally would have them on the "Snowflake" setting with the fan on the "2" position when we're away. However, anticipating the weather I just turned them on continuously last night before bed. As a side note I did test them on the freeze setting while I was there this AM and they did turn on so I left them on the automatic setting. On the other hand when I went back down later, they had both turned off, even though the temperature was still in the low 40's. I thought they were supposed to stay on until ambient was 50 degrees.
 
My R29 is in Anacortes. I just checked outside temp and it is 14F. Cabin is 50F and bilge is 45F. I run only the Webasto on high for cabin. No cabin electric heat. Been doing that for three years. Some people say that is bad but I think issues happen on low. Mine can only run on high since I put in an after market digital control. I use a Twin Hornet in bilge.
How do you no monitor batteries and temperature with Wi-Fi? I have a basic Ring camera viewing gauges and I manually look at it once a day on my phone. No automatic notifications, yet way better than nothing.
 
The monitor I use is a product from Sensar Marine. Andrew had mentioned it in Tugnuts as something relatively easy to install. $120 per year for a subscription. It continuously monitors; bilge water level, bilge pump activity, house and engine batteries, bilge temp, impact, and GPS location, which you can access anytime from your smartphone. The app will plot the last 30 days of each of those parameters.

The GPS feature has two elements, one is for a geofence that notifies you if your boat moves outside a 150m circle and the other provides a trip plot from one stationary spot to the next one. The GPS is not without it's glitches though as several times my boat has taken short fictitious journeys by itself away from the dock 🙂

https://sensarmarine.com/en-us/
 
Pretty frigid down here in Seattle, too. Currently registering 23F at the boat in Portage Bay. I use Govee brand sensors on the boat along with their wi-fi bridge. I have one in the cabin, stateroom, engine room, and outside in the cockpit. I have an xtreme cabin heater running on freeze control in the cabin, and an xtreme bilge heater running in the engine compartment. Everything is hovering at around 45 degrees, right where it should be. Also have a big de-humidifier running and keeping everything at 50%.
 
Does anyone know how to stop the air from blowing in at the bow of the boat. In front of the anchor locker there is a gap about an inch wide and cold air just pours in. Here in Seattle the temperature inside the boat with the Wabasto heater set to it's highest setting is 59 degrees.current outside temperature is 29. Since I am living aboard i would like ti minimize as many air leaks as possible. I purchased the boat this summer and thankfully there was a small automatic heater on board. I have it in the engine compartment and the temperature there is 41 degrees. so it is doing it's job.
Thanks.
 
My 2017 29S has no air leak. It is hard to visualize what you are talking about. I lived on my boat 4 days a week for two years, year round. It got down to 8 deg several years ago and the Webasto got it to 68F, no problem. I have an inboard engine. I am not sure if all R29’s have inboard and how that affects Webasto.
 
Maggie Anne":2vt77aja said:
The monitor I use is a product from Sensar Marine. Andrew had mentioned it in Tugnuts as something relatively easy to install. $120 per year for a subscription. It continuously monitors; bilge water level, bilge pump activity, house and engine batteries, bilge temp, impact, and GPS location, which you can access anytime from your smartphone. The app will plot the last 30 days of each of those parameters.

The GPS feature has two elements, one is for a geofence that notifies you if your boat moves outside a 150m circle and the other provides a trip plot from one stationary spot to the next one. The GPS is not without it's glitches though as several times my boat has taken short fictitious journeys by itself away from the dock 🙂

https://sensarmarine.com/en-us/


Curious how often you are having issues with the GPS. I just had my first fictitious notification right before bed and drove down to the marina.

I'm also getting "severe impact" notifications throughout the day. I'd never know if someone actually hit the boat.
 
I get a false "Maggie Anne Has Moved" notification maybe once every couple of months, so not that often. If I check the map display on the app an hour or so later it shows the boat is back in it's slip where it's supposed to be.

I do get tons of impact readings none of which seem to be correlate to any actual events so I don't find that feature very useful,
 
Like the Govee, the Inkbird is Wifi device that doesn't need a hub. There is normally a 30-35% coupon you can 'add' to make it about $20. If you want it can even do 1 hour intervals and stores data for 1 year for free.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0B4R ... UTF8&psc=1
 
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