Category Archives: Boat Details

Starlink, a Game Changer

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Connectivity on the boat has always been a bit of a challenge.  On the one hand you want to live in the moment and enjoy the absolute beauty around you.  On the other hand you want to be able to download weather, stay in touch with family and friends, and do basic things like banking.  

For the last 14 years we have been hustling to stay connected while on the boat.  It was always a challenge and it was invariably expensive.  So, how did we stay connected before Starlink?  We had several options which we ran consecutively as inevitably one did not work for various reasons.

Local Data Plans

When we are near land, we would visit the local communications shop, pick up a SIM card and purchase a pre-paid monthly data plan.  This would allow us to get basic WhatsApp (which is an amazing, free, app), low data apps, cruising apps (navionics, weather), basic email, and would give us a local phone number.  On average, this ran between $50-$150USD per month.   As you can see, we end up with a lot of different SIM cards.  What we have found is that Vini, Digicel and Vodafone do not work in different countries.  So, we end up with Digicel SIM cards from multiple countries.

Iridium Go

We have Iridium Go which is a satellite based communications technology and was our go to means of communications while we were underway (on passage or on route).  Iridium Go gave us a limited number of minutes of voice calling, text messages (with limited characters), limited email (no photos, attachments, logos), SOS, and the ability to download weather.  You could not access the internet.  The bonus with the Iridium Go is that you can take it with you in case of an emergency and you had to evacuate the boat.

We had the external antennae, spare batteries, and multiple sim cards.  The equipment costs around $1500-$2000.  Prior to Starlink, we were paying $160 per month which gave us unlimited data and 150 minutes of talk.  Once we got Starlink, we dropped this plan to the lowest possible plan which is $70 per month which gives us 5 minutes of talk and 1500 text messages – virtually nothing but it keeps the account active.  We mainly keep this for a back up plan in case something goes wrong with Starlink and we need a communication tool.  Expensive back up.

GoogleFi

I no longer have a cellular company in the USA so when I return for visits I have to use our GoogleFi account (on an android phone $500.  Originally I would tether GoogleFi phone to my iPhone to give me connectivity when I am not in a wifi zone.  Then I just started transferring the GoogleFi SIM card to my iPhone which is much easier than carrying two phones.

The GoogleFi monthly service is $30/month.  We hope to cancel this service this year when I return to the states.  I plan to sign up for a travel sim with www.mintmobile.com with my iPhone for connectivity.  If this works, I will have to port my main cell phone number (which I still use for WhatsApp) to Google Voice which is free.  

Other Communication Costs

We have other communication costs including our website hosting fee of $50/mo, Predict Wind $299/yr, and a few smaller expenses.

Starlink

Starlink claims to give you access to the internet virtually anywhere.  If you carry around their dish which is not really likely.  However, it is a complete game changer for cruisers and people who travel both on land and at sea!  It now gives us internet access 24/7 whether we are near shore or thousands of miles offshore.  

Starlink is a satellite internet constellation operated by American aerospace company SpaceX, providing coverage to over 70 countries. Starlink has launched 5,828 satellites into space and 5,438 are currently in use.  That’s a lot of satellites!

Here is a photo of our Starlink dish which we mounted to our dinghy davit.

What does it Cost

Well, it aint cheap that’s for sure.  We were lucky in that Starlink was offering a special to New Zealand rural customers.  We were staying in Whangarei at the time and that is considered a rural area so our equipment cost $300 NZD ($180 USD) as opposed to $599. 

Monthly Plan

They have many plans but since we are moving a lot, we are on the “mobile plan” and the monthly cost while we are near shore is $199/mo NZD ($128/mo USD).  If we go offshore or are more than 12nm from land, we upgrade to the Mobile Priority Plan and pay an additional $2-$3 per gigabyte of data.  It doesn’t sound like much but it adds up quickly.

Connecting Starlink

The website brags of an easy set up with a simple plug and play.  However, for cruisers, we had to do some modifications.  The first thing you should know is that Starlink is a power hog!  It draws on average 3amps (with the motor disabled and ice melt turned off) on 12v.  Even so, at start up it can be as high as 7amps and if you are doing a lot of downloads it can run 4-6amps.

Disabling the Motor

So, why did we modify the unit?   We disconnected the motor that made the dish rotate as it searched for satellites.  We simply locked the dish into a flat horizontal position so it has easy access to the sky.  This was a little scary as you have to drill a hole into the unit so be sure you know what you are doing before you attempt this project.

Converting to 12 volt

We converted AC to DC power to save more power, to save the ‘inefficiencies’ involved in converting 12v to 120v and then to 48v which is what the Starlink dish needs.  This conversion savings is small, but also eliminates the super basic Starlink router that runs hot and doesn’t have much functionality.

Converting to 12 volt also allowed us to control and monitor the usage on our CZone setup, and we created a ‘schedule’ that turns Starlink off at night and on in the morning (our time zone).  And a button we can press when we leave the boat to turn off the dish when we leave to go exploring.

We are using a 384watt 12v to 48v DC to DC converter, and Tycoon POE injector to get the power to dish.  Since Starlink used their own wiring plan, we also had to create custom CAT6 network cables to make it all work.    We chose to cut/hack the ‘ethernet adapter’ cable as part of the hack and leave the ‘long custom cable’ supplied by Starlink intact.   This gives us the opportunity if any of the ‘custom hacked cables or pieces’ fail we can plug in the original router and cable and be back in business.  Tho we do have backups of each of the customized hackery to convert it to 12 volt.  

In the process of doing our conversion we also joined and helped others get this working and its amazing how ‘fragile’ all the pieces can be.  The converter wasn’t stable or the POE injector wasn’t putting out enough juice, or the custom CAT5 cables were not crimped cleanly.  Lots of debugging when into why the ‘speeds were off’ or simply intermittently working or just not at all.

Routers

We use a Mikrotik router so that we simplify our network.  Every device wants to create its own ‘hot-spot’ / access point.   That requires you to change your Wi-Fi connection depending on what you were wanting to do onboard.  Iridium Go! was the most annoying since it did not provide a way to change the network settings, so we were always switching networks to be connected to iridium satellite vs boat instruments vs media server vs anchor alarm vs CZone network.  Using a decent router we were able to disable all the ‘access spots’ so that connecting to our one network everything is available.  We can see boat navigation instruments and the internet at the same time without having to switch which device we are connected too.  

Conclusion

As you can see there is a lot that goes into “staying connected.”  Hopefully, we will be able to ditch GoogleFi by early summer (saving us $360/yr). We also plan to start disconnected Iridium Go during non passage times.  This would save us $70/mo every month we are not using Iridium Go.  However, when we wanted to initiate Iridium Go for a passage we would have to buy a $15 SIM card, pay $50 start up fee and pay the $70 or the month.  Sill a LOT cheaper than spending $840/yr for access we only use 12-20 days a year.

We will still need to purchase local SIM cards for access while we are away from the boat and of course we will have to continue paying for our web hosting and Predict Wind fees.  But in my mind, every little bit helps when you eliminate costs.

Feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions on Starlink, the set up, power saving techniques, and or other communications.

Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual live events.  We visit the beautiful anchorages of Whangaroa in our last blog post.

A New Set of Wheels

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Boy that could mean so many things…a new boat — na.  A new dinghy — na.  A new car — na.  We literally mean a new set of wheels.  But why do we need wheels on a boat?  Well, we don’t “need” wheels but we got them for our dinghy.

Many cruisers use wheels to help them pull their dinghy onshore during a beach landing.  Our previous dinghy was soooo heavy. We could have used dinghy wheels for her but she was too heavy for the wheels.  Yes, the wheels have a weight restriction.

But, our new Highfield 360CL weighs in at 75 kilos, the outboard weighs 55 kilos and we carry about 15 kilos in fuel for a total of 145 kilos.  Just the right amount of weight for a set of new wheels.

Which Wheels to Buy?

There are lots of different types of wheels on the market and we really had to do our due diligence.  We made sure they would accommodate our dinghy’s make, model, and weight while still being able to work in hard and soft sand.  Beachmaster consistently came up as the top brand. 

Matt emailed them to make sure they would work and hold up with our set up and we received an affirmative reply.  We ordered the removable mount set with retractable wheels.  We wanted to be able to take them off if we were not planning on using them for a while.

Matt placed the order on Thursday.  On Friday we received a call from Beachmaster asking if we were a foreign flagged vessel and I said “yes.”  She then asked if the wheels were being installed onto our dinghy which would be leaving the country with us, I said “yes.”  And then she said, I will then send you a new invoice as the original invoice charged you for GST (tax) and you qualify for a GST (tax) free order.  

What?  Yes, that is absolutely true.  Normally, both Matt and I automatically request GST free so I assumed he did on this order.  But he forgot.  So, the company proactively realized this and reached out to us to credit us the GST!  Seriously an amazing company.

Drilling Holes Into Our New Dinghy

The package arrived on Monday (1 business day after placing the order).  Talk about service.   We measure multiple times, tape off the area, and measure again.  We then put them up with VHB double stick tape so we could raise and lower the wheels without hitting the rub rail.  Then we drilled the holes into the transom.

The top photo shows he wheels down and the bottom photo shows the wheels up.

It took two of us to drill the holes so no photos.  Once the bolt holes were drilled, Matt taped them off and filled them with 5200 so they would not leak.  Then we installed each side.

Here are the final photos.  The before (upper left), installed and up (top right), installed and down (bottom left).

Now all we need is a beach to try them out!

Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual live events.  This blog post occurred around mid-January 2024.  In our last post we spend a lot of time redoing our dinghy chaps which came unglued.

Chap my Hide! Dinghy Chaps Unglued

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Our new dinghy, a Highfield 360CL, has had a few issues.  Most recently the velcro holding the dinghy chaps (which are the cover to protect the pontoons) stopped sticking to the dinghy.  

We had our dinghy chaps custom made by Kim at Masterpieces in Canvas about 8 months ago.  She did an amazing job and we have had over a dozen people compliment us on the well made covers!   It was not her fault that the velcro sticky back stopped sticking.

The Problem

Kim used the sticky glue on the back of the velcro to adhere the chaps to the dinghy. The male part of the velcro stuck to the chaps and the female part (soft) of the velcro stuck to the dinghy.  In theory this works and it did for a short while (8 months).  But as the dinghy gets hot and cold in the sun it expands and contracts.  This causes the glue on the velcro to loosen and come off.  So, not a good long term plan.

With our last dinghy, we had the velcro glued onto hypalon strips, then sewn together, then we used special glue to stick the hypalon strips to the hypalon dinghy.  We should have remembered to do that to these chaps, but it slipped our mind as we had so much other stuff going on.  Our new dinghy is made from PVC not hypalon unfortunately. 

Hindsight is 20-20 they say.

The Remedy

We had a lovely conversation with Tim at Northland Inflatables.  He was able to sell us PVC strips and special PVC contact glue.  In addition, he walked us through the best way to remove the glue from the dinghy, the application of the velcro to the PVC, and the glueing process of the PVC strips to the dinghy. He is a wealth of information!

Tim informed us that the PVC strips will be stronger if you cut them diagonally across the fabric (rather than with the grain of the fabric).  Good tip.

We were ready to start this project after purchasing our special 2-part PVC contact glue, special brush, and 18m of 30mm wide PVC strips!

Step 1A: The Prep

It seems like all I do is glue removal projects!   Removal of all of the graphic stickers and its 23 year old glue, scraping all of the glue, 5200 and silicone from the ceiling panels, 6 hatch frames and of their adhesive, and now the dinghy glue.  And the funny thing is that they are all different, using different glues, on different surfaces, and requiring different removal techniques.

We removed the outboard and hauled the 75kilo dinghy up using our spin halyard.  Placing the dinghy on our two bean bags allowed easier access to the glue areas on the outside (see photo below).

The dinghy has 23 pieces of velcro spanning over 18 meters.  Tim had suggested we make the strips 30mm wide even though our velcro was only 25mm. He thought it might make sewing easier.  But in retrospect we should have just got 25mm strips.  Now we have to accomodate for the extra 5mm.  What I decided to do was apply the velcro on the bottom of each strip and had the extra 5mm on the top.  The reason I did this was because several velcro strips aligned with a seam and we did not want the white PVC strips to show.

We created a sheet and labeled/numbered each piece of velcro so we know exactly where it goes when we put it back.

Step 1B: More Prep

We used a pencil to mark where each piece of velcro (the edges, start and end) and then we taped all around the velcro before removal.  Taping will help limit the spread of glue and MEK when you start the adhesive removal process.  

We were really good about marking the edges but we did not tape until afterwards.  So the problem was the MEK took off the pencil markings so we had to guess where some of the pieces went. And some of the MEK extended beyond the velcro area causing a very slight discoloration.  So, tape before removing your velcro.

Step 2: The Removal

I carefully remove each of the 23 strips of velcro, one at a time. I place them on the PVC strips lining them up on the edge and labeling each one so I know where they go when we have to put them back onto the dinghy.

Next I get to removing the tons of glue off the dinghy.

We cannot use anything sharp to remove the glue because we would risk puncturing the pontoon (very bad).  I tried a rubber square, a plastic paddle, and a cool tool Aaron from Norsand Boatyard had given me and none of them worked.

Finally Matt brought out a putty knife that he adapted for me.  He rounded the corners and dulled the blade.  Eventually, I was able to remove the adhesive while using a heat gun to warm up the glue and the modified putty knife.  This would get the large globs off.  Then I went back with MEK (really nasty stuff) and a non-absorbent rag to remove the difficult to see remnants of the glue.  If you use an absorbent rag you end up wasting a lot more MEK. But you have to wear very thick, high quality gloves as the MEK will eat your skin and nails!

After many hours we finally have a dinghy without residue…clean.  It is always amusing to me that I have such a hard time removing adhesives.  Why do you ask?  Well, I am removing it because it no longer sticks, so why is it hard to come off?  Why I ask you?

Note

Tim from Northland Inflatables told us to put the velcro on the dull side of the PVC strips.  The dull side is the side that has UV protection which does not stick as well as the clean shiny side with no UV protection. The trick is trying to determine the shiny side from the dull side while in the sun.  So, we stick the velcro to the dull side, then sew it on.  This leaves the shiny, clean side ready for the contact glue to stick to the dinghy.

Step 3: Sewing

I tried to use our trusty Baby Lock sewing machine to sew the velcro to the PVC strips.  However, the machine struggled with the PVC as it was slippery and wouldn’t move with the machine’s foot.  And it made the stitching on the back look funny.

Matt breaks out our new “to us” Sailrite Sewing machine.  I had not used this machine yet as it totally intimidated me!  But, you got to start somewhere.  The Sailrite has much better feet and it just sucked the strips right through!

I had 38 meters of sewing to do as I sewed all four sides of each of the 23 strips of velcro to the PVC – it will not move now!

Step 4: Glue PVC strips to Dinghy

We did a lot of research on what was the best glue to stick things to PVC and either Bostik 995 or PVC contact glue were stated to be the best.  We found a tiny bottle (50ml) of Bostik 995 at All Marine for over $100.  Well that won’t do as we need over 300ml.  So, we asked Tim what we should use and suggested this special contact PVC glue that he uses on all of his dinghy repairs.  He sold us 300ml for $25.  Sweet as!

We run MEK along the strips and the dinghy to ensure there is nothing that will prohibit a good stick.

Next, we tape off the dinghy where each strip goes.  This will protect the dinghy from getting excess glue on it and it will help us align the strips in the exact place since we won’t have the luxury to move them around once they make contact with each other.

Matt and I work together to adhere the PVC strips.  Tim gave us a “chip” brush that he cut down to almost a stub and then rounded the corners.  He said this will help us to use less contact glue.

First you apply the contact glue to the PVC strip and then to the corresponding area on the dinghy.  You let it set for 10-15 minutes.  Then you go back with a heat gun to warm both up and slowly and carefully apply the PVC strip to the dinghy.  I say “slowly and carefully” because once the PVC strip makes contact with the dinghy it aint movin.  

Then I follow behind with a dowel to press the PVC strip to the dinghy and ensure it is stuck on good.

We ended up having to get an additional canister of the special PVC contact glue to finish our project.  But we did use it for two other smaller projects.  In the end I think we probably used 350-400ml.  We were probably more generous with the glue than necessary.

Completion

As you can see we are doing our best to leave no room for errors and to ensure this is stuck on good.  After a week of work we are finally done and our beautiful chaps are now snug as a bug in a rug!  Let’s hope these last us many years.

Our blog posts run 10-12 weeks behind actual live events.  This blog post occured in early January 2024.  Don’t miss out on our luxurious experience at Wai Ariki Hotsprings and Spa – check out our last blog post.