Snow Gum has two Plastimo Olympic 135 compasses. Plastimo make yachting equipment predominantly out of plastic, on the basis that it won’t corrode. That’s a good idea. This also means that keeping water out of their equipment is not particularly important.
The Olympic 135 compass has drain holes at the bottom of the housing that let water out quicker than it comes in at the top. Plastimo expect that the compass will be mounted over a watertight pedestal. Garcia have provided a very nice access hole under the compass, sized perfectly for a rugby player’s arm, but it’s good at letting water through too. This water makes its way down to the steering compartment, via the electrical stuff inside the helm structure. Hmmm.
This video explores the problem of this leak. It also shows how to disassemble a Plastimo Olympic 135 compass. Garcia are helping me to devise a solution, to stop the leak. An idea I have proposed is to prepare a disc of aluminium slightly smaller than the hole, which would be siliconed or epoxied into place. It could be the piece that was cut out! 🙂 Then, remove the silicone sealing at the base of the binnacle. Water that gets through the compass will flow harmlessly out from under the binnacle and across the top of the newly watertight pedestal.
I’ll make a follow-up video showing how the problem is solved.
Regards, Rick.