Practical Boat Owner t http://www.pbo.co.uk 69
SWITCHPANEL SURGERY
Lucy is one of 45
Cornish Yawls
built in the late
1980s-early 1990sThe original bulkhead carried the rotary battery switch in
the original location, a new Beta engine instruments panel,
a voltmeter and test button, and a 12V power socket. The original
fuse panel was replaced with a Vetus unit by the original owner,
but I never liked the untidy positioning of the items.
With the instruments freed I cut a large rectangle from the
bulkhead with a drill and saw, then filed the edges. This
wasn’t easy and the result wasn’t perfect, but it would be hidden
in any case. I left a decent lip at the bottom to fix the hinge strip.
4
1
2
The battery cables came in low on the right, with sundry
lighting and direct battery feeds above them. The main flow
of live and earth feeds to instruments leave top left. Needless to
say it was quite a task identifying what went where.3
The wiring of the Vetus switch panel wasn’t great because
the very poor access made it difficult to arrange things
logically, which is something I hoped to solve. I found an
earth strip buried deep within this lot which would have been
impossible to access at sea.