Just a Little Warmth
- Vali
- 2 päivää sitten
- 3 min käytetty lukemiseen
"Just a little warmth, just a little, for this grey evening..."
Macko suddenly started singing an old love song.
Naturally, I had to ask who the lucky lady was.
Turns out it was Kabola – our Dutch beauty, hiding away under Victoria's saloon sofa.
A few wrinkles never hurt anyone. Unfortunately, the burner pot was in rather worse shape. We took it to the scrap metal yard and got just enough back for a couple of "energy drinks". Even at the very end, Kabola was still looking after us.
Kabola had been the heart of our central heating system. A diesel-fired stove that didn't even need electricity to keep us warm. After crossing the North Atlantic she'd enjoyed a five-year beauty sleep, completely unnecessary in the tropics.
Unfortunately, tropical humidity hadn't been quite so kind.
The only part that really mattered – the burner pot – had quietly rusted away. As the nights started getting cooler, we fired her up for a test run.
The result?
Diesel poured straight into the bilge.
Not ideal.
The factory in the Netherlands confirmed our fears. This particular museum exhibit had been discontinued years ago and spare parts were no longer available.
After ringing around every marine supplier and motorhome dealer we could think of, we ended up buying a modern Autoterm Flow water heater.
Now there's a sentence guaranteed to make any liveaboard skipper twitch.
Modern. Electric.
A quick phone call to our friend Markku aboard Akasha, currently sailing north, helped settle the nerves.
"It's a great bit of kit," Captain Mikkola assured us.
Fair enough then.
Meanwhile, we remained prisoners of the marina, surviving on a little fan heater whenever we had shore power.
What followed was, of course, a classic fifteen-minute boat job.
Remove Kabola. Install Autoterm.
Four days later the new heater was finally sitting exactly where it should. Water pipes, diesel lines and wiring – all done.
Then we discovered that the "complete installation kit" didn't actually include the control panel.
Because apparently "complete" means different things to different people.
Fortunately, getting parts in New Zealand is refreshingly painless, so another parcel was soon making its way across the country.
So yes... another completely normal fifteen-minute boat project.
It took roughly eight times longer and cost about eight times more than we'd planned.
Pretty much exactly as expected.
To be fair, New Zealand continues to impress us. Parts are available, people actually know what they're talking about, and prices are nowhere near as frightening as we'd prepared ourselves for.
The Autoterm itself has been brilliant. Five kilowatts is more than enough to heat all eight radiators and the hot-water cylinder. It burns only about half a litre of diesel an hour, and fortunately we've got plenty of that. The extra 100-litre tank Jaska built years ago keeps it happily supplied and tops itself up from the main tanks whenever the engine is running.
Compared with the old Kabola, there are only a couple of downsides: a gentle fan hum, a little extra background noise... and about 6 Ah of battery consumption.
..Which, naturally, immediately created our next fifteen-minute project.
That spare solar panel still needs mounting on deck.
The new heater may be a little noisier, but so was the skipper while fitting it. The running commentary was non-stop. "Fifteen-minute job. Only one toolbox." Ah yes... famous last words. There she is. Small, tidy and surprisingly fierce. Our new heater.