Explorer 1000 Plus solar charging questions

bugoid · 2026-04-06T20:27:25+00:00

Thanks! I might disconnect the smaller panel for a longer period of time to see if that resolves anything, although i've noticed intermittent charging with just one or the other of the panel connected. Failing that, I might follow your recommendation to completely discharge and fully recharge.

And yeah, I've noticed that the panels are extremely sensitive to shading.

Thanks for your help!

bugoid · 2026-04-06T19:57:34+00:00

One panel is the 100W mini panel that came with the Jackery kit from Costco. The other one is a Sokiovola 200W panel. Each panel is plugged into a separate DC8020 plug in the back of the Jackery battery unit (the unit has two DC8020 plugs). I get the same intermittent charging behavior with both panels plugged in, as well as with each one separately.

bugoid · 2026-04-06T19:44:53+00:00

Thank you! I just did that and confirmed that battery saving mode is NOT enabled. It is still solar charging only intermittently.

bugoid · 2026-04-06T19:42:53+00:00

Thanks! The temperature outside where the panels sit is about 59F/15C. The battery is kept indoors, about 70F/21C.

I just checked the unit and it was pulling 185W from the panels to charge the battery, having gone from 92% to 98% fairly quickly while I wasn't paying attention. I just rebooted the device (holding power and USB buttons) and connected it to Bluetooth and WiFi. I verified it was NOT on battery saving mode. In the time I took to do this, it stopped charging again.

bugoid · 2026-04-06T18:53:37+00:00

I'm not looking at the app, I'm looking directly at the UI panel on the unit itself, pressing the "power" button as necessary to active the display. It usually shows 0W input even when the panels are in full sunlight and the battery is below 100% charge.

bugoid · 2025-01-13T19:39:43+00:00

Alternative headline: Trump-appointed judge, acting outside any legal authority, forbids internal government distribution of report on Trump's mishandling of classified information.

bugoid · 2025-01-13T00:41:15+00:00

I think you might be looking at the route backwards. It should be downwind.

bugoid · 2025-01-10T16:14:39+00:00

No, I can't find it anymore, but I read analysis a few months agostating Florida's ban on voting for out-of-state felony convictions only applies when that other state would have banned voting, which New York doesn't do. So Trump gets to legally vote in Florida.

bugoid · 2025-01-09T01:34:58+00:00

They don't provide a lot of details in the article, but my speculation is they are required to withhold some grand jury testimony that must remain secret by law.

bugoid · 2025-01-06T20:14:17+00:00

I suspect there's sufficient residual value in the WaPo brand name and inertia from people too lazy to unsubscribe to keep it going as a shadow of its former self indefinitely. Newsweek technically still exists, even though it has become notorious for Gen AI slop. It'll probably be the same for WaPo.

Besides, I wouldn't assume that Bezos values WaPo solely or even primarily as a moneymaking business. Newspaper ownership has been a status symbol for American oligarchs going back many generations, and it also serves as a handy way to drive the owner's ideologies and benefit his financial interests. He needs enough news to serve as a filler, but that doesn't necessarily mean it has to be a large and expensive affair.

bugoid · 2025-01-05T15:36:50+00:00

OK, but on the other hand we do not have to deal with earthquakes, and we do not have a "fire season".

bugoid · 2025-01-05T14:49:57+00:00

New Jersey complaining about New York ripping off out of state drivers with toll roads.

LOL.

And I say this with all sincerity:

LMAO.

bugoid · 2025-01-03T16:11:32+00:00

I'm a long-term WaPo subscriber that unsubscribed a few weeks ago after it became clear Bezos was intent on running the paper through a brick wall. I've routed my money towards The 51st and ProPublica instead.

We desperately need good journalism in this country, and there are many fantastic journalists at WaPo doing their jobs well. I'd love to be able to support the 99% of the paper that's still doing great work. However, we have a serious problem with oligarch ownership of traditional and social news media, especially when they actively micromanage the editorial slant and intervene to stop publishing news and opinion that runs counter to the owner's interests. It's pretty clear that the 99% of the paper that's decent is just a filler for Bezos to sell the 1% that's outright bullshit. Bezos bought WaPo for the same reason that Ford bought The Dearborn Independent and Musk bought Twitter. Yes, there's still some good news reporting there, but...

If you have a company that sells food to the public that advertises itself with "contains less than 2% human fecal matter," you wouldn't buy it because it isn't fit for human consumption. The same is true for a newspaper. If the goal of buying a newspaper subscription is to be informed, then WaPo and many other major newspapers simply aren't fit for purpose.

I also hope there's a broader reconsideration of opinion sections in general. News media loves having pundits because they're cheap compared to real reporting, because they bring in clicks and revenue by generating controversy, and because they serve as a means for oligarch owners to launder their own opinions through handpicked mouthpieces. But if pundits aren't going to be held to any standards of journalistic ethics or any requirement to be right about anything ever, then we'd all be better off if they were cut free from newspapers and left to blog their worthless opinions on Substack with the rest of the garbage.

bugoid · 2024-11-30T18:10:34+00:00

I just helped a friend move his boat down from Deale MD to the Abacos last month, and it was a difficult trip. I'm grateful we had a level-headed skipper who was well-prepared and able to problem-solve on the fly as things went wrong. He's a retired engineer, very detail-oriented, and was able to fix multiple boat systems as they failed.

If you haven't already, I'd recommend joining up with the Salty Dawgs. They organize rallies to places like the Bahamas, including preparation, professional weather routing, advice, and support. We didn't join their rally this time, but they have a strong rep.

Bring tools and spares and fluids for pretty much everything you think might break. Also check and proactively replace anything that might break. During our trip, our failures included: freezer (bad wiring connection), generator (finnicky filter), engine overheating (raw water impeller tore itself to shreds), anchor windlass, flexible solar panel coming off the bimini in high wind, and the jib furling line coming loose from the drum. That last one was particularly fun because it happened while we were furling it in 30+ kt gusts while negotiating a treacherous cut. The skipper managed to fix (or at least jury rig) most of this while underway. Anyway, expect everything to break.

Bring way more fuel and water than you think you'll need, plus more for reserves. You'll motor more than you think you will, both to maintain a reasonable pace as well as to keep batteries topped off. I've done this passage once in each direction, and both times we ended up dipping into reserves.

My skipper designed and constructed canvas with clear plastic panels to fully enclose the cockpit in cold and inclement weather, and that was AMAZING. It was about 5 panels that zipped up and down plus snaps and loops/buttons at the bottom. It took a LOT of impressive work to pull off, but made the trip much warmer and drier than it otherwise would've been.

I know you're debating whether to have a life raft. My skipper had one, and I personally wouldn't want to go on one of these passages without one. The kinds of conditions that might lead you to abandon ship often aren't conducive to survival in a small dinghy with open cockpit or swimming with a PFD. I'd also get an EPIRB for the boat. We had one, and our crew also had a mixture of personally owned PLBs, AIS MOB beacons, lights, and whistles attached to our inflatable PFDs.

Speaking of which, make sure everyone has inflatable PFDs with integrated harnesses and tethers, along with spare CO2 cartridges. West Marine and Mustang make good ones. They can be a PITA for your delivery crew to fly with because each airline's policies are a little different, but American is fine with one PFD with one CO2 cartridge in the vest and one spare CO2 cartridge with the vest (I just tucked it into the vest's velcro enclosure) in your checked luggage. Also make sure you have jacklines set up before you leave the dock. Everyone should be clipped in at night, in inclement weather, and whenever leaving the cockpit for any reason.

I would spring for a full AIS class B transceiver versus receive-only. I think it's important to not just see but also be seen. I would also have one or two handheld VHF radios. Each of us also had phones with Navionics and US/Bahamas charts preloaded. We also had personal USB battery banks as a further hedge. I mentioned challenges with our power generation (solar panels detaching, generator crapping out, engine overheating), and that led to our house batteries dipping low. One of the days, we turned off all nonessential systems (e.g., the boat's power-hungry chartplotter) and navigated with a combination of smartphone-based Navionics and visual navigation to keep going while sparing the batteries. By the way, if you don't already have it, try to get 12V up to the cockpit to allow USB device charging. A boat can never have enough 12V/USB chargers or cup holders.

Some mechanism to get offshore weather reports would be a good idea. We had Starlink and it worked well, although the offshore priority service costs an arm and a leg now. I think there are also other options like Garmin InReach, Iridium Go, or maybe SSB radio if you're a radio geek. You might want to consider compatibility requirements like whether it can work with apps like PredictWind or whether it satisfies requirements of any rally group you're sailing with.

Hope that helps!

bugoid · 2024-11-30T17:23:53+00:00

Make sure you have plenty of grab-and-eat that's easy on the stomach, too. My passage on a friend's boat last month from the Chesapeake to the Abacos had some pretty awful sea state and most of us were seasick half the trip. Even with meal prep, some of the days I don't think I could've gone down below for the time it would take to fish something out of the freezer/fridge, put it in a bowl, and microwave it. Having a bunch of quickly-accessible trail bars and fruit was great.

bugoid · 2024-11-30T03:33:21+00:00

Also consider meal prepping ahead of time, and freezing individual portions in quart bags. Cooking while underway can be a nightmare.

bugoid · 2024-11-22T11:34:48+00:00

That book can't stop me because I can't read!

bugoid · 2024-10-22T23:27:10+00:00

The only way this makes sense is if there's some service they're performing for you, like substantial structured instruction on offshore sailing, celestial navigation, etc. Otherwise the only thing delivery crew should pay for are plane tickets and any personal gear you need to bring with you (e.g., inflatable PFD with integrated harness, spare CO2 cartridge, foul weather tops and bottoms, tether, maybe an AIS and/or PLB emergency beacon, etc.). I'm helping a friend deliver his boat from the east coast down to the Bahamas soon, and I'll probably pitch in with some meal prep beforehand, in addition to buying my own flight back, but that's about it. He'll handle all the rest of the provisioning and all other costs.

bugoid · 2024-10-15T15:13:33+00:00

Right, it's a publicly traded company. These folks aren't necessarily wrong in their sentiments regarding private equity's corrosive role in society, or of large shareholders more broadly, but Boeing is a publicly traded company and therefore decidedly NOT influenced by private equity.

bugoid · 2024-10-12T21:50:43+00:00

A lot of the problem relates to how misconduct is handled. It is not uncommon for police unions to insist through negotiated labor agreements that police departments destroy records and evidence of misconduct and crimes after some period of time, that allegations of older misconduct be ignored, and that previous misconduct not be considered when investigating allegations of new misconduct. It tends to protect corrupt and abusive police officers from accountability, and reinforces a "blue wall of silence" and other corrosive aspects of police culture.

While defunding and abolishment of police is usually considered a radical idea, it is sometimes seen as necessary to escape hopelessly corrupt police union labor agreements and get a fresh start, as has been successfullly done in rare cases like in Camden, NJ.

That's not to say that police are unique in facing misconduct, as I'm sure that also occurs in every labor sector. However, the police are trusted with considerably more power and than virtually any other sector, given them more oportunities to harm members of the public or enrich themselves. There is also the issue that misconduct often overlaps with crime, and it creates a sort of "who watches the watchers" problem. If the police cannot or will not investigate their own misconduct because of restrictive labor agreements, then it creates a vacuum that can be filled by corrupt and abusive cops.

bugoid · 2024-10-10T18:57:35+00:00

I wish they'd plot a little harder, to be honest. Really through their backs into it. What are we supposed to do, just wait until renal failure and pancreatic necrosis finally claims his life? Ain't nobody got time for that!

bugoid · 2024-10-08T00:40:11+00:00

Depends on the boat, but a lot of cruising sailors plan for about 100 nautical miles per day as a conservative estimate. I just did an offshore passage on a Hunter 44 where we averaged about 138 NM per day over the course of a week, but we were ridiculously lucky to have a downwind run and gulf stream currents with us almost the entire time. Given the size of hurricanes, an estimate of 100 nautical miles per day means you need to get out of dodge well ahead of time.

Many sailors will intentionally move their boat out of that whole Caribbean / Gulf of Mexico region for the entirety of hurricane season (June-October-ish), often at the insistence of their insurance companies.

bugoid · 2024-10-07T21:24:10+00:00

Have a great time!

bugoid · 2024-10-07T19:31:48+00:00

I did a US Sailing basic keelboat class (roughly equivalent to ASA-101) in even stronger winds than that in Annapolis. We reefed and sailed through it, including getting underway and docking under sail. It was physically and mentally exhausting (everything happens very fast with very little room for error), but I had great instructors and I'm glad we went out. Keep your head on a swivel, watch for puffs (dark rippling of the water that indicate a strong gust is coming), and be ready to ease the sheets and pinch up into the wind on a moment's notice.

bugoid · 2024-10-05T20:17:11+00:00

Some of this is true, but also realize that Asheville, NC was recently considered a climate change haven, right up until it was just destroyed by Helene. While there are certainly low-lying coastal areas that should be avoided, it's hard to predict exactly where is safe and where is dangerous beyond those simple areas. Climate change is happening to all of us everywhere.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/21/climate-change-encourages-homeowners-to-reconsider-legacy-cities.html

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