Thursday, September 21, 2017

Hooking up the hydraulics

Kind of light on the pictures, but just prior to hauling out we got most of the hydraulic plumbing in place up to the forward bulkhead where the bow thruster is going. This included three more lines from engine room to bow (supply, return, and case drain from the thruster motor- more on that later).
There was also a lot of engine room hoses to make and install. I used a hydraulic fitting crimper to make all the hoses in the shop at work:


Then a weekend installing everything:





Snaking new hoses through the boat to the bow:




Reworking the anchor winch plumbing to work with the new hydraulic pump:


Hooking up all the wiring for the control box:



After all this, I was able to successfully start up the engine and run the pump to set pressures and make sure all the controls for the system work the way they are supposed to. This pump is a beast: 
20+ gpm at 3,000 psi, at engine idle. So far so good. Good pressure, no leaks found, and the anchor winch works. The big test will be running the bow thruster motor after we get it installed at the end of our haulout. Hope to be able to launch the boat with the bow thruster fully functional.