The original electrical panel was still in place on the Moody and this had various additions added to it over the years. On the left hand side there were two chart plotters. The Raymarine was original fit and was linked to the similar unit in the cockpit.  Around about 2010, AIS had been added and rather than upgrade the navigation a decision was taken to add an additional plotter to show the AIS information. Personally the thought of going below to check the AIS track of a large ship that may be on a collision course sounded like madness.  Also with our plans to go round the world we didn’t expect the original navigation to last 25 years without trouble.  So the decision was taken to upgrade the Raymarine navigation and remove the redundant setup. We considered other manufacturers but we have been comfortable with Raymarine equipment and so decided to stay loyal to the manufacturer, also thinking that it should be quite easy for us to understand how it worked since it would be an evolution from the equipment we were used to. Of course an upgrade from that period meant that the existing radar set up would have to be replaced.

Thats when the fun started, so firstly there was a deal where we could get the fish finder add on for the cost of the sensor – anyone who knows Maria’s fishing ability will know that this is money well spent….we will never see any fish on it!

We were also thinking about our plans to travel and the knowledge that the likelihood the charts will not be accurate.  For that reason we thought it would be worth looking at Forward Facing Sonar (FFS) so that we can see exactly what is in front of us and hopefully therefore avoid hitting it! Now on the East Coast, where we have very shallow water and mud, there is an unwritten rule that if you haven’t touched the mud you probably aren’t really trying ;). We are very careful these days having touched the bottom once in the Dufour but I am guessing that running into a reef will be no laughing matter so FFS it is.  It looked like the Echopilot was the best fit for us and integrated with everything else. We have combined that with a 7inch plotter which will show this view to Maria at the helm. I am led to believe that the purchase of this equipment was no reflection of a lack of trust in my ability to tell Maria if we are going too shallow but a niggling doubt remains… 🙂

Anyway, we also took the opportunity of another trade in deal with Raymarine to modernise our autopilot. We are hoping that the new equipment will help us to have fewer breakdowns and repairs in the future or at the very least have spare parts available. I wouldn’t fancy finding a spare part for a 20 year old plotter on a small desert island. So we have three plotters: nav station down below, next to the companionway and a smaller display on the steering binnacle for Maria to see her FFS as well as all the other functionality.

Finally, we changed all of the small instruments above the companionway to complete the modernisation.

None of this would have been possible without the excellent advice and work of Oliver from Seapower Marine. He has been wonderful and I think has kept the cost down as much as possible while making Mariadz as fault free as is humanly possible.  He has even identified and rectified water damage from the fresh water used to put out the fire in the galley all those years ago.

One good thing was that the boat came with relatively new Rolls AGM batteries. These seemed in reasonable condition and they were split as a dedicated engine start battery and two bags of 4x110Ah batteries dedicated to domestic supply and the winches. Having done some research on battery charging, we decided that we would never want to reduce the batteries below 50% which means that we effectively have 200Ah of usable energy if the batteries are fully charged.

The moody has over 30 lights which are 10W. If these are left on for an hour that is 300W which at 12V is 25Ah. You can probably see where this is going….. If I switch the lights on I use up all my battery power!

One of the first jobs on the Dufour had been to change all of the bulbs to G4 LED Warm White Light Bulbs which draw a tenth of the power. It was clear that this was something that was needed on the Moody immediately. We opted for warm white bulbs to give a softer light and these have been excellent. At the same time, we changed all of the navigation lights to LED too so at least our lighting is optimal.

The winches draw a lot of power when they are used but a dedicated battery bank did seem excessive especially as we have winch handles! So it seemed sensible to consolidate the battery banks and use these across all uses. A second idiosyncrasy with the Moody is that the service battery bank is above the keel, not a bad place to have quite a bit of weight. The second bank is under the aft master cabin bed! So it wasn’t just that I had put some weight on that had led to the stern being lower in the water. There is a slot available aft of the existing battery bank and before the engine room where the second bank could be located. This seemed sensible from an electrical perspective and with a view to weight distribution. Moving a couple of pumps, which also simplified pipe work, was all that was required to make this change happen.

So now we have 800Ah of batteries for our winches and domestic use.

As a standard the Moody 54 has a life raft fitted in a dedicated locker on the aft deck above the aft stateroom. I guess this is well positioned since you should always step up into the life raft and with its weight, not many older cruisers are going to be able to pull it out and lift it over the guard rail so the water will be lapping over the stern by the time you are ready.

However, apart from the aft lazarette and the anchor locker there is no stowage accessible from the deck. This was not a problem on our previous Dufour 455 which seemed to have lockers everywhere.

For these reasons we decided to move the life raft to create an additional locker and to make it more accessible in case of emergency.  At the same time we braced the pushpit by connecting it to the heavy duty davits. The work was done for us by Ian and Rob at East Coast Stainless, based in Ipswich.  We were really pleased with the work and they were able to fit us in despite becoming increasingly busy as their reputation goes from strength to strength.

As you can see, it is a simple quick release frame, which allows the life raft to be stowed safely and deployed quickly.

So the Moody arrived with an Avon 340 rib, with no engine. Unfortunately, Maria has an unfortunate history with inflatables and seems to lack the ability to get in or out elegantly, she has the same problem with Lotus Elise’s 🙂

We knew if we were going to have a tender that Maria would be comfortable with in any weather then we would need to look at improving or changing.  Maria is not a fan of the jockey console and we know people who have found these uncomfortable. I’m sure Maria’s reason is linked to their similarity to motorbike seats and her dislike of these for safety on the roads. So we would be looking at a bench seat and a standalone console. I looked at pricing these up from Outhill who had a vast range for a number of ribs.  The ones for our Avon would fit and do the job.  When I started pricing up these, including fitting and a new engine, the price was increasing rapidly.  Although the Avon was five years old, it had hardly been used, but we explored alternatives thinking we would sell the Avon.

Mariadz is fitted with 300kg Simpson Davits which are excellent and how the rib is normally stowed. However, these are rated for 150kg each and I was keen that we wanted to be well within the limits of the davits. There were several reasons for this.  Firstly, it was likely that the rib would be used for rubbish etc on passage, there was likely to be a cover for the rib which would be in addition to the weight of the rib and engine.  Finally, water weighs a lot and a rib can hold a lot of water and I was concerned in case this happened for whatever reason, because it was likely that the weather wouldn’t always be good there would be a lot of water flying around! We didn’t think we could extend beyond the 340cm that the Avon had been since this did occupy the stern.

Having considered a number of manufacturers and gone to the boat show, we looked at the Walker Bay Genesis series. These are super lightweight and have a shape that seems to push water to the side rather than up, over and in my face. With a 20hp Suzuki motor (power start, power lift, remote steering) the whole setup was 150kg (ish) and I was comfortable that this was well within our limits.  On the advice of Dan Cross at Boatsmart, we decided to have the thin-profile throttle which looks a lot smarter and navigation lights. As part of the deal for the motorhome we agreed that they would deliver the Rib when they collected the BMW which we had traded as a deposit for our motorhome. This saved us the delivery fee, the cost of fitting a tow and buying a trailer, or of sailing the boat to the South Coast to collect it.  The delivery went without a hitch and the “lads” at Ipswich Haven Marina (you know who you are Phil et al…), took her in the big lifting cradle to put her in for us. Of course we went through the mandatory first time problems. Where is the lock for lowering the engine? Also being unable to start the engine through a combination of not pumping through fuel or not having the fuel cut off line inserted. Eventually she started and we took her back to Mariadz to become the new tender.

We have read a lot of blogs and have seen that quite often people will look to see what Ribs are tied up on the pier because this is a sure sign that the mothership is unoccupied. For this reason we were keen that the “tender to” signage was not too prominent. On speaking to our insurance company they were comfortable with her being named in her own right and having t/t Mariadz on it and so we engaged Geoff at Atlantic-signs again to help us.

But what to call her? As I’m sure you know Mariadz is not named after Maria’s intentions when she met Adam! And we have two feline crew…..so the Rib is called Connie after Clyde and Bonnie. So the decision was made and Connie, t/t Mariadz was named.

As you can see from the photo above Maria is comfortable to get in and out of this one ok :). And, as you do in these situations, we both had a little play while we got used to the new rib.

So play time was over and it was time to bring up the Rib onto the davits recently vacated by the sold Avon.  This is where the fun started. The lifting points were in different places to the Avon and the internal shape of the boat meant that the chain that we had to attach the lifting mechanism to the Rib was the wrong length.  This resulted in much cursing and several trips to fox’s chandlery we finally got the chain to the right length with the right connectors so we could lift the rib.

At this stage the davit mechanism’s started slipping but that is a whole different story for another time…..

So our final enhancements were to add a portable plotter with built in GPS so that we also knew the speed she was doing, we wouldn’t want to break any rules. She is now fitted with an anchor and ready to go.