110 to shorepower conversion?

[bdkorth]

Hi,
My wife and I have a Catalina 25'' that is on a trailer until the Idaho lake we sail it on thaws. Solid ice up there soon. I have pulled the batteries out and am trying to figure out if there is a power adaptor to go from a regular 110 wall socket and convert into plugging into the shore power plug in on the Catalina. I have looked at some pictures online, and can''t tell from the pictures if they are the correct configuration. Any input? I would sure appreciate it, would make working on her during the winter much more bearable to have electricity and warmth. Thanks in advance for any input.

Brad

[RobGallagher]

My boat is on a mooring and does not have shore power. I keep a battery charger on board and use something called a "pigtail" for hooking up if I''m at a dock overnight.

One end is to plug into 110 shore power, the other end is a standard 3 prong 110 socket. The thing is only about 12 inches long and cost about 20 bucks at West Marine. I run an extension cord from the pigtail to my boat. For ease of storage, I purchased an extension cord on a reel that has 4 plugs built into the reel.

Good luck,

[petercra]

Take a look at page 626 of the West Marine 2002 Master Catalog. There''s an excellent description of the various types of connectors. Nearly every marina and boat of this size that I''ve seen uses a 30 amp 110 volt twist lock connector -- female at the dock and on the boat (sources of power are always female to prevent exposed pins from being hot). Larger boats might be 50 amps or 220 volts. Confirm your plug by looking at page 626.

Then turn to page 630 of the same catalog, it appears that you want is West Marine 194423, Marinco 104A which has a standard 3 prong male plug on one end and a female 30A twist lock on the other. They also have a 264598 (Marinco 106) which is 20 amps and appears to somehow locks. I''m not sure how as the plug configuration appears to still be a standard wall plug. The latter is a lot more money, I doubt if you need. You can call West at 1-800-BOATING, their technical support is pretty good and they should be able to confirm what you need.

I''ve used one of these pigtail adapters on my boat and it works fine. If you have a polarity reversed light on your a.c. circuit breaker panel on your boat be sure to check it after you plug in to make sure everything is OK. Otherwise you could get a shock from touching the prop shaft or other supposedly grounded items. A surprising number of marinas and 110 volt plugs are miswired. I didn''t connect the available power directly to my boat last winter because the light came on indicating reversed polarity.

[bdkorth]

Thanks for the responses. It really helps and gives me a place to start. I truly appreciate it. West Marine here I come, sorry SailNet.

Brad