A winter delivery on the rivers

[rgano]

Glad to hear all is going well. In that picture, I'd say that hull seems a little lift-deficient. Maybe some huge trim tabs would get it up enough to let it accelerate a little more and get the bow to climb a bit better. If it does better than 20 kts flat out, but is struggling along like that, it might need more engine to actually get up and go.

I was thinking that same thing. I know from the sea trial data the boat was run at 4400 getting 22 MPH. I ran it to 3500 for just a minute the first day to check things out. Got 18 MPH and it did seem to level out a bit. I only weighs about 22,000 pounds.

With essentially no rake of the bow I find that when I want to push the engines to catch up to the Marlowe we are hanging with our bow starts to dig in as we run over their big rolling wake. It reminds me of a destroyer at sea burying her bow as we ran down sea in big waves, but that ship was built to do that while this thing could end up in real trouble. The bow wave rolls right up to just under level with the flat deck (NO bulwarks there, just aluminum hand rails). Imagine what would happen in a 3-4 foot swell in the Gulf if I tried that! Owner has no intention of such shenanigan's, but this power could mess somebody up if improperly applied.

 

[rslifkin]

I was thinking that same thing. I know from the sea trial data the boat was run at 4400 getting 22 MPH. I ran it to 3500 for just a minute the first day to check things out. Got 18 MPH and it did seem to level out a bit. I only weighs about 22,000 pounds.

With essentially no rake of the bow I find that when I want to push the engines to catch up to the Marlowe we are hanging with our bow starts to dig in as we run over their big rolling wake. It reminds me of a destroyer at sea burying her bow as we ran down sea in big waves, but that ship was built to do that while this thing could end up in real trouble. The bow wave rolls right up to just under level with the flat deck (NO bulwarks there, just aluminum hand rails). Imagine what would happen in a 3-4 foot swell in the Gulf if I tried that! Owner has no intention of such shenanigan's, but this power could mess somebody up if improperly applied.

Definitely seems like a hull where you need to know its limits. Based on the performance you're seeing, either that's one draggy hull or it needs different gearing and props for better performance. At only 22k lbs, 22 mph is slow with those engines. I've got the same power in my boat (smaller but heavier at 26k lbs) and I'm a bit faster than that (17 kts at 3300, 18 at 3400, 25 - 27 at WOT).

 

[tom hudson]

A Winter Delivery on the Rivers

In early February 2018, we docked at Palafox Marina in Pensacola. A cold front that night pushed temps down to 9F, the same night that that it got down to 3F back in Nashville. The next morning someone was going down the docks offering to deliver firewood....

It doesn't happen often, but it can get cold on the Panhandle. Piloting from the flybridge can be no fun then.

 

[rgano]

In respect to the hull/engine match, the PO told me he mostly operated in the 1600 RPM range; so there was not any concern about getting optimal performance at speed. I think the new owner is going to take his initial que from me and run in the under-2500 Rpm range. The boat will likely never venture mile than sixty miles east or west of PC and usually substantially less.

Re: the fly bridge: I will never operate this boat from there. I need to be much closer to the mooring action in locks and marinas than the fly bridge affords with its awkward access a single vertical ladder all the way aft. It is also completely open with no wind protection in this chilly weather. I haven't even removed the canvas cover from it.

 

[Olebird]

Wonder what hydrofoils would do for it ?

Note to remember:

Mile Post 166 -

https://www.cloudedinmystery.com/ghost-ship-eliza-battle.html


33 souls froze or drowned while 300 Tons of cotton went up in flames and the Eliza Battle went down. 1857 @ Kemps Landing


------
#43 would look good on the side of that brick!!


Enjoy the Big City - I spent 2 months there one weekend!!

 

[rgano]

Well, foils would definitely get this bow safely above the water. One has to be careful about where to come down in our shallow bays.

 

[rgano]

Nothing can stop progress on a delivery like a failed head when one is all you have. Nothing gets you back from a short trip to a local auto parts store faster than your wife calling from the boat saying, "There's smoke in here, and I am getting off!"

How are those two things connected? Well, the Vacuflush motor apparently seized and shorted the wiring in its 40-Amp fused circuit. About a foot of it smoked up the place pretty well.

Parts to correct this casualty arrived this afternoon as did a piezo-electric alarm to go on the end of the wires I ran to the helm console from the FireBoy firefighting gas bottle in the engine room where some fool had snipped off and removed the original wiring.

We are now ready in all respects to continue southward on schedule from Demopolis, but it's gonna be COLD. Winds will be in our favor and not be beating us up in the single lock chamber we will pass through. One more lock after that, and we are home free getting to Mobile. Our new friends in the Marlowe whom we were "escorting" left the day before yesterday leaving us on our own for the first time since we ran the Tennessee River on day one. Hard to believe tomorrow will only be our fifth day underway since we drove north to pick up the boat on 26 December.

 

[Olebird]

Need to have a word of prayer with surveyor.

 

[rgano]

Need to have a word of prayer with surveyor.

I have seen two of this surveyor's reports on two very different houseboats. I would have to say I am unimpressed, now even more.

We made 93 miles today from Demopolis to Bobby's Fish Camp where we will be treated to blustery near-freezing weather with the chuckle of water under the bow all night.

We ran all but one hour of this run at 2500 RPM. For one hour, with a before and after sticking of the tanks with the very accurate dowel the PO left behind (one of the few things), I ran at 2800 using almost exactly 20 gallons (ten per engine). We were running 12.5 MPH at 2500 and 14 MPH at 2800, with river current help.

Tomorrow we are going to try to use every second of the ten hours of daylight to run 130 miles to Dog River Marina as anchoring is anathema to the wife since I will not run the gasoline generator while we sleep in the predicted freezing weather. We have gotten CO alarms every day for some short period of the day, sometimes all three CO alarms. This requires freezing ourselves as we open up to get good air flow.

If 2800 RPM will get us at least 13 MPH we can do it assuming I can get the Coffeeville lock master to get us through starting at 0530. At that RPM we would use 200 of our 240 gallons of gas. If we cannot maintain enough speed, we will just have to slow and anchor above Mobile before making a shorter day of it on Monday.

Windfinder shows high easterly component winds on Mobile Bay on Monday and through to Tuesday afternoon. We must cross it west to east in this box of a boat on our final, 35-mile, run, and it must be pretty calm.

 

[Comodave]

At least you know the CO detectors are working... Gotta love gassers.

 

[rslifkin]

It never fails to amaze me how so many boat designs fail to keep exhaust from getting pulled along and sometimes sucked in at certain speeds.

 

[BandB]

It never fails to amaze me how so many boat designs fail to keep exhaust from getting pulled along and sometimes sucked in at certain speeds.

Mainly houseboats.

 

[DCDC]

If needed, there are good anchorages just off the Tombigbee in the Tensaw River inlet and Big Briar Creek, ~50 and 25 miles north of Dog River respectively.

 

[rslifkin]

Mainly houseboats.

I have to watch for it on my own boat too. Not an issue at low speed, but up on plane, if you have the windshield closed and side curtains down, it's an issue with no wind or straight into the wind. A crosswind or tailwind avoids it, as does opening the windshield slightly or rolling the side curtains.

 

[Comodave]

Lots of sedan style cruisers exhibit this problem too, station wagon effect.

 

[rgano]

This model of Gibson is a straight box from for to aft exacerbating the station wagon effect. I am not going to deliver any more gassers of any stripe. OBs are the only gasser I will board anymore.

Thanks to the lack of concern on the part of the Coffeeville lock master, our lock luck finally dissolved. We will probably be taking advantage of one of the numerous anchorages north of Mobile rather than making Dog River tonight.

 

[cardude01]

Enjoying this thread. Y’all are nuts, but in a good way. ?

 

[Olebird]

Seems like I have seen some aftermarket mufflers or exhaust diverters that reduce or eliminate the risk of the station wagon effect??

 

[BandB]

This model of Gibson is a straight box from for to aft exacerbating the station wagon effect. I am not going to deliver any more gassers of any stripe. OBs are the only gasser I will board anymore.

Thanks to the lack of concern on the part of the Coffeeville lock master, our lock luck finally dissolved. We will probably be taking advantage of one of the numerous anchorages north of Mobile rather than making Dog River tonight.

The gas engines on those are one thing but the real dangers on houseboats have always been the gas generators.

 

[rslifkin]

I've seen some people use turn downs to drive the exhaust underwater or out to the sides to try to help the issue. I've thought about trying it on my boat.

And yeah, I agree with the generator concern. Placement of the exhaust relative to vents and such matters and you've gotta pay attention to wind direction when opening windows with it running to avoid blowing exhaust into the boat. I also won't run a gas generator overnight, even with CO alarms everywhere unless it's a dire emergency.

 

[rgano]

We finally hit a stretch in this delivery where we had to anchor for the night on Sunday, the tenth. We ran the generator until bedtime and set one of our CO detectors at chest height on the vertical ladder on the aft deck, right over the exhaust. Never heard a peep out of it on that windless night. Go figure.

To wind this tale up, we moored the boat at my pier yesterday instead of turning it over to the owner in Gulf Shores as originally planned. Seems adverse weather over this weekend ruined his two-day cruise party plans, and he has elected to run the boat 48 miles back down the track to Baytown Marina today where the partiers will board. Thus, today I accompanied one of his buddies and him ten miles down the bay to the fuel dock. (We arrived home with 40 gallons of gas). I got in some instructional time on the boat's underway and maneuvering characteristics. They are experienced boaters, in 20-something outboards, and were a bit perplexed when I told them while blasting through the 15-mile long cut between our West Bay and Choctawhatchee Bay to be on watch for a tow coming around a turn and to be ready to talk with the tow about 1- or 2-whistle passage. Blank stare - "What's that?"

I prayed for them and their two coolers full of oysters and beer until we got a text that they had made it.

Since the boat will live here for a short period, I will be on hand out on the pier to see what happens when they return Sunday afternoon with the predictable sea breeze pushing across the face of the slip.

It was satisfying to deliver a boat, albeit in sound mechanical shape, which was stripped of everything down to the boat hook complete with food and drink as well as the owner's favorite coffee creamer and ready for him to blast off to new fun.

 

[cardude01]

That was a cool adventure. Thanks for bringing us along.

 

[rgano]

That was a cool adventure. Thanks for bringing us along.

One way to occupy yourself to keep socially distanced during the pandemic.

 

[Blissboat]

Enjoyed the trip, Rich. Thanks for the combined travelogue and boat log.

 

[JohnEasley]

Good read. Thanks for bringing us along. Glad you made it safely.