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I am considering building a teak electronics box for the new console. Does anyone have plans and dimensions for one? Does anyone have a Outrage / Montauk with the later console design close enough to measure the console top (L x W )?
Thanks
It is approximately 30 inches wide, and fairly narrow! I'm not sure you'll accomplish what you want to with this rather small console (relative to the consoles being made today).
Are you also going to have the masthead lamp run up through the console top and the electronics box?
I haven't figured out yet what to do about the lighting. I am considering just an all around stern light.
The real purpose for the electronics box is to have some place to lock up both the GPS and the Fishfinder. I could lock them in the console but i usually have other stuff locked in there. It would also provide a place to store cell phone, ipod and ID while out on the boat.
I also realized by removing the t-top I need to find a place to store the ladder as well.
I recommend you not modify your console until you determine what to do about the lighting problem aboard. I understand the desire to have a place to lock valuables – in this regard, I really like the newer consoles.
Re: the lighting problem aboard.
Since you’re now missing your T-Top, which, in my opinion is a nearly PERFECT solution to the lighting problem aboard small boats, you’ll need to evaluate how best to solve this problem.
First, we’ll need to determine how often you boat in nighttime conditions. Low vis conditions such as rain and fog aren’t as important here, because night-vision isn’t critical as it is for nighttime boating.
The problem with an all-around stern light, in my opinion, is that most are upon a woefully inadequate (height wise) staff. You need this night-vision killing, backscatter-creating light as far away (above) the cockpit as is feasible. It needs to be at least a 6 foot tall mast, otherwise you’ll turn around to check for traffic and blind yourself with white light, and you’ll create a “blind spot” for oncoming boaters who will not be able to see the light due to your body in the way, or worse yet, any canvas you have up.
Part of the beauty of the Outrage series of boats was the use of “international” lighting – i.e. separate side marker lights and a separate masthead (steaming) light and a rearward-facing stern light.
This created the hope of a dark cockpit to protect the pilot’s night vision. Most boats with an all-around stern light pole abandon all hope of this dark cockpit. The major drawback was that running with the canvas up at night was nearly impossible. Certainly the eisenglass window needed to be stowed otherwise it was like looking out a living room window with the lights on in the house, looking for details of what is happening on dark street.
If you only navigate at night during rare early-morning or late-evening runs to or from fishing or watering holes, then an all-around stern light may be a fine solution, sans canvas.
I still think that as challenging as it can be from time to time, that if you do not have an arch or T-TOP on your Whaler, a masthead light on the console, raised high above the operator’s eye level and using the forward facing glare shield (available from PERKO), combined with a rearward facing stern light, is the very best solution – or at least, the best compromise.
For your situation, this could still be accomplished by removing the fitting atop your console, and overdrilling the hole to accommodate a PVC shaft that would go through the “interior” of your new box. Atop the new box, re-install the fitting so that the mast would drop through both the fitting and the tubing into your console. This would keep the locked box contents clean and free of any contamination coming in through the masthead fitting. If you’re switching to Mills Canvas, I recommend talking to a local canvas shop about the feasibility of modifying it to accommodate a small flap to allow the masthead lamp to protrude above the canvas.
Just for the record, in case it didn’t come through loud and clear – I’d avoid using an all-around white light in all but two conditions: 1. You hardly, if ever, operate the boat at night or in nighttime (pre dawn or post dusk) situations. 1. You use a very tall mast on which to mount the all-around white light, tall enough to sufficiently put the light above your head, and above any canvas you may have deployed to protect you from weather.
Lighting:
At this point I rarely boat after dark. That may change with the new engine but I don't expect it to initially. The next thing is, I will have a new console and without the T-Top, I have no current lighting on the console or any remnants of any so I am basically starting fresh. I have the standard red / green but nothing else. I am looking to have something on the boat in the event I get stuck out at night so I can have lights and be legal but I realize whatever I do now will get transfered into the final configuration as I make more and more changes to the boat.
I was going to possibly build a stern light, or rather Tom's version of the stern light but the base is no longer available so I am reviewing my options at this point.
Teak Electronics Box:
The one nice thing about this would be limiting the holes in the console to 1 for pulling wires into and out of the box and the 4 or 6 holes to secure the box to the console top and that's it. I am thinking of it more like the electronics box on T-top so I would run a single power feed to the box and run a single NME183 feed from the box to the Navman and that is the end of the wiring. Still debating if I install the VHF in the box or into the console. If I install it in the box then the same hole used to bring power in would bring both the VHF antenna and the Cell antenna up from the rigging tunnel into the box. I am really waiting until I have console in hand to decide where to install the switches for the bilge, master power and lighting.
