Friday 10 Apr, CY day 27: After breakfast we remove the bimini to start sewing the solar panels framing while we still have the over boom cover to keep us cool.

I spend most of the day in the saloon fighting for space with the massive amount of bimini material that seems to engulf everything.
At the aft end of the bimini there is a clear perspex panel where, in theory, you can view the rig and sails while standing at the helm. But we never use it because you simply cannot see much through it. And going forward it will have 2 of the 6 solar panels on it anyway. So now it will be covered up for good, with the panel of sunbrella that is normal velcroed to its underside. There are also lots and lots of other small bits to sew in preparation for each solar panel. For instance: 4 triangle wear patches per panel – so 24 of those. And 2 thin UV strips per panel – so 12 of those, and so on. And velcro strips down the middle for the sunbrella UV protection for the wiring.

After the bits and pieces are cut and prepared, by the evening we actually start sewing on the pieces for the first solar panel slider system. It takes 3 hours to sew just that one. Hopefully, the next 5 will be quicker because we need to get the bimini back up by Sunday when it is forecast to be windy again, meaning we will have to take down the over-boom sunshade.
In-between this, we continue to test the solar panels on the bow deck. They seem to output OK. It’s so nice to see decent battery charging power coming purely from the sun.

It’s been another hot windless day today. The surrounding sea is glassy calm and we take several swims to keep cool. Thank goodness we have this luxury, especially as we hear everyone’s swimming pools ashore are going green due to the maintenance companies being on lock-down.

As it’s Good Friday holiday today, there was no government briefing from the authorities. So nothing to report on the local Covid-19 situation. It’s actually a relief not to hear about it for a whole day!

So ends day 2 of the bimini solar panels sewing project. No wonder these things cost a lot of money at canvas shops.