Finally got the trim tabs installed this weekend. I am in the process of uploading the pictures off of my camera on my other computer so I figured I'd post the installation details while that is going on.
I received the tabs on Thursday. River Marine Supply shipped them within a few hours of me placing my order. That's always nice. I started the installation on Friday afternoon. There was a window of opportunity where there was supposed to be no rain in the area. The instructions were pretty good. I read them a few times to make sure I understood everything before I began. I also bought plenty of beer in case things went sour.
The left tab is where I started. It took me about 30 minutes to mount it because I kept re-reading the instructions, then I would re-measure, then re-read, etc. Once I got the left tab mounted, the right one took less than 10 minutes since I knew what I was doing. With regards to the right side, the only thing I was unsure about was whether or not I was going to need to notch out my swim step to make room for the actuator. Once I got the tab mounted, I knew a notch was required. I attempted to make the notch with a hole-saw. It partially worked. I then had to use a jig saw to finish the notch, which required me removing the swim platform to do so. Once the notch was done I went to drill the holes for the actuator. The directions said to use the actuator template to mark the hole locations. For the life of me, I couldn't find the template in any of the packaging. It could have been there and maybe I missed it. Who knows. I ended up just making my own template out of thin cardboard. Once I had the template, the holes were easy to mark and drill per the instructions. The nice thing about roplene is the fact that you don't have to drill large pilot holes to get screws to go in. I kept all my holes small and the tight fit combined with the sealant should make a water tight fit. Once I got the actuators installed, I ran the tubing to the battery compartment, which is where I opted to install the pump. Up until this point, I had only spent about two hours getting to this step. I felt pretty good. The pump installation ended up being the most painful part of installation. The battery compartment is pretty tight and installing the bracket that holds the pump took longer than expected. It also was the part of the job that made me consume the most beer and let a few select words fly. Luckily there were no nuns or small children in my area. I finally got the pump bracket installed and the pump in place. I went to run the wires up to the console. When I installed my fishfinder, I re-ran a piece of string from the battery compartment to the console in case I ever needed to fish a wire through. In an effort to fish the pump wires and a new piece of string through to the console, my tape came loose and my string came out empty. After drinking some more beer, and letting the language fly again, I had to get creative in running the wires back in place. That was finally completed. At that point I was about 3 1/2 hours into the job. I decided on a mounting location for the switch and made some rough measurements to see if the stock wires were long enough to reach to where the switch would go. I think they would have been just long enough but it would have left very little slack in the wires, which would have made them more difficult to work with. I ran out of extra wire so a trip to the hardware store was in order. I decided at this point to break for the day (night) so I could eat a half-bloody steak and consume some more beer.
Day two started off frustrating. There were rain clouds all around me so I was racing against the weather. I went to solder the wires to the new wire I purchased the night before. My soldering iron decided to pick that moment to stop working. I then grabbed my butane torch, which also decided to not work. I didn't feel like towing the boat to the hardware store to buy a new soldering iron so I used some wire connectors I had in the garage. I would have preferred solder but the wires have no tension on them so I figure the connectors will hold up. The connections are also easy to get to in case I decide to solder them at a later time. I got the switch installed and wired everything up. Without thinking, I ran the 12V power line to the power distributuion block. I hit the swtich to test out the tabs. I heard the pump run and got a smile on my face. At about the time the smile formed, the pump stopped. The language continued from the day before but it was too early to start the beer (not to mention the fact that I still had a lot of stuff to do during the day that would have been harder to do with beer in my system). So after a minute of thought, I realized that I had beed stupid and plugged the power line (which contains a 20 amp fuse) to the power block (which had a 10 amp fuse installed). Sure enough, the power block fuse blew (like it's supposed to). So I rewired the power line and replaced the blown fuse and everything was good to go. I ran the tabs up and down a few times to purge the lines and all was good. I cleaned up the hydraulic lines in the battery compartment and put all my tools away. I ended up finishing about two hours before the rain started, which worked out nice. Total time was probably about 5 1/2 hours and a case of beer. If I were doing it again, I am sure I could shave at least an hour off of that. Unfortunately the weather isn't very nice so I need to wait to test them out. The sealant I had is the 7-day cure type anyway so I will need to wait a week before getting them wet.
Overall I am happy with the installation. As I mentioned, the hardest part was the pump, which was due more to the location I chose to mount it in. I am sure the performance will be much better as well so I would say it was worth the effort and money. I will try to post the pictures I have taken. I've never posted pictures here so hopefully I'll figure it out. Hope this helps anyone that is considering the job themselves.
