Boston Bombing

My thoughts about the Boston marathon bombing are mixed.  I am encouraged by the response of the regular everyday people. Those at the bombing reacted quickly and helped the victims.  Seeing pictures of people carrying those hurt and applying first aid was inspiring.  The outpouring of donations of money and blood was impressive.  This some of the good that I saw over the last few weeks.  Also the quick resolution of the situation by the apprehension of the perpetrators so quickly; kept the fear of having another indecent from growing (at least from that set of criminals).  The bad: once again the media.  The over-blown, uninformed, around the clock coverage was again ridiculous.  The bad information that was reported and the speculation did nothing to help.  I think having to fill 24 hours of coverage causes this.  How about report what happened just the facts?  Then shut up until you have more facts.  Don't fill the void with rumor and conjecture.  The media contributes to these incidents with the coverage.  Having caught these guys quickly has cut off the flood and may contribute to minimizing the over exposure and encouragement of copy cats.
Was this terrorism?  I say yes if you define it as violent acts meant to influence others behavior with the fear created.  More succinctly from the dictionary: the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion.  Terror is defined as an intense state of fear.  Now reports state the reason for the attack was they were displeased that America was waging war in Afghanistan and had been at war in Iraq.  I would assume the idea was to influence or coerce us to leave Afghanistan or were they just mad and wanted to let our their anger?  The other problem is with the definition is that was it systemic?  A single act is not systemic.  In fact I liken the bombing to a mass shooting by a disgruntled person.  They acted out against America instead of a elementary school. Is carrying out a violent attack against a state terrorism, is it war, is it just a crime?  When it comes down to does it matter?  The survivor will be tried and punished.  Should be tried with murder and no need to blow it into something other than that.  In fact trumping up the charges to terrorism could make him a martyr in other potential violent prone individuals eyes and could spur another act.  I say minimize the act, minimize the individual (don't make them a celebrity), but punish severely. If the media does their usual this wont happen.  He will be made out to be public enemy #1 and get more than the 15 minutes of fame he already has gotten.  The more time spent in the spotlight is more chances of spawning copycats after the lime light.  It also gives the acts a stage to increase the potential terror effectivity of another attack.  I wouldn't do it.         

Spring boat work

Ah Spring....Boat work season.  I alluded to the project I did last week and the one I started the side panel. Well that has led to some additional places which I will get to.  Also on the agenda was the normal boat work for the spring plus some:

Change fuel filters

check all electrics

charge and clean batteries

bleed steering system

paint the nose of the outboard bullets (getting corroded due to the fact they settle in the the water)

replace zincs (Marina to do this and paint the bottom)

clean everything (getting outside detailed by marina)

 What didn't go as planned?  I noticed a steering fluid leak (one side was replaced a few years ago but the other is old) now I have to rebuild to replace the seals

A light is out (and has been) in the helm area so I have to replace that

The fuel is weeping around one of the priming bulbs just like last year which I fixed using a special clamp and tool, but it is now doing it again.  I cut the fuel line because that side was too long and maybe contributing to the leaks (had to buy a special cutter so the cut was straight).   

Oh and still working on the side panel shown below.  

chartplotter fishfinder install

So I started working on my boat a few weeks ago and realized that I had noticed my fish finder was failing.  Given that if I wanted to replace it I had to do it before the boat went into the water, I decided to do it. I picked a Raymarine E7D mainly because my current units worked for over 15 years and I was familiar with them.  I decided to install the unit in the old electronics enclosure cover.  This isn't ideal because they are exposed to the world, but I noticed that all the other boats in my marina had electronics even more exposed. I decided to keep my charplotter even though the E7D is a multi-function display (MFD). I will use it until it goes up and dedicate the MFD to fish finder mode.  I had my marina install the new transducer mainly because it required under the waterline holes be drilled and they had it at a reasonable price.  Next was the mods to the mounting panel I did at home.  The first picture shows the templates and the second shows the old chartplotter (RC420) set where it is to go.  I plan on putting a new plate on or a cover plate when that one is done.  At the same time I did this I decided to do two things that were out of scope for the install.  One was pretty straight forward and I figured I had the dash apart I should replace the side panel that wasn't replaced when I got the new engines.  It was cracked and wrapped.  The new side panel is shown below with the trim tab controls installed.  The second out of scope item was driven by having a VHF radio that supported DSC or digital signal calling, which means it can send and or send and receive position data via NMEA 0183.  The radio is in the radio box above the helm.   The new MFD (and the old one for that matter) has NMEA connections and I thought I would set up the system to support that again while I was wiring up the E7D.  Well that was a mistake. The day of the install I got the display wired and mounted and the side panel on.  Then I started to look at what it would take to get the NMEA up to the radio.  This was going to require running 8 wires up to the box through the hardtop tubing.  I found an unused 10 gauge wire running up there but the first problem was were did it come out under the dash. The second problem was what wire could I find that was 8 conductor stranded in a small enough size to be run up there.  To solve the wire location  problem I had to take apart the area under the seat where the wires came in from the hardtop and then traced it back under the dash.  I then attached a weed whacker line to the 10 gauge wire and pulled it through.  Once done I decided that I needed 2 pull wires in case I lost the new signal wire or it broke.  Both happened by the way multiple times.  The second problem had me go to West Marine (the wire they had was too big) then to Home depot (only had solid core telephone or CAT5 cable, would break under vibration) and finally a electrical supply house (didn't have anything like what I needed). In the end I went back to West Marine and bought wire that was 1.5 to 2 times the diameter of the 10 gauge wire.  As I said I spent 4-5 hours trying to pull this wire though. As I was doing this I realized that the radio I had only needed 2 of the 8 wires and only sent location data and wouldn't receive it and display on my MFD.  In the end unless I upgrade my radio this isnt half as neat as I thought it was going to be. After a long hard day I buttoned everything up and caulked the panels, but then I said I should do the other side panel which doesn't require getting under the dash but has 10 switches and lettering on it which is going to require some real work. Also I can now route the engines data to the MFD (and vice versa) via the NMEA 2000 or deviceNet network that they can share. That looks like it is straight forward but will require a cable or two and opening the dash again (nice summer project).     

Below are some more pictures.  Under the side panel, the MFD and old chartplotter as installed, under the seat (you can see the orange weed whacker line used to pull), The radio box, the display's wiring (re-purposed the old engine terminal strips that were left after getting the new engines).