wkearney99

Shrink also has the advantages of being slicker than canvas and not requiring as much support. Properly installed shrinkwrap ends up being a lot tighter than most other options. That taut surface offers several things. One being less movement and that generally means less chance of it working loose and causing damage to the boat surfaces. Another benefit is it's ability to shed loads. A tight, slick surface will slough off snow better. These assume it having been properly installed. The downsides to shrink are it's a one-shot installation and it's wasteful. You can't typically re-use it.

And you realize how poorly those portable units "integrate", right? Usually with nothing more than audio outs. It's not in their best interest to have you subscribing with only one device. Better to ding you for one radio built into your car, the wife's car, the house, another in the boat, etc. Not that it invalidates the idea, just that satellite radio makes a less than ideal analogy. As for a "does everything" core device, that often ends up as a 'jack of all trades, master of none' scenario. Can't argue against it being a fine idea, just not one without a lot of engineering hassles and expense. Meanwhile purpose-built devices do a better job at often considerably less cost. Now, make the devices interoperate more seamlessly and then you're on to something. Each can contain as much or as little functionality as necessary to perform it's tasks.

So you've never left your plug or keys at home? Wouldn't that be great, no chart plotting because you didn't bring the phone along... Can't argue against having better integration. Being able to search or route plan on the phone and upload to the plotter would be great. Being able to pull data from the boat for use on the phone would likewise be helpful. A few gateway type of devices could handle this. For some casual situations using a phone works. But when the weather turns crappy and you NEED to have the plotter working, as the boat is being tossed around like a toy, a handheld phone is not going to suffice.

Most electronic controls have a programmable delay. Some even have modes to allow for greater delays for different speeds (like a different ramp-up curve during docking). I'll never go back to using a boat without them. But then I'm using a boat with inboards.

Generally, a well-done shrink job is more secure than a tarp. A tarp will have all sorts of extra folds in it. It'll end up collecting water or whipping loose in the wind. Loose material flapping can cause a lot of damage pretty quick. Water collected in the tarp can freeze or cause mold. Tarps don't usually have means to vent properly either. Most tarps aren't all that UV stable and will rot out a lot sooner (but probably not over the course of one winter). Then there's the "it looks like crap" perspective...

Nothing wrong with using the wingnuts, as they're safer for removing the batteries. I agree about using a battery box for the wet cell battery and capping ALL terminals. Especially if you stop using wingnuts. They sell boots designed for all kinds of connections. I'd consider using the top posts on that other battery instead of the side connections. They make connectors that will grip the posts and then provide a stud for the wingnut type connection. That way everything is connected 'the same way' in the event you need to change batteries around. You REALLY don't want to leave the chance that anything falling across the terminals could cause a short/spark. Like when holding a wrench and having a wedding ring or wristwatch hit the other terminal. The arc will burn the Hell out of you, in some cases bad enough to lose the finger. Here's one other suggestion, take steps to secure the wiring. Don't just leave it dangling like that. Wave action will cause the wires to shift around and eventually the motion will cause the connections to break (either at the connectors or internal to the wire). Use some screw-down or adhesive square wire tie mounts.

What's to tell? It's a splitter that lets you feed two Sirius units from one Sirius antenna. Sorta thought that would've been obvious from what I posted. The sat antenna is powered so it can't just be "passively split" between two devices. The unit deals with properly powering the antenna. It's Shakespeare part SRS-3 and it came complete with enough cabling to wire up just about any typical recreational boat.

Probably not the best idea as those cleaners will likely destroy the plasticizers in the vinyl, making it brittle and cause it to crack a lot sooner than it would otherwise.

I picked up a bunch of 1/0 marine wire (and it IS different than auto or welding wire) from Skycraftsurplus.com I then picked up a hammer crimper from a local battery supply store. I used Ancor lugs and proper heatshrink. Still looking good as new 3 seasons later.

And note if you have more than one Sirius device you can get a combiner from Shakespeare to share a single antenna. Got mine from Jim at BOE and it's worked great for three seasons now.

Yep, you can use either the Raymarine OR the Clarion interface. You don't need both. The one you choose will determine how you change the channels. If you have the Clarion remotes and you want to use those then you'll have to get the Clarion interface. The Raymarine interface can only be controlled from a Raymarine chartplotter, not the Clarion radio or it's remotes. You may want to think about how you change channels. The Clarion interface is nice in that it keeps any guests from fiddling with your chartplotter just to make radio changes. But you still have to use the radio (or it's remotes) to make volume control changes. That and you have to page away from your charts in order to get to the radio controls. Personally I don't like the Raymarine setup as it's visually pretty ugly and not all that friendly to use. The Clarion box isn't without flaws though, you only get three groups of 5 pre-set channels. You can't roll up/down through single channels. You can only make single channel changes from the radio itself (NOT the remotes). The remotes only allow scrolling up/down between those pre-sets. But that's about my only complaint about the Clarion setup. It works nicely otherwise. And if you decide to add the Sirius weather module you don't have to add a second antenna. Shakespeare makes a combiner that will let you share a single Sirius antenna between two devices. I have the Clarion interface for the radio and the Raymarine module for weather. Both go through the combiner and a single antenna. One less widget drilled into the radar arch. It's worked great for three seasons now.