Rewired mast

The wiring that comes out of the mast includes:
1) VHF coax
2) mast head instruments: wind speed and wind direction
3) masthead trilight
4) steaming light/deck light combination fixture

I redid all the connections in the bilge and some of the wires that run the length of the mast.  The old connections in the bilge were wet and soggy when I unwrapped the ancient electrical tape that was “waterproofing” them.  I soldered each of the wires directly (i.e. direct splice, no butt connector), put a heat shrink over each of the individual connections, then put a large heat shrink over the whole group.

VHF coax connectors:  The old ones looked heavily corroded, so I cut off as much coax cable as I dared in an attempt to expose fresh, uncorroded foil. The coax was pretty manky and I didn’t feel great about it, but I didn’t want to pay for 50ft of new coax to pull up the whole mast.  This was unfortunately not as successful as I hoped–I ended up soldering the new connectors onto still pretty corroded foil.  Then we got a deal at ancor on new VHF coax, so I ended up redoing it again after the mast was in the boat.  Poor timing on my part, but it worked out alright.  I ran the new cable all the way to the back of the radio, so there is no connector in the bilge as there was before (this is preferable, since there are substantial losses in signal power at every connection).  The next time the mast gets pulled, the coax will have to be cut in the bilge and a connector installed.