I recently took the plunge and bought my first sailboat (or any boat for that matter), a 1969 Ericson Mark I, sold all my stuff, and moved onboard. I've got a handful of hours sailing experience, so take that in consideration with what I might be missing here.
My broker and I took delivery 2 weeks ago and sailed from the previous owner's marina to the marina I am in now, about an hour away. As we were pulling into the channel of this marina, we ran up on a small sandbar (depth sounder is non-functional, it's on the list of things to fix); we threw the boat in reverse and opened up the throttle to get off the sand for about 20 seconds. It worked, but then a few minutes later the alarm and oil pressure light went on. and stayed on. We powered down and waited, and when the tide came in we motored into the slip, alarm blaring.
The engine is a Yanmar GM20 with < 900 hours on it, the oil is clean, recently changed, and the level is perfect. We motored for at least half an hour that day with no issues, and closer to an hour during the sea trial. Also, the oil analysis came back perfect the day before all this.
My troubleshooting so far: first I disconnected the wire from the oil sender, fired up the motor, alarm was still blaring. OK not a bad sender. But then the next day I decided to try again (I had been tired the day before, maybe I grounded it carelessly) and sure enough disconnecting the sender stopped the alarm. So I bought a new sender, installed it, fired up the motor, and the alarm stopped! However when I stopped the engine and started it again, the alarm came back.
Sometimes if I rev the engine or shift to reverse, the alarm sputters, sometimes stops for a short period.
I didn't have my multimeter until today (still moving on to the boat from 6 hours away) - but it looks like the sender wire, disconnected from the sender, is grounded. Which I would expect it not to be, since that's the sender's job at zero pressure. The sender does climb to full resistance with the motor running and drop back to zero with it off, so I'm pretty sure it's not a real oil pressure issue.
Any ideas before I rip out the whole wiring harness looking for a short? I know boat ownership is supposed to be a constant battle with things breaking, but I was really hoping to get more than 24 hours in without doing an electrical overhaul.
**unrelated fun fact** - I've been a moto guy for years and when we bumped the bottom and then the oil pressure alarm went off, my first thought was "oh crap a rock cracked the case." took me a minute to remember that boat motors do not hang at the bottom of the keel
.
My broker and I took delivery 2 weeks ago and sailed from the previous owner's marina to the marina I am in now, about an hour away. As we were pulling into the channel of this marina, we ran up on a small sandbar (depth sounder is non-functional, it's on the list of things to fix); we threw the boat in reverse and opened up the throttle to get off the sand for about 20 seconds. It worked, but then a few minutes later the alarm and oil pressure light went on. and stayed on. We powered down and waited, and when the tide came in we motored into the slip, alarm blaring.
The engine is a Yanmar GM20 with < 900 hours on it, the oil is clean, recently changed, and the level is perfect. We motored for at least half an hour that day with no issues, and closer to an hour during the sea trial. Also, the oil analysis came back perfect the day before all this.
My troubleshooting so far: first I disconnected the wire from the oil sender, fired up the motor, alarm was still blaring. OK not a bad sender. But then the next day I decided to try again (I had been tired the day before, maybe I grounded it carelessly) and sure enough disconnecting the sender stopped the alarm. So I bought a new sender, installed it, fired up the motor, and the alarm stopped! However when I stopped the engine and started it again, the alarm came back.
Sometimes if I rev the engine or shift to reverse, the alarm sputters, sometimes stops for a short period.
I didn't have my multimeter until today (still moving on to the boat from 6 hours away) - but it looks like the sender wire, disconnected from the sender, is grounded. Which I would expect it not to be, since that's the sender's job at zero pressure. The sender does climb to full resistance with the motor running and drop back to zero with it off, so I'm pretty sure it's not a real oil pressure issue.
Any ideas before I rip out the whole wiring harness looking for a short? I know boat ownership is supposed to be a constant battle with things breaking, but I was really hoping to get more than 24 hours in without doing an electrical overhaul.
**unrelated fun fact** - I've been a moto guy for years and when we bumped the bottom and then the oil pressure alarm went off, my first thought was "oh crap a rock cracked the case." took me a minute to remember that boat motors do not hang at the bottom of the keel
.
