Editor's note: The following is about the experience of this past weekend. I gathered all my technical thoughts for future reference in this subsequent post.
First, a quick note... Vicky has safely made it back to China and is doing her time in quarantine.
I had great plans for this weekend. I was all packed for a 3-day stay with plans to do some boat projects and try my hand at single handing again. I finished up work and left right at the end of the day to make it there just after sunset. And what a sunset it was... as I was driving southwest into Rock Hall, the sky just LIT with the sun illuminating what seemed like the entire sky. I was in a great mood as I walked out on the dock.
I went below and started to switch on the lights... and nothing. Nothing would light. There was no voltage displayed on the electrical panel. Just a little green LED saying that the AC power was OK (but no voltage shown).
But hey, I had recording studio technology class in college and that remains the best course I ever had since it taught me a very logical approach to troubleshooting a system. I went out (several times, it turned out), and started at the dock pedestal... breakers on... blue lights on the smart cables... LEDs on in the cockpit locker where the electric enters... and of course the green LED saying AC power is OK on the main panel. But nothing would power up.
The photo below was taken with the iPhone flash and makes it look much brighter. I did have the LED candle going but nothing else.
After a few trips through it all I noticed that the battery charger was on and showing 0 volts and 0 current going out to the batteries. The breaker for the main panel was also tripped. Clearly the batteries were dead.
I heard a voice outside and it turned out Captain Gary was on Simple Pleasures II (across the dock) and stopped by to help troubleshoot. I was a little bummed he couldn't get it started right away. (But also kind of glad he didn't just walk in and fix it - personal pride, etc., etc.,)
I finally decided that the most prudent course of action was to just go home. No DC power on a boat means no water pressure, no flushing of the electric toilets, and no lights. With it only being an hour or so drive, that's what I did.
But first, in a stroke of genius (if I do say so myself)... I posted the issue to the Facebook "Catalina 42/425 Yacht Owner's group". Then I started driving. An hour's drive gives one time to mull things over and I realized that the zeros on the battery charger probably were key. And sure enough, the Facebook group came through (it was actually Captain Andy who gave me the lead). The battery charger must have reset because the batteries were too low and there wasn't a simple reset button on the charger to restart it.
Overnight, I read and researched on the Net... in the morning when it was light out, I hightailed it down to Rock Hall and switched the charger to "Power Supply" mode. This put voltage into the batteries (and turned on all the boat systems), but it doesn't do any monitoring of the charging process. I left it like that for 30 minutes which brought the battery voltage up a bit while not being long enough to cause any issues, then switched it back to "Battery Charger" mode. Now it was outputting the expected voltage and current.
My new batteries are AGMs and so it took a slow approach to bringing them up to charge.
I passed the time during the morning by filling in the screw holes for our hatch support (discovered to be very loose during our last day trip) with marine epoxy putty.
I couldn't go out as by early afternoon it was only up to 25% charge... not enough to guarantee I could start the engine.
So I took a nap. A few dock mates commented on their ability to hear me take a nap (I left the CPAP packed).
I turned off all the systems and returned home to let it charge overnight.
I came back down to Rock Hall on Sunday afternoon to check it. The battery voltage was up to 13.3 V and the charger current was in the auto maintain mode.
That was the weekend... no going out, no overnight, but a chance to learn a lot about my electrical and battery system.
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