MYTraveler
Guru
My prior boats were, for the most part, inshore boats, that were all heavily used and not well maintained before my purchase. I think I suffered most every mechanical failure imaginable and got towed in plenty of times.
I purchased my current boat new and have been meticulous about maintenance. In the six years and 2,000 + hours I have owned her, I have never had a cruise ending failure of any sort. In fact, I have had very few failures that I wasn't able to remedy on the spot, and none of them were of critical system. (The icemaker broke on a fishing trip, but I was able to diagnose the problem (no freshwater flow because the float bowl was stuck), the video card on one of my NN3D black boxes failed, but there are 3 in the network so it was only an inconvenience; one of four engine room blowers failed -- I ran with three and replaced on return; anchor windlass blew a 500 amp fuse, but I had a spare.)
Still, it is common (IME) to see what seem to be well maintained boats suffer a mission critical failure (a dockmate lost a transmission 100 miles offshore, a friend lost power to both ECM; another guy overheated his engine (s?), even though he had been running at low rpms), etc.
Between those vicarious experiences and my person experiences with prior boats, I can't help but be concerned by the prospect of a debilitating failure when I am days from anywhere. Do you all worry about that, or do you regard that sort of failure (ie, critical, that you can't repair) unlikely? I really wish I could stop worrying about it.
I purchased my current boat new and have been meticulous about maintenance. In the six years and 2,000 + hours I have owned her, I have never had a cruise ending failure of any sort. In fact, I have had very few failures that I wasn't able to remedy on the spot, and none of them were of critical system. (The icemaker broke on a fishing trip, but I was able to diagnose the problem (no freshwater flow because the float bowl was stuck), the video card on one of my NN3D black boxes failed, but there are 3 in the network so it was only an inconvenience; one of four engine room blowers failed -- I ran with three and replaced on return; anchor windlass blew a 500 amp fuse, but I had a spare.)
Still, it is common (IME) to see what seem to be well maintained boats suffer a mission critical failure (a dockmate lost a transmission 100 miles offshore, a friend lost power to both ECM; another guy overheated his engine (s?), even though he had been running at low rpms), etc.
Between those vicarious experiences and my person experiences with prior boats, I can't help but be concerned by the prospect of a debilitating failure when I am days from anywhere. Do you all worry about that, or do you regard that sort of failure (ie, critical, that you can't repair) unlikely? I really wish I could stop worrying about it.
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