pottering about...

I went down to the boat last night, and spent a few hours pootling around doing little jobs here and there... Used some graphite spray on the sliders on teh main, and the main now falls down unaided... when I can afford a bosuns chair, i'll be able to re-rig the lazy-jacks I test hoisted the storm jib, thats all seems OK.... lubricated and serviced various bits and bobs of fixings.... freed up snap shackles etc etc I did a couple of slightly less pleasant jobs, particularly cleaning the oily water out from under the engine.... yuck.... I also started again the process of trying to track down why the alternator is not charging the batteries properly.... I tested out the cable between the alternator and the battery... measured 0.15 ohm so that looks OK... the excitor circuit is getting power at the switch... about 12.5V without any charge system running, so that seems OK... In the battery sensed excitor circuit is a diode to drop some additional voltage, and hence raise the output charging voltage....... well it looks like that might be the problem... its showing virtually no resistance in either direction.... surely not correct for a diode?.. although I am still measuring 12.5 V at the alternator end of the excitor circuit... my theory is that the diode has failed... a replacement is 24p... (plus £3 postage!) so its worth replacing anyway..... lets hope this solves the problem... Finally, I met up with the guy selling a wheel system Saturday morning.... its just what I was looking for, so £200 poorer, and I now have a wheel system.... given that I need to ideally drop the rudder to fit it, It wont happen until the autumn when the boat comes out of the water, but the pedestal and wheel looks a treat in the cockpit!