It was a fine, sunny morning in early Spring when I went to meet the skipper of this fishing vessel at Sussex Yacht Club, in Shoreham-by-Sea. I immediately warmed to his easy-going and friendly nature, and though our initial meeting was supposed to be just a scoping mission, I got straight in and started work. The project comprised of fitting a Garmin fish-finder transducer and Garmin chart plotter. Sussex Yacht Club is a fantastic place to work, a welcome relief from large, corporate and impersonal marinas that are quickly becoming the norm. The boatswain Ben is extremely helpful and friendly, as are the boatyard staff.

With the transducer fitted on the first day, the boat was launched on the second, and the skipper took her East to Lady Bee Marina in Southwick. At her home berth, I ran wires for the chartplotter as well as replaced degraded cables in the engine room and fitted new battery terminals. On the third day, I installed a new negative busbar, as around 30 negative cables had been connected to a single bolt. ISO 13297 requires no more than four connections to a single stud! I also repositioned the VHF radio and fist mic, ready for a custom-made fascia to be fitted to house the new chartplotter. The skipper was great throughout, making this was a fantastic project to work on.