Sorrento 25
Petty Officer 2nd Class
- Joined
- Oct 9, 2006
- Messages
- 181
What a miserable day. Yesterday went fine. I popped in a new VHF in about 30 minutes. Today I spent about 8 hours on the boat and all I planned to do was install a new depth sounder.
Mistake #1: Thinking I was being clever I decided to fish some extra wires up to the cabin for some AV stuff that I want to install later along with my transducer cable. I spent a couple hours getting a tag wire in and pulling the new wires along with the transducer cable. I ended up using a 1/4" steel rod to finally accomplish this in two steps and with an intermediate access location under the dash that my hand barely fit into.
Mistake #2: Then I noticed the hole in my dash was a hair bigger than the new gauge and every other gauge hole in the dash.
No biggie, that gauge plate is a little warped and little pieces are breaking off at the screw holes so I'll pull it and cut another. Pull some screws and yank the gauge plate forward to disconnect it - huh? It doesn't move. Crawl underneath and a half dozen or so wire terminals are hooking it on. I bend those, pry at the top (Its caught under the lip of a dash pad), finally get it forward an inch or two (zero slack on the wires), disconnect a dozen random wires labeling carefully, and finally get it out praying I can decipher the gibberish and get it back in and wired correctly later.
What would it have taken to put a 12 pin Molex on that dash????
I scoped out my antenna bracket that I wanted to replace because its the most hideously corroded thing on the boat and those nuts are virtually inaccessible. An Orangutan might be able to get a tool on them. They must have mounted that before they bonded the deck on or something!
This has to be the most service-unfriendly thing I have ever worked on. :/
Mistake #1: Thinking I was being clever I decided to fish some extra wires up to the cabin for some AV stuff that I want to install later along with my transducer cable. I spent a couple hours getting a tag wire in and pulling the new wires along with the transducer cable. I ended up using a 1/4" steel rod to finally accomplish this in two steps and with an intermediate access location under the dash that my hand barely fit into.
Mistake #2: Then I noticed the hole in my dash was a hair bigger than the new gauge and every other gauge hole in the dash.
No biggie, that gauge plate is a little warped and little pieces are breaking off at the screw holes so I'll pull it and cut another. Pull some screws and yank the gauge plate forward to disconnect it - huh? It doesn't move. Crawl underneath and a half dozen or so wire terminals are hooking it on. I bend those, pry at the top (Its caught under the lip of a dash pad), finally get it forward an inch or two (zero slack on the wires), disconnect a dozen random wires labeling carefully, and finally get it out praying I can decipher the gibberish and get it back in and wired correctly later.What would it have taken to put a 12 pin Molex on that dash????
I scoped out my antenna bracket that I wanted to replace because its the most hideously corroded thing on the boat and those nuts are virtually inaccessible. An Orangutan might be able to get a tool on them. They must have mounted that before they bonded the deck on or something!
This has to be the most service-unfriendly thing I have ever worked on. :/
