A QUICK AND EASY WAY TO ADD A SOLAR POWERED LIGHTING SYSTEM

I mentioned awhile back how living on my boat with it's LED lights and Solar Panels inspired me to build the solar powered lighting system for my house.
Now a company called BIOLITE has come up with a compact solar lighting, charging and music system that is priced reasonably and could be used at home or on a boat.

It even has an FM radio and MP3 player built in. Here is an overview:



Looks like a quick and easy way to add a solar powered lighting system to a boat or home.

 Kit includes a 6 watt solar panel, screws, the control box, three individual string lights with individual switches, including one with a motion sensor.

• Lighting includes 3 over-head lights with their own switches: 2 100-lumen string lights and 1 motion sensor light.
• Control box includes 20-watt hour rechargeable battery to store solar energy, 2 USB device charging ports, digital display for feedback on power availability, and speaker control
• Enjoy the built-in FM radio and speaker or use the SD card reader to play your MP3 music

At $149 the BioLite SolarHome 620 Portable Off-Grid Solar Lighting System is at a minimum a great way to light up your evenings or if you already have solar it could provide the backup lighting you need for nights at anchor. While allowing your current system to deal with important functions like refrigeration. 

Hat Tip: Boat Bits

SONGS FOR SAILING: Albatross

I've come upon a new song to add to BIANKA's MP3 player category of songs for sailing. I usually don't play music while under sail since I prefer the natural sounds of the water and nature. At anchor or while working on the boat over the winter it's nice to have a little nautical tune on the boom box. I don't know how I came upon it but, Fleetwood Mac's Peter Green composition  Albatross seems perfect for lazing in the cockpit on a starry night, laying on a coat of varnish or breezing along at four or five knots.

DOWNSIZING SOUNDS GOOD

The entertainment system on board BIANKA is not elaborate. For over decade it was a Panasonic RX-DS7 boom box. The unit had a CD player, AM/FM radio and even a cassette player. Yes, I still have some cassettes. Unfortunately, the unit over the years has gotten a little beat up which included a few falls to the cabin floor.

It's got a couple of dents in the speaker grill. The CD had also become non functional and developed a raspy sound in it's speakers. The reason why I found out on closer inspection is that one of the speakers  had broken away from it's mounting:

Obviously after ten plus years it was time for a new unit.  So the other day I made an impulse buy and bought a new "entertainment center" for the boat. It is a GPX CD/Radio/MP3  Boombox   .
It is a basic unit that has no cassette player but, does have a line input so I could plug in my MP3 player or even a cassette player if I ever wanted too. It also has a digital tuner as compared to the old Panasonic unit which had a linear tuning system:

The GPX CD/Radio/MP3 input Boombox   is also much smaller that the Panasonic it is replacing:

On a thirty foot boat like BIANKA having smaller items in the cabin is a good thing. I also modified the GPX so I could hook it into the 12 volt to 9 volt power supply I built to power the Panasonic unit:

I also added Anderson Powerpole connectors to the GPX  unit and power supply making it easy to disconnect and secure the box while underway:

. The unit sounds good and fits easily on the shelf I built for the Panasonic unit:

While I tend to not play the radio or CD too often on board preferring to keep an ear out for the cry of the Osprey or other sounds. Still it's nice to have some tunes available from time to time. The first CD I played on the unit was John Renbourn's The Hermit which is an excellent CD for listening to on board on a tranquil summer evening. Hopefully this unit will last as long as the previous "entertainment center" on board.