Electrical revamp for Pippin

After mid-Atlantic battery failure, John Willis decides it's time to upgrade his electrics

- John Willis

New set-up in the bow battery compartment

Sailing to the Azores recently highlighted some electrical weaknesses on my yacht Pippin that had me desperately changing batteries around at sea - never a good idea.

I was eight days out, 180 miles west of Vigo, Spain, and wanted to tackle the battery issue before the forecast bad weather struck.

It seemed only one of two domestic 105Ah lead acid leisure batteries was working. The engine bank consisted of a 105Ah battery, wired separately, and up front lurked a fourth battery for the winch and bow thruster, which I decided to commandeer for the leisure bank.

Naturally, the squall hit just as I was carrying the 23kg battery back along the cabin to the battery compartment under the skipper's wheelhouse pilot seat.

Predictably I achieved nothing except blood, sweat and tears so I switched off the fridge, ate my last steak reserved for a special moment, minimised radar use and burned diesel for the next eight days to recharge the batteries with the engine's 80A alternator. My old 100W solar panel did its best to help whenever sunshine peeked through the clouds.

Electrical woes continued when my anchor winch succumbed to its numerous immersions, and the Raymarine autopilot failed just off Terceira Island's harbour, forcing me to helm for almost the first time in 16 days.

Pippin is a much travelled Frances 34 Pilothouse

Advantages of AGM

Back home in Guernsey my marine electrician sucked his teeth and chanted technical spells over my battery compartment, with its spaghetti junction of cables and wires, ancient bus bars, split diode and numerous add-ons - a common sight in many 25 year old boats. He recommended immediate and expensive surgery.