My
boat is a 1978
Columbia 10.7. I have been refitting her over the last 5 years to get her ready for long term
live-aboard and
extended cruising. One aspect that has been bugging me is the
icebox.
Insulation was mostly an afterthought back in the 70s. I don't remember a
single airtight cooler from those days, similar to the Yeti. My
icebox was originally built with a thermoelectric
cooling plate that was supposed to chill the icebox when plugged into
shore power. So, it didn't have any effect when underway. In either case, it didn't
work anymore so I removed it.
On a hot 80º+ day, a 20 lbs bag of ice may last 24 hours. Most of the ice will be gone by day 2. In my Yeti, 20 lbs of ice will last 7 days unless you are constantly opening and closing it and putting in and taking out items. But you will still have some ice after 5 days and items will be cold.
My goal is to build a new icebox with real
insulation and eventually (in the future) add a Dometic or similar
refrigerator compressor.
So, my original plan was to remove the top of the existing icebox, cut out the liner and any insulation and then replace it with modern insulation and liner. But as I reviewed the construction of the existing icebox I can see that the icebox is integral with other elements of the
galley and pantry. The top of the icebox actually extends under the port side and aft pantries and drawers.
I don't see a way to remove the entire top (light blue) without disassembling the pantries above it (magenta and yellow). Another option would be to cut away the forward bulkhead (dark blue) of the icebox and "gut" it from the front. This would cause the least amount of disruption and probably allow me to
rebuild and replace the icebox before launching this spring.
The alternative is to start from the top down, disassembling the entire aft end of the
galley and two pantries.
Method #1: Gutting the icebox from the front would be faster and cheaper, but may be more difficult in some ways. Basically, I would have to
work from the front and then slide the new icebox in and then replace the forward icebox bulkhead.
Method #2: Disassemble the whole icebox and pantry area. Would take longer and cost more, because I'd have to
rebuild the galley and pantry, along with the icebox. There are also
electrical wires embedded in this area, both AC and DC. The Pros of going this way is that I can redesign the galley and pantries to make them more useful and more appealing. If I went this way, I doubt that I would able to finish the whole thing before spring launch. If I went this way, I would also seriously consider taking apart the sink area as well.
I've included a
photo of the galley with overlays showing how the components integrate with each other. These structures were originally installed without considering that you might want to replace one or another in the future.
Am I missing something? Is there an alternative that I am not considering?