As most know a bunch of gulf coast sailors had a raft up planned for this past weekend. Not sure about others, but here is how it went for me, and it wasn't pretty. I left on Thurs. morning with a novice friend buddy boating along. Plan was to make it over to Petit Bois Island in two days, with an overnight stop at Cat.Island. Winds are very light, and what there is right on the nose. So were motoring along, I have auto working and am just sitting back and enjoying being out. About two hours out from our anchorage, my electronics all start to go haywire. First to go is the depth, the boat mounted Kenyon and the one in the Garmin chartplotter.
Scrolling through the Garmin to see if I can find a reset, or an error message, I come upon a voltage readout. 16V. That is too much. About this time, the auto pilot goes crazy, hard wired VHF shuts down, and the compass on the auto pilot and the Garmin are 60 degrees apart. I assume the high voltage is the cause of this, and shut everything down. I know the area well, so don't even need to look at a chart. Get anchored up, and things look pretty good. Wind is now out of the south about 5 knots, and we are totally protected from the south. Very exposed from the north though. Sure enough, about 2AM Fri. the winds clock around to due north, and blow about 20 to 25. Bouncy the rest of the night, and not any sleep, as I stay on anchor watch and tuned in NOAA weather. NOAA tells me the winds are E at 10 to 15. Someone needs to stick their head out the door. Friday morning the winds lay down a little, to maybe 15, but still kind of bumpy. My buddy is seasick, and says the hell with this he is going home. I tell him that if he is going to be more than a day tripper on the lake, he has to learn to deal with whatever comes up. Well, so be it, and he heads for the house. I have the old anternator I replaced on board as a spare, so I do an alternator swap. Kind of slow going as the boat is bouncing around pretty good. By the time I get that finished, is too late to make Petit Bois before dark, and I am not very familiar with that area, so decide to split the trip in half. Make a run to Biloxi , and on to Petit Bois on Saureday . This will give me two days of a tad over 20 miles each day. Piece a cake. Make Biloxi, very nicely. East wind about 15 or so, and I am headed NE, so just a nice sail across. Get tied up and go pig out on crab legs and shrimp at the casino buffet, and have a very nice night. Sat. morning I am up and off before 8AM, with a 22 mile run over to Petit Bois and looking forward to a nice weekend. That is untill I hit the open water of Mississippi sound. It's blowing 25 or better straight out of the east, and I need to go due easy. Waves are not the big, maybe three footers, but they are vertical and about three feet apart. It is a rough, wet, teeth rattling ride, and takes me 7 hours to make the 22 miles. When I get to Petit Bois about 3PM, I don't see a sign of another boat. Give a call on the handheld VHF and get no reply. Apparently I am the only one crazy enough to be out here in this, and can certainly understand why there was no one else there. Mississippi Sound was certainly snotty, but I don't even want to think about what Mobile Bay would be like, with it's wide expanse of water open to the gulf. I certainly don't want to even attempt to spend the night anchored in this slop, and it shows no signs of letting up. Easy decision. Hustle it up and head back to Biloxi. Make it back in a tick under three hours. OH YEAH Little on the wild side, but WOW what a ride. Basically dead down wind, consistant 8 knots, 9 pretty often, and even saw 10 a couple of times. Tie up in Biloxi, a little tired and beat up, but an interesting day. Sunday morning is go home day. It's a long haul from Biloxi to my dock, so I have to get an early start and hustle. Going through the Rigolets and the Lake Ponchatrain crab trap jungle after dark is not what anyone would have high on their list of things to do. But have about 15 knots of wind, just a little south of due East, so not a dead down wind run. The plan is to really push the boat early, motor sail for all I can get, then if I get a little ahead on time, shut the iron sail down, turn on auto and enjoy the day.
About two hours out, looks like time is not going to be a problem, and thinking about shutting down the engine for the rest of the day, when I notice the temp rise about 15 degrees, then drop back down to normal. So I watch it for a few minutes, and it stays normal, then I hear the exhaust note change, and about ten seconds later the temp starts up. FAST By the time it gets up to 160 I have engine shut down. My first thought is thermostat, since the rise and fall of the temp. but just going to sit back and let things cool off a bit before I even take a look. Still making close to 7 knots, and should be fine getting home by dark at this speed. Sit back and have a cup of coffee, and wait for the temp to drop. By the time it gets down to 120, ready to see whats wrong. Easy things first, so I first check the raw water strainer. No Problem. While I'm there, shut off the seacock, pull the intake hose, and crack the seacock. Water, there, thats not the problem. So, out with the thermostat. It appears to be open, but take it out anyway. Get things buttoned back up, crank engine. Same exhaust note, and temp starts up pretty quick. So it's not fixed yet. Let things cool off a little bit, and pull the water pump, pull cover and check impeller. The impeller has only been in a couple months, and very few hours. It looks perfect. Put the cover back on, put water pump back on and crank engine. Same song, second verse.
Not cooling at all. By now I don't even have to look at the guage, the exhaust note tells it all. Now it's back to head the head scratching part. Something somewhere has to be blocking water flow. But what and were. So, I take the hose off that goes from the water pump to the thermostat housing, and crank the engine. No water. Now I know it is between the seacock and there. Pull the hose off the intake side of the pump, and suck.
Mouthful of salt water. Only thing left is the pump itself, and I already checked that once.
Off again with the pump. Look at everything, mostly looking for a blockage. Then I notice the impeller looks different someway. Turn the pulley, and the impeller doesn't move. Damn. Pull the impeller out, and the hub has spun. Never seen that before. And this is a new, genuine Yanmar impeller, with about two hours more than this trip on it. But fortunately I have a spare. In with the new impeller, button everything up, and it works as it should. Good thing too, as I am now less than an hour from the Rigloets RR bridge. No way I would ever get through there, with no power. Waiting on a train to pass before the bridge could open, tide and wind both astern and was drifting over 4 knots towards the bridge, and not a lot of manuevering room in there. But as they say, alls well that ends well, and I made it home, safe and sound. So, someone pipe up with a date for another raft up. No sense letting a little snotty weather screw up a good idea. And any comments on my performance are welcome, and critical ones especially welcome. Can always use some smarting up.
Scrolling through the Garmin to see if I can find a reset, or an error message, I come upon a voltage readout. 16V. That is too much. About this time, the auto pilot goes crazy, hard wired VHF shuts down, and the compass on the auto pilot and the Garmin are 60 degrees apart. I assume the high voltage is the cause of this, and shut everything down. I know the area well, so don't even need to look at a chart. Get anchored up, and things look pretty good. Wind is now out of the south about 5 knots, and we are totally protected from the south. Very exposed from the north though. Sure enough, about 2AM Fri. the winds clock around to due north, and blow about 20 to 25. Bouncy the rest of the night, and not any sleep, as I stay on anchor watch and tuned in NOAA weather. NOAA tells me the winds are E at 10 to 15. Someone needs to stick their head out the door. Friday morning the winds lay down a little, to maybe 15, but still kind of bumpy. My buddy is seasick, and says the hell with this he is going home. I tell him that if he is going to be more than a day tripper on the lake, he has to learn to deal with whatever comes up. Well, so be it, and he heads for the house. I have the old anternator I replaced on board as a spare, so I do an alternator swap. Kind of slow going as the boat is bouncing around pretty good. By the time I get that finished, is too late to make Petit Bois before dark, and I am not very familiar with that area, so decide to split the trip in half. Make a run to Biloxi , and on to Petit Bois on Saureday . This will give me two days of a tad over 20 miles each day. Piece a cake. Make Biloxi, very nicely. East wind about 15 or so, and I am headed NE, so just a nice sail across. Get tied up and go pig out on crab legs and shrimp at the casino buffet, and have a very nice night. Sat. morning I am up and off before 8AM, with a 22 mile run over to Petit Bois and looking forward to a nice weekend. That is untill I hit the open water of Mississippi sound. It's blowing 25 or better straight out of the east, and I need to go due easy. Waves are not the big, maybe three footers, but they are vertical and about three feet apart. It is a rough, wet, teeth rattling ride, and takes me 7 hours to make the 22 miles. When I get to Petit Bois about 3PM, I don't see a sign of another boat. Give a call on the handheld VHF and get no reply. Apparently I am the only one crazy enough to be out here in this, and can certainly understand why there was no one else there. Mississippi Sound was certainly snotty, but I don't even want to think about what Mobile Bay would be like, with it's wide expanse of water open to the gulf. I certainly don't want to even attempt to spend the night anchored in this slop, and it shows no signs of letting up. Easy decision. Hustle it up and head back to Biloxi. Make it back in a tick under three hours. OH YEAH Little on the wild side, but WOW what a ride. Basically dead down wind, consistant 8 knots, 9 pretty often, and even saw 10 a couple of times. Tie up in Biloxi, a little tired and beat up, but an interesting day. Sunday morning is go home day. It's a long haul from Biloxi to my dock, so I have to get an early start and hustle. Going through the Rigolets and the Lake Ponchatrain crab trap jungle after dark is not what anyone would have high on their list of things to do. But have about 15 knots of wind, just a little south of due East, so not a dead down wind run. The plan is to really push the boat early, motor sail for all I can get, then if I get a little ahead on time, shut the iron sail down, turn on auto and enjoy the day.
About two hours out, looks like time is not going to be a problem, and thinking about shutting down the engine for the rest of the day, when I notice the temp rise about 15 degrees, then drop back down to normal. So I watch it for a few minutes, and it stays normal, then I hear the exhaust note change, and about ten seconds later the temp starts up. FAST By the time it gets up to 160 I have engine shut down. My first thought is thermostat, since the rise and fall of the temp. but just going to sit back and let things cool off a bit before I even take a look. Still making close to 7 knots, and should be fine getting home by dark at this speed. Sit back and have a cup of coffee, and wait for the temp to drop. By the time it gets down to 120, ready to see whats wrong. Easy things first, so I first check the raw water strainer. No Problem. While I'm there, shut off the seacock, pull the intake hose, and crack the seacock. Water, there, thats not the problem. So, out with the thermostat. It appears to be open, but take it out anyway. Get things buttoned back up, crank engine. Same exhaust note, and temp starts up pretty quick. So it's not fixed yet. Let things cool off a little bit, and pull the water pump, pull cover and check impeller. The impeller has only been in a couple months, and very few hours. It looks perfect. Put the cover back on, put water pump back on and crank engine. Same song, second verse.
Not cooling at all. By now I don't even have to look at the guage, the exhaust note tells it all. Now it's back to head the head scratching part. Something somewhere has to be blocking water flow. But what and were. So, I take the hose off that goes from the water pump to the thermostat housing, and crank the engine. No water. Now I know it is between the seacock and there. Pull the hose off the intake side of the pump, and suck.
Mouthful of salt water. Only thing left is the pump itself, and I already checked that once.
Off again with the pump. Look at everything, mostly looking for a blockage. Then I notice the impeller looks different someway. Turn the pulley, and the impeller doesn't move. Damn. Pull the impeller out, and the hub has spun. Never seen that before. And this is a new, genuine Yanmar impeller, with about two hours more than this trip on it. But fortunately I have a spare. In with the new impeller, button everything up, and it works as it should. Good thing too, as I am now less than an hour from the Rigloets RR bridge. No way I would ever get through there, with no power. Waiting on a train to pass before the bridge could open, tide and wind both astern and was drifting over 4 knots towards the bridge, and not a lot of manuevering room in there. But as they say, alls well that ends well, and I made it home, safe and sound. So, someone pipe up with a date for another raft up. No sense letting a little snotty weather screw up a good idea. And any comments on my performance are welcome, and critical ones especially welcome. Can always use some smarting up.
