Radar Love

Week of April 10th

One of the things on our fixit list was the works then doesn't then works again radar. It had been a blessing when crossing from the panhandle to Tarpon Springs in the fog. But it wouldn't spark up again when we left Naples. The second mechanic, Jason, was an electronics guy in a previous life and he agreed to take a look.

I hooked up the display box at the binnacle and plugged it in. The receiver seemed fine but there were no returns on the screen despite being surrounded by them in the lagoon. Jason looked up the mast at the radar dome. After a double take he said that he saw a problem.

The top of the radar dome was gone. The gasket between the dome and the base was hanging to one side and the transmitter inside could be seen from the side. The storm the night before must have taken the top of the dome off, but in all likelihood the problems started long before.

The radar didn't work after we first bought the boat. I honestly don't remember trying it during the survey since it wasn't included on the list of equipment. I'm thinking now maybe that was intentional rather than an oversight. We hooked it up again later thinking maybe we had done something wrong and it worked, and continued to work until Naples. The thinking is that the dome was loose and/or leaking, but not in an obvious way when the surveyor went up the mast last Spring. It finally was loose enough to fly off in the recent storm, which had 50mph+ gusts reported nearly.

Weirdly enough Jason had the same radar on his boat, but the display box didn't work on his. We agreed than one of us should buy the working half of the other's radar.