Since winter in the Pacific Northwest is not the optimal boating time, with wind gusts yesterday to 59mph, it is a better time to be doing boat maintenance and upgrades rather than trying to go out.

This weekend we finished the install of the Simrad NAC-3 autopilot core pack, replacing the original dead SeaTalk autopilot.

Here is the original SeaTalk system, the control unit or brain of the system was installed in the bilge and appears to have had way more salt water in it than any computer system should have.

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The new autopilot is integrated to our Simrad NSS-15 an dis controlled on screen rather than a separate hardware device. One big difference is the old autopi

Here is the new system, which we mounted the main computer under the salon sofa rather than in the bilge.

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The parts of the NAC-3 autopilot system are the following:

• Your display screen. We are using our existing NSS-15 display what we had installed in September.

• There is the main autopilot computer, which talks to the NSS display via NMEA2000 cables. This also connects to 12 volt power and to the hydraulic unit that is used to push the steering in one direction or the other. Fortunately we were able to salvage the hydraulic pump from the old system.

• Rudder feedback device. This is NMEA 2000 connected to the rudders to determine what their current position is.
• The Compass / GPS unit The autopilot needs to know the exact compass bearing of the boat at all times in order to be able to adjust as needed. The Compass/GPS unit is also attached with NMEA2000 cabeling.

The biggest part of the install as usual was the pulling of cables. We pulled NMEA2000 cables from the pilothouse dashboard to connect the NSS15 and the compass/GPS unit, to behind the refrigerator where we had the existing NMEA2000 connection. Next we ran 2 cables down in the engine room, one to the rudder feedback device, and the other popped up under the sofa where we have the NAC 3 device. We also ran a NMEA2000 cable to the fly bridge for our next project which will be connecting the NSS-9 on the fly bridge, and connecting the new radar to the radar arch.

As far as maintenance goes, next weekend we will be having the oil changed and tune up work being done by our mechanic on both of the Cummins diesel engines.