The rebuild of the Refrigeration/freezer too about 5 months. We were living aboard so I bought a small refrigerator at COSTCO and placed it in the pilot house. It just fit in front of the steering station with only a few inches to spare. Once I had that in place, I took a wrecking bar and claw hammer to the inside of the existing box. Once I got most of the interior pulled out, I climbed into the space and continued cleaning it to the hull. I was 20 pounds lighter at the time. :-) I started with the pink insulation board and added 2 inches of foam to the inside of the box. At the turn of the bilge I used spray foam and plywood forms to build steps so food, bottles and what not would not all slide down to the bottom. I lost some square inches in doing so but gained "Usable shelf space". I think the trade off was well worth it. By adding the steps/shelves, I also increased the amount of foam space on the inside of the hull which takes the sun. I then had vacuum panels made to fit inside in the exact shape of the interior box. I followed with two more inches of the pink board. The bottom was filled up with layers of the pink board for as deep as I could just reach to the bottom. That ended up about 5 inches including the vacuum panel. I had a friend who made tanks for plating systems and chemical cleaning give me some space age plastic that stays soft down to - 10 million degrees or in any event, really cold. After I cut the plastic to fit, he came in with his plastic welder and welded up all of the seams. In the process of designing the box, I divided it up using the pink board for the divider which turned out to be about three inches including the vacuum panel. I used a professionally made box lid from the same company who supplied the panels. The top of the freezer is about 6 inches below the inside lid of the box hatches. My thinking was that while I have to open the refrigerator and then the freezer to get into the freezer, cool air will fill the freezer compartment instead ambient outside cabin air. I think this keeps the freezer from having to work so hard to get the temperature back down after opening the freezer. There is a sliding shelf that I slide back and forth to get to the freezer or refrigerator sections. The freezer is 3.19 cubic feet and the refrigerator is 5.34 cubic feet. Not all that big but big enough for us.

There is a machinery space on the starboard side of the pilot house that is accessible from under the chart table. I have both of the compressors mounted in there as well as the air conditioner and SSB radio. That would be looking forward from the entry hatch. If you looked aft, you would see an additional hatch that is the entrance to the generator space. You gain access to the other end of the generator through the starboard cockpit locker.

A long time ago I made the decision to be comfortable while cruising. Cruising should not be an endurance marathon for your wife. "Lets see how miserable I can make it and see if she sticks around". Not a sound concept in MHO. Having made that decision, I have to put the amps back. It's a bunch of amps too. I run the DVD-TV, the computer, as many lights as she wants and Ice by the bags. She uses the microwave and anything else which makes her life easier. That, in turn, has kept her living on board prior to us cruising full time and now cruising for over 12 years. Not a bad trade off.

We have 2 4D AGM batteries which is a bit less then I would like but it is what it is. No more room and I can't deal with the weight of more batteries. After all is said and done, when I get up in the morning, after all the TV and everything else, I'm down about 125 amps. I make that back with 350 watts of solar, the wind generator and the diesel generator. I run the generator through a Zantrax 2000 Watt inverter/charger and usually it's about an hour a day on top of what the solar/wind systems put in. I have link 10 meters as well as the remote power share panel which allows me to control how much the Zantrax pulls from the generator. By using It I can keep the generator loaded but not over loaded. I hope this helps. Feel free to ask if you have any more questions.

Steve S/V Brendon