Compass light

I ran the cable for the compass light quite some time ago, I had left it coiled up below the steering pedestal with the intention of connecting it up sometime in the future. On Monday morning I took the compass out to see what was required to connect the light only to find that the twisted pair cable had been cut/broken off leaving two very short tails. Further investigation showed that both wires were originally soldered directly to the lamp and one of them had come adrift, I tried to re solder it to no avail, I found a replacement from Force Four chandlery which was duly ordered on Monday evening

Wednesday was spent cleaning up the mounting for the compass there was an old rubber gasket together with large amounts of silicon sealant to be removed, also the screws which hold the bezel were short machine screws which were fitted into tapped holes in an aluminium ring which was then screwed to the top face of the steering pedestal. The threads in the tapped holes in the aluminium ring had corroded away so I countersunk the holes from the underside of the ring so that I would be able to retain the bezel with countersunk screws and nyloc nuts inserted from below.

The new lamp arrived on Wednesday so on Friday morning I fitted it into the lamp holder.

New lamp on right original to the left  of the picture

New lamp fitted to the lamp holder

The twisted pair cable was connected to the supply cable using a connector block I know I don't like them much but by securing the connector block to the inside of the steering pedestal, with a self tapping screw from the exterior, I was able to support the weight of the supply cable so that the strain was not taken by the twisted pair which is very thin. The compass was then re bedded into the steering pedestal using closed cell foam tape.

Self tapping screw to secure connector block

Compass in place note nyloc nuts on the bezel

It can be seen from the above photographs that the steering pedestal could do with re coating I am assuming that the black finish is probably original I am not sure what it is, possibly powder coating, this will be a job for next winter. I finished up the day with a bit more cosmetic stuff removing various paint and glue splashes from various bits of stainless steel handrails etc some were down to me but previous owners are also guilty the black spots in the photograph are rain.