Today brought many new (and more optimistic) things on the upgrade front. Don came out this morning and we re-capped both ends of the communications cable running from the inverter to the generator. We also replaced the yellow conduit covering the cable, as the old was cracked and we needed a little more cable. This fixed the problem with communication between the inverter and the generator. Don was able to get the inverter to tell Wendy to start, but the power to the fuel pump is the same as the power to the starter, and thus is being cut off once the generator is started. Don is working on a solution.

This afternoon I sat down with the power meter and came up with questions on its installation, which were sent to the engineering team. Also came up with questions on the installation of the C40 (bug 116) and the installation of the potable water float switch (bug 12).

A leak in room 1 was discovered when it rained a couple of days ago. I looked at it with Don today and discovered a large, square hole in the side of the hab that had obviously been patched with a glued-on patch at one point in time, but is now open. We plan to patch this. We're also going to foam around the heater exhaust and turn the vent so it is exhausting downward instead of upward (at Don's request).

Also, Jan and I came up with a semi-permanent fix for the toilet pump. There is a loose wire in the pump which occasionally required jiggling in order to get the pump to run and pump water from the GreenHab to the toilet. We were hoping to be able to solder it, but couldn't get to any connection, so we just duct taped the wire securely in place after testing that it was connected. This should hold, but future crews should be aware of it in case it shakes free.

I'm pretty optimistic about our ability to finish at least most of our list. Anne is going to patch and caulk the shower tomorrow, since after tonight everyone will have had a shower and we can afford to wait 24 hours for everything to dry completely. She is also going to remove the wooden blocks around the top of the shower and caulk instead (we assume they were there to block cracks), because wood is going to mold if used in a shower. It will be exciting to get more things crossed off our big dry erase board of engineering tasks.

Emily Colvin, XO
MDRS Crew 47