Washdown and short sail

Well, it came to that time of the year, when we needed to wash down the main sail. Actually we hadn't done it for a couple of years and the stack pack stitching had deteriorated in the sun, so we took it and the mainsail off. We then restitched the stack pack and washed down the main sail.

We couldn't get all the dust off, so as we put it back up we rinsed it down and let the slurry run over the boat, which then needed cleaning!

It's amazing how much higher tall people like Tim can reach. Shorties like me climb to get some places and Tim just reaches up!

So, having done that, let's take King Malu out for a brief sail...

The weather has turned warmer at last, which means, not only is Tim in shorts and T shirt, but I am too! (Though I do have a sweatshirt on as well).

The wind is modest, 10 knots, but the sun out, so what do we get on the wind and solar?

11 Watts of wind and...

198 Watts of solar.










However, there is something significant about this: Silentwind have produced a new BOOST controller, so the modest 11.7 Watts of wind is actually coming from a wind generator that is only putting out 5.5 Volts. The BOOST controller takes this and converts it into energy that can charge your batteries.

Want to know more about this fantastic new controller? Contact us at Malu Marine.

Solar panels for boats

One of the biggest problems on sailing boats with solar panels is shading. There is so much gear that can shade the panel! These two photos illustrate it exactly. But note that we are developing flexible smaller panels... in each case there are two panels not one. Hence, in the first photo, one of the panels has 40% shaded (low output) and the other 5-10% shaded (close to full output). On the other side of the boat one of the panels is 100% shaded (almost no output) and the other 5% shaded (almost full output). If these were single large panels then they both would be significantly reduced output power.