Lazarette

Before I can move forward on the steering system, I needed to finish sheathing the lazarette. The lazarette is the area aft of the engine room and underneath the cockpit. The rudder post and steering gear is located in this room. The room is pretty large measuring about 14' x 7' x 48" high.

While the lazarette is home to the rudder and steering gear, I also have put some more equipment in here. The marine air conditioner that will cool the salon and wheel house will be in the lazarette along with the water heater, freezer, air compressor, 90 gallon black water tank, and generator discharge line ( wet exhaust), and fresh water hot and cold manifold.

When I was welding the boat I framed a level pad for the black water holding tank. Other than that one level area, the lazarette floor follows the shape of the hull.

I sheathed the lazarette with 1/2" B/C plywood then painted on a coat of primer( actually, I had my 16 year old son Conall Jr. paint the room), and three coats of white enamel house paint. Since I was working in that are, I decided to install the light wiring and the conduit and boxes for the various electric equipment. I had already run the wires to the big junction box next to the generator in the engine room so it was no big deal to continue the conduit run in to the lazarette. I decided to install a light switch outside of the lazarette on the engine room AC light circuit ( this will be on an inverter circuit). There will also be two DC lights in that room on a switch.

The lazarette room turned into a little bit of work and I found myself saying " since I'm in here I might as well...". Since I had finished the electric conduit and box's I decided to finish the generator discharge line. I also completed the water line manifold and made all those connections.

The water line manifold turned out to be a nice way to complete all the water lines for the boat. Instead of using "T's " hidden behind walls, I ran lines for every fixture back to the lazarette. I used a PEX manifold that comes with a nice re usable compression connector that has a shut off valve for each line. I still have to install the lines for the clothes washing machine, the salon 1/2 bath, and the aft deck outdoor shower, but I will have to wait to do that when the boat gets to the launch site. The nice thing about this manifold is that it is easy to expand and will be a breeze to winterize all the fresh water piping from this manifold by some simple valve turning and my air compressor. This was the smallest manifold my plumbing supply house sold with 9 hots and 12 cold ports. The 1" cold inlet goes all the way through so I can feed it from either the top or bottom.

The lazarette is going to be the closet of the boat and I have a feeling it will be jammed with all kinds of stuff. Once I have all the components installed I'll probably fill all the wall space with shelving. I'll wait to install the 3/8 plywood ceiling once the boat gets to the launch site. I'm only a few steps away from having the fresh water system complete, and I might head in that direction before I work on the steering and hydraulic system.