I'd like you to meet my friend Murphy.....

sunchaser said:

Andy

How many MMC stations on the vessel? Did you move to a different location? I've been curious if one location on fritz all are hampered ---?

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Hey Sunchaser,
Our N62 has 4 MMC Stations. The other 3 stations work perfectly fine.
I believe it's the potentiometer. I'll be calling ZF in the morning.

Runaway starter.....maybe due to starter relay/solenoid switch contacts 'welding'
together (in crank position) from heat from high resistance of dirty/corroded contact surfaces.

BandB, we both have several theories on what caused it to run away. He has assured me that every electrical connection and every wire will be tested and retested before he signs off on the claim being fixed. It's going to be interesting after he gets everything put back together and is ready to smoke test his work. I wish I was going to be here for but I'll just have to wait to hear from him.


Mich Mike, Jim and I have discussed that and he's going to make sure everything is in good order before he applies power.

Make sure the fire extinguisher is not out of date, and he knows where it is.

Hung starters rarely burn up control wiring. Yep, can burn up cables, especially if there are high resistance connections, but can't see them burning up the light gauge stuff.

Starters also have over run clutches so it won't turn into a generator if hung. Unless the clutch welds itself, but that would be apparent on teardown. And even if it did, it would overcharge the batts and doubt it would burn up control wiring.

Starter reported as "rebuilt" so it was not in too bad of condition??

I suspect the wiring had a fault first, then burned up stuff, then conductors crossed and THAT fired the starter. Probably not initiated by a starter fault. But hey, I am commenting on the net!!!

Alway watch DC voltage when starting engines. Volts should dip and come back up when starter is finished. If volts stay down, check things out. A hung starter keeps volts low.

GFC said:

BandB, we both have several theories on what caused it to run away. He has assured me that every electrical connection and every wire will be tested and retested before he signs off on the claim being fixed. It's going to be interesting after he gets everything put back together and is ready to smoke test his work. I wish I was going to be here for but I'll just have to wait to hear from him.


Mich Mike, Jim and I have discussed that and he's going to make sure everything is in good order before he applies power.

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Sounds good. This is one of those cases where you don't just fill in and replace the obvious but you consider all the wiring and connections to be suspect.

Ski in NC said:

I suspect the wiring had a fault first, then burned up stuff, then conductors crossed and THAT fired the starter. Probably not initiated by a starter fault.

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I floated that balloon a few posts back. It is the most up front explanation for what happened.

I suspect the two of you are right. I see the starter as perhaps the innocent victim.

By way of an update, Jim put together a bid to the insurance company that closely matched the one done by the surveyor. It's an open ended bid, meaning that as they get started putting this thing back together and testing every system on the boat, if other things pop up that look like they were damaged in the original incident, the insurance company will pick up the tab on those items also.


So, are you sitting down? The total cost of the repair on items that have already been discovered....drum roll please.....$15,032.


Yeah, that's what I thought. Of that, around $6,400 is parts and $7,400 and change is labor. Some of the rest is sales tax. YOWZERS!!!


Thank heaven I bought a yacht policy and didn't skimp on the insurance coverage. I have to pay my deductible out of that $15K and the insurance company picks up the rest.

Thank goodness you have good coverage and you seem to have gotten a reasonable adjuster from the insurance company who also has a sense of trust with Jim. I am very hopeful this case will continue on a positive note. It just sounds like that's the spirit of what is going on. I think you get a feeling very early in the process of whether you have someone who is going to be difficult or someone interested in being fair and see that things are fixed properly. Also, great that it's left open.

As to the amount, I'm not surprised having known people who had electrical issues on boats and cars. You're still out the deductible plus loss of use for an extended time, but this is what we get insurance for. I'd encourage everyone to check their policies carefully and make sure their policy would have covered this.

I know this has been stressful but it's got to be a relief now to at least know the work is getting started and there is agreement as to what is to be done.

BandB, there really isn't going to be any loss of use time. We spent a month down here in AZ right before Thanksgiving then came back here right after Christmas. I talked with Jim this afternoon and he said the boat will be back together in about 2-3 weeks. We're headed back to WA near the end of Feb so that should work out great for us.


I hear you when you're talking about getting a good feeling from the insurance surveyor and the mechanic. When my 330 Sundancer got hit by a BUI boater it was a constant fight with the lady(?) from Allstate. It appeared her main function was to save Allstate every penny she could. Every time we talked on the phone it was a battle.


I could write a book on how to get in the insurance company's pocket with things I learned from dealing with Allstate. Not only did I get them to pay me off quickly on the boat, but I also got in their pocket for $3,000 a week for a rental boat for four weeks between when their insured hit me and when I got paid for the boat. That was $12K of the $26K they had to pay me over and above what they paid for the boat.


By the time she and I were about half way through our fighting, err, I mean negotiating sessions she'd pi$$ed me off so much that I was not going to go easy on them. That extra $26K took a lot of the sting out of having to fight with her on the phone.

GFC said:

When my 330 Sundancer got hit by a BUI boater it was a constant fight with the lady(?) from Allstate. It appeared her main function was to save Allstate every penny she could. Every time we talked on the phone it was a battle.

.

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I have an old Allstate story where my mother made a huge mistake. She was run into from behind while stopped at a light. She did have back and neck injuries. They wanted her to settle when she had no idea how long she'd have issues. Later we learned there was a general feeling that Allstate treats their customer very well but not the other party. Well, they delayed and delayed as to any additional time or amounts and ran the negotiation to one year. As it turned out at that time any action against an auto insurer in NC had to be taken within one year.

About three months later, a lady who was actually a friend of our family, turned around to deal with her kids in the backseat and ran into the back of my mother who was stopped at a light. Guess who their insurer was.

When the same Allstate adjuster showed up, they knew this wasn't good. This time around things went much differently.

I've seen boats assigned to adjusters who know nothing about them. I was at a dealership one day when a boat that had sunk had just been pulled from the water and they were ready to start work. The adjuster was saying they couldn't start work until it was looked at and they had multiple estimates. The dealer informed him that he needed to speak to someone familiar with boats as the estimate if they waited one day would be many times more. They had already started to work as they weren't going to wait regardless. Another adjuster called them a few minutes later to thank them for jumping right on it and saving them a few thousand dollars.

BandB said:

When the same Allstate adjuster showed up, they knew this wasn't good. This time around things went much differently.

I've seen boats assigned to adjusters who know nothing about them.

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When my 330 was hit by the BUI that was insured by Allstate they sent out a claims adjuster to look at the boat. Before I let him look at it I questioned him about his experience with boats and he admitted he had NONE but did do a claims adjustment on a Corvette once, and they're fiberglass so he figured he knew what he was doing.

At the end of his examination of the boat his figure was around $10,000. I didn't argue with him but called my not-so-friendly Allstate agent the next day and chewed her arse out for wasting my time by sending out such an incompetent idiot.

I insisted that they come up with a list of 5 NAMS/SAMS surveyors and I would pick one from the five. I did, and the guy I picked was knowledgeable about Sea Rays. His estimate was slightly north of $150K to repair it.

My not-so-friendly agent just about crapped in her knickers when she got the info from the surveyor the next day.

I loved it!

People not use to boats don't grasp how much more expensive they are than cars and so they just visualize the damage and think in car terms. They see the side of a boat bashed in and think of replacing a car fender.

I had pretty much all my insurance with one company, so tried them on a quote for my boat. It was immediately obvious their rep knew nothing about boats, I opted to stay with the present marine specialist underwriter.

Wise choice Bruce.

By way of an update, I've been talking with the boat yard owner/mechanic who is repairing the damage on the boat. He pretty much had things all together and was testing systems when he found he was getting 24V on the ground. They traced it back to the alternator and remove it to troubleshoot it.


They took it to a company here in town that specializes in rewinding/repairing alternators and generators. They found the spot inside the alternator where the voltage was being send to ground.


There's a new alternator on order and when it gets here (a week or so) they should be close to getting things all buttoned up and ready to be ops checked.


I don't know what the bill for this additional work is going to be, but before they discovered the faulty alternator the bill was just a bit north of $15K. Thank heaven for good insurance coverage.

Another update--the alternator got here and it works great. The new tachs that were ordered and installed don't work so great. In fact, they no workey at all.


Seems that the old digital tachs relied upon a sending unit that read rpm data off the flywheel and sent an impulse to the tachs.


The new tachs are strictly digital so they had to do a workaround to get them to work. Then they worked but didn't read accurately. Seems they were programmed for an engine that ran at higher rpm than the Cats do so the new tachs had to be sent back to the factory to be reprogrammed to work on the Cats. It's only about a 2 minute reprogramming job but it delays things about 2 weeks with the mailing back and forth.


Mr. Murphy is still alive and living in Kennewick, WA.

Mike-in today's world, you would think you could plug them into your computer via a USB cable, log into a website and the tech could reprogram them remotely. These companies need to catch up!

THD, that would be nice, but I'm OK with the older tech stuff that needs to be sent back for reprogramming. If it were the middle of the boating season I might feel different though.

One more update. We took the boat out for a cruise last week and, while it's running, not everything is done yet. We found that the new fuel gauges are not calibrated, and the tachs that he put in are smaller than the old ones so he's going to switch them out for the larger tachs.


He's doing away with the old systems monitor and is going to install a new digital readout. I'm having a new panel built to house the trim tab gauges and the new digital readout gauge.


After that there are only a couple more things to take care of. Then it will be time for a sea trail where Jim and I will check every system on the boat to make sure everything is working before we both sign off on the insurance claim.


Oh, and another check is in the mail. This one for a bit more than $11,100. That brings the total repair cost to a bit north of $26,000.

GFC said:

BandB, that's a valid question. When he installed the starter he knew that all of the sea cocks were closed and that's why he didn't continue cranking to start the motor. The starter turned the engine over and that's what he was looking for.


I've used this mechanic for about 3 years. When I speak of him as a mechanic that may be underselling him. He's the owner of Columbia Marine Center, a full service marina and repair service. He's been in the biz since Christ was a corporal, knows what he's doing and I have full confidence in him and his crew.

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sorry. I don't believe in Murphy nor in Coincidences.

Wake up and smell the coffee.

You have a multitude of issues, yet dismiss out of hand the common denominator.

He may be a wonderful guy who has been in business forever, good, he has other customers to pay for his kid's college education.

Wxx3 said:

sorry. I don't believe in Murphy nor in Coincidences.

Wake up and smell the coffee.

You have a multitude of issues, yet dismiss out of hand the common denominator.

He may be a wonderful guy who has been in business forever, good, he has other customers to pay for his kid's college education.

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On post #2 of this thread I already shared the concern and the more written the more I have to agree with Richard on this.

I'm glad you have an unlimited pocketbook on this repair (insurance to spend until it's complete and done right). Just obvious sloppiness and carelessness concerns me. Maybe he just hadn't finished with the fuel gauges but why do you install the wrong size tachometer? It's so obvious.

At this point you have no choice about the work itself. However, if Jim is the one doing the work, that makes it imperative that you and/or someone else check it before signing off on it.

I certainly understand your concerns and will not sign off on a completed insurance claim until everything is done and Jim and I have taken the boat out to do a thorough sea trial. My wife is going along to drive the boat and he and I will be ops checking every system on board to make sure things are right. He is the one who brought the need for the sea trial and he said it should take about 4 hours to do it right.


I don't know what happened with the smaller tachs being installed but we've talked about that and he's changing them out at his expense.


Jim is the only one anywhere around here who has the knowledge and capability to take on a repair of this size and type. If he had turned this job down we would have had to have the boat towed or trucked to Portland, OR to have the work done. That's a 230 mile trip down the Columbia River. Understandably I'm hesitant to start pissing him off at this point.


Up until now the work he has done and his communication with me have been excellent. He and I will talk about the incorrect tachs, but all things considered that's a relatively minor part of this whole job.

Well I'll drop the subject, but I just still have concern over the initial problem of the runaway starter.

BandB, would you please PM me with your concerns? I'm interested in what the concerns are. I'm certainly not a mechanic so I would appreciate your input.


Thanks,


Mike