Slowly Getting Through The Pre-Season Projects!

[Dougcole]

On the second to last day of our annual summer Bahamas trip last year I was feeling pretty smug as nothing on the boat had broken for the entire month long trip. I really felt like I was ahead of things as this is what I had done in the year or so prior to the trip:


Replace all electronics.
R/R exhaust elbows, both motors.
Replace FB strataglass and bimini
Cooling sysytem flush, motors and genset, raw and fresh.
Replace anchor
Full service dinghy OB
Repair all weak spots on dinghy tubes, add internal sealant
R/R duckbill valves on head.
increase holding tank vent size
Buy new watermaker
Sew new window covers
Had intercoolers serviced
R/R fan on deck fridge
Impellers
Rebuild Raw water pumps both engines
Have AC checked/serviced by a pro
Replaced some hoses and belts, as needed
Added big external Racor filter to dinghy



I had reason to be feeling pretty good, right? Our boat is a 2005, well maintained, and Mainships are pretty low maintenance. That's what I thought too. Boy, was I wrong.


On the way home our port fuel tank started leaking. Had to have it repaired ($1,500) could have been worse.
And since then these things have happened:
Dinghy tubes are leaking, again.
House Bank (4.5 years old) died. $500.

Controller on genset died (same day as the house bank, yay!) $1,000
Cooling fan on main fridge died. $20
Installed SOC monitor
Vacuum pump on head failed $500
Vacuum tank on head failed $400
Got a bad tank of fuel for the dinghy in the Bahamas but didn't know it before I poured what was left into the tank of my truck (I never store gas around as it goes bad) it fouled one of the injectors on my truck ($450) and ruined the high pressure pump on the dinghy motor ($600).
Exhaust hoses on main engines had to be replaced (I was expecting this) $500


Coupled with the fact that our business is having a bit of a down year, it's been a tough winter.

 

[Westiculo]

Yikes, yeah we have tons of work left too.
Considering these are our shifters, throttles, and cables, we're not going anywhere soon.

 

[Dougcole]

That's a lot of work and I feel for you, but those shifters are at least pretty much bombproof. I had a brain box on our Micro Commaders go out last year right when we were backing into a slip. Stb engine instantly revved up to about 1300 rpm and wouldn't come out of fwd gear. It was probably the scariest few seconds of boating I've ever had before I got that engine shut down. It was an expensive repair too, I forgot about that one.

 

[koliver]

Westiculo
Is your removal of all of your shift and throttle controls due to a failure, or just Preventive. If the latter, what led you to do so? If the former, what was the failure?

 

[Art]

Westiculo
Is your removal of all of your shift and throttle controls due to a failure, or just Preventive. If the latter, what led you to do so? If the former, what was the failure?

Good questions, thank you!

Yes! Enquiring minds want to know...

 

[Westiculo]

Westiculo
Is your removal of all of your shift and throttle controls due to a failure, or just Preventive. If the latter, what led you to do so? If the former, what was the failure?

The controls were very stiff, especially on the flybridge. I lubed the cables last year but it didn't help much.
Now that they're all apart, it's easier to tell that 3 or 4 out of the 8 cables have a lot of friction. I already bought replacements for all, so will switch them all out (the newer cables seem a lot fancier too).

The other problem was that there was a considerable amount of play in the throttle - moving the stick a small amount wouldn't change rpm. Turns out there's these cable ends that screw onto the cable and mate with the Morse control. A couple of them were worn down considerably - I believe that's what introduced some of the play.

 

[Star0210]

On the second to last day of our annual summer Bahamas trip last year I was feeling pretty smug as nothing on the boat had broken for the entire month long trip. I really felt like I was ahead of things as this is what I had done in the year or so prior to the trip:


Replace all electronics.
R/R exhaust elbows, both motors.
Replace FB strataglass and bimini
Cooling sysytem flush, motors and genset, raw and fresh.
Replace anchor
Full service dinghy OB
Repair all weak spots on dinghy tubes, add internal sealant
R/R duckbill valves on head.
increase holding tank vent size
Buy new watermaker
Sew new window covers
Had intercoolers serviced
R/R fan on deck fridge
Impellers
Rebuild Raw water pumps both engines
Have AC checked/serviced by a pro
Replaced some hoses and belts, as needed
Added big external Racor filter to dinghy



I had reason to be feeling pretty good, right? Our boat is a 2005, well maintained, and Mainships are pretty low maintenance. That's what I thought too. Boy, was I wrong.


On the way home our port fuel tank started leaking. Had to have it repaired ($1,500) could have been worse.
And since then these things have happened:
Dinghy tubes are leaking, again.
House Bank (4.5 years old) died. $500.

Controller on genset died (same day as the house bank, yay!) $1,000
Cooling fan on main fridge died. $20
Installed SOC monitor
Vacuum pump on head failed $500
Vacuum tank on head failed $400
Got a bad tank of fuel for the dinghy in the Bahamas but didn't know it before I poured what was left into the tank of my truck (I never store gas around as it goes bad) it fouled one of the injectors on my truck ($450) and ruined the high pressure pump on the dinghy motor ($600).
Exhaust hoses on main engines had to be replaced (I was expecting this) $500


Coupled with the fact that our business is having a bit of a down year, it's been a tough winter.

That’s terrible...I’m sorry.