Limping in circles...

Kintala is still swinging to a mooring ball in Boot Key Harbor. We have been here a week or so, waiting out beam seas and headwinds in the Hawk Channel. This morning held promise of being the start of a marginal, but doable, two day weather window that would see us in No Name Harbor.

Ah, but then we did the engine checks…

Deb found the engine case around the Jabsco water pump completely encrusted in salt. That pump, now officially designated as a Papa-Oscar-Sierra so far as Kintala is concerned, has failed yet again. The good news is it didn’t start puking on the way from Marco Island to Shark River, rather waiting until we left Shark River to come to Marathon. Here we can borrow bikes to ride to West Marine, order up a new pump (again) and a rebuild kit (again) for the old pump. The old-old pump from the last time we did this doesn’t look like a good candidate for rebuild. The plan, from now on anyway, is to have a rebuilt pump always sitting on the shelf. In fact, we will likely have both a pump and a second rebuild kit on the shelf. That is how little we have come to trust this essential piece of equipment, particularly given our tendency to anchor out in places far from support facilities.

Some days I really, really hate the lack of quality control that seems endemic in the marine industry. This would be one of those days. It is the seal at the drive pulley that keeps failing and, yes, I know that often indicates too much tension on the belt. No, it isn’t the belt tension on Kintala causing the problem. (I've put on a few thousands belts.) A good friend of ours, also with a Tartan 42 / WesterBeast, had so much trouble with his Jabsco that he replaced it a different manufacturer’s pump. It turned out the replacement pump had issues of its own, specifically a drift key much too light for the loads placed on it. At least a leaking pump will still move enough water to get one to shore. A sheared drift key will bring the Beast to halt. So we will stay with the Jabsco.

Though this is a good place to get stuck with a mechanical, missing the weather window is now a pretty sure bet. As a result we are going to modify our cruising routine a bit. Back when I made  a living as an air ambulance pilot the procedure was to do a post flight inspection rather than a pre -flight. That way we could be airborne as quickly as possible when called. We still did a quick walk around when climbing aboard, mostly to ensure that no one had bumped into the aircraft with a fuel truck or something.  That was a routine I had established years before. A habit formed the night a fork truck driver at New York’s JFK managed to poke a window out of the Navajo I was flying, but didn’t bother to tell me about it. Fortunately I had duct tape on board…seriously. There are lots of stories in the airplane world you probably don’t want to hear. Anyway…

From now on, when Kintala drops a hook or picks up a ball somewhere where she is likely to be for a couple of days, we are going to do a post-sail deck and engine check. The deck check is sort of done just by putting the boat to sleep for the night or, more accurately, setting up the deck so we can sleep. But, from now on the engine checks are going to get done as well. If that had been our procedure last week, we could have fixed the WesterBeast while sitting, waiting on weather anyway.

We really can’t keep missing weather windows.

It is fair to say that I have been a life long wanderer, by airplanes big and small, cars, motorcycles, hiking boots and, late in my life, sailboats. If this particular trip was being done in any of the above (except a sailboat) the weather that has kept us stationary - and will likely keep us parked even after the Beast is repaired - would not be any consideration at all. It would not cause the least bit of discomfort while moving and certainly would not entail any additional risk. At the moment I am finding that to be a bit frustrating. I know, “The journey is the destination” but this doesn’t feel like journeying. Between trying to stay at least somewhat comfortable while under way, and nursing the mechanicals of a boat in a salt water environment, if feels like limping in endless circles.

But we will limp along knowing, eventually, some kind of wandering line will eventually be drawn on the chart. We will be somewhere else, and that much closer to catching up with Blowin' In The Wind.

Out of Control

(Note: this is an impossibly long and technical post. I promise I will reward you with pretty pictures later. If you have the task of changing the control cables in your boat, please read on.)

Item # 17 on Tim's list: Throttle cable needs replaced.

Item # 18 on Tim's list: Shifter cable needs replaced.

One of the problems with projects like that on a list are that those eight words represent three and a half weeks of calendar time (rainy days and other things like errands and waiting on parts get in the way), and 9 actual days of working time. That's a long time to go without checking anything off The List.

Now if you think that any monkey ought to be able to change out three control cables on a sailboat in less than 9 days, be sure you never purchase a sailboat with a V-drive, at least one that Tartan made. Westerbeke was kind enough to place all the common service items on one side of the engine - oil filter, fuel filters, fuel pump, injectors, control cables - and then Tartan promptly turned the engine around backwards, installed a V-drive, and jammed all those nicely accessible service items right up against the refrigerator with a whopping 1" of space between, and that includes the 1" thick sound insulation.

It took every ounce of willpower this perfectionist could drum
up not to rip everything out here and start over. Who installs
things this way?? Those are my pink messenger lines.

Next, you take that same engine and add 29 years of previous owners and their desire to have all the latest electronic gadgets that require wire to be run hither and yon, and the adequately sized cutout in the bulkheads that the control cables were fed through all the sudden become horribly, inadequately, completely jammed full. Then there's the string of tie-wraps attaching all of that rat nest of wires to the control cables that have to be cut, some of them (of course) in the cubby at the foot of the aft berth under everything stored there, and it's full.

As if all of that wasn't enough, add the fact that some genius designer around the time of Noah decided that both the throttle and the shifter cables should be clamped in the same clamp, and that the clamp should reside 10 inches down inside the binnacle which has a diameter roughly the size of a grapefruit, and into which is stuffed a shaft, a shaft brake, steering chain, wire rope and lighting wiring. Of course, to do this one has to remove the shifter housing which is held on by four very long machine screws which have likely never been removed in 30 years and have frozen solid (3 hours, chisel, vice grips). No less, the genius (read: sadist) decided that to remove the cables (one of which comes up on either side of the wheel shaft), one has to disconnect the cable clamp, tie a line onto the cable ends, push the cable ends down into the binnacle, work the throttle cable under the shaft and then pull them both up on the port (shifter) side. Unfortunately, the genius failed to consider the fact that the clamp is larger than the space left between the shaft and the steering chain so it requires lifting the chain off the sprocket to provide the extra half inch missing.

Rudder post and steering wire rope in the background

The difficulty there lies in the fact that the chain is held in place by the wire rope attached to it, which is in turn held in place by the nuts fastening it onto the rudder quadrant. In order to lift the chain off in the binnacle, one has to empty the lazarette, climb down inside, unhook the wire rope from the rudder quadrant, climb back out, lift the chain off the sprocket. Oh, and then remember to reattach the nuts so you can lock the rudder down so the oh-so-kind sport fishermen in the marina don't break your rudder during their 5-knot approach to their slip next to yours. Hopefully, you remember this before you have put everything back into the lazarette (ask me how I know this.)

Three of my favorite tools. Two different lengths of bronze rod
and a ball of butyl tape. Combined, they are life savers for
maneuvering and retrieving all sorts of things.

After the chain is lifted off the sprocket, you need a long screwdriver or my favorite tool, a two-foot piece of bronze rod with hooks bent on each end, to work the clamp out of the binnacle so you can remove the control cables. Why in the world somebody designed it that way I have absolutely no idea. The logical way would have been to have single cable clamps on each side of the binnacle but, hey, I'm just a grunt mechanic so what do I know? Doing all of this necessitates unhooking the control cables from the engine end as well to give you the play needed. Ahhh...the plot thickens.

Remember the V-drive? To unhook the shifter cable from the engine end, you have to remove a cable clamp (one of the most accessible in the whole job), and then remove the cotter key holding the pin that runs through the clevis which attaches to the shifter arm. This was the easiest thing in the whole job and it took me two hours.

One of the screws for the clamp deep inside the engine

Since I was going to be doing the other two cables, I decided to replace the fuel cutoff cable as well. To remove the engine end attachments for the throttle and fuel cutoff, you have to remove the cables from the cable clamps and remove a nut from a ball fitting on the throttle and a set screw from the fuel cutoff. Each of those two attach points took over four hours. For two screws. Most of that time was spent laying on the engine with my arm nearly up to my elbow jammed between the fuel manifold and the exhaust anti-siphon hose. Working with one hand. Blind. The screws were standard, not phillips, and were less than an inch from the fridge side wall which meant using an offset screwdriver attached to my wrist with my handy 3-cent tool keeper, and getting about 1/32 of the full turn between each time I dropped the screwdriver. Easily retrieved by my tool keeper, wash, rinse, repeat...and repeat...and repeat...

Once you're ready to remove the cables, you have to attach messenger lines to them (I used Gorilla duct tape) and attach the bitter end of those lines to something on the engine. My messenger lines did get tangled on more than one occasion because I used standard weight messenger line. Notes on messenger lines: use a little heavier line like paracord  that you can really tug on, and color code them if you're doing more than one cable at a time. When you're reinstalling them, you'll be glad you did as you're often working in different cubbies where you can't see the whole line.

Three days to remove three cables. The first delay was waiting on the cables. Our shifter cable was a 6400 model Teleflex, and the really good parts guru here at Snead Island couldn't find one. Turns out, the only reason we had a 6400 was because the boat was originally outfitted with a Paragon transmission which requires one. Now we have a Hurth transmission which can function on a 3300 model. Cheaper, more readily available and half the thickness. Score! Easier to run back through the stuffed bulkhead cutouts. Ahhh, but the plot thickens again.

Converting from the 6400 to the 3300 also requires changing out the shifter handle shaft on the binnacle. The shaft we had was too thick to accept the clevis that fits on the 3300 cable. Lots of chit-chatting with Edson's very capable and kind technical staff and we had the parts on order. Ordering was the easy part. Installing was another thing altogether. Another half day (and half a can of PB Blaster) down the drain. It turns out that the set screw in the end of the shifter handle wasn't what was holding it. 34 years of corrosion did just fine, thank you.

Running the new cables turned out to be much less of an issue than removing them. The new cables were much more flexible and slippery. It took me less than 6 hours to run all three new cables. Keep in mind that it would take considerably less time to do all of this with a helper. Part of the reason it took me so long was I was climbing in and out of the boat constantly and the companionway stairs were removed to access the engine. It also involved going from access panel to access panel from cubbie to cubbie, each time moving the cable just a few inches. Color coding the messenger lines is extremely helpful in this process.

Installing the binnacle fittings and getting the cables anchored in the binnacle was next. This involves figuring out a way to hang a flashlight in such a way that it can shine past your head which is squeezed between the cup holder and the binnacle while holding a very long piece of bronze rod with a hook on the end. Why you say? Because the bronze rod will be used to try to prod the cable clamp bolt down into the binnacle in such a way as it lines up with the teeny little hole, push on the clamp to push the bolt through the hole, and then hold it there while you feed the nut on the outside of the binnacle. Oh joy.

Edson binnacle cable clamp

Last, but not least, you have the fun of attaching the engine ends of the cables. Shifter cable was the easiest, done in  just a couple hours. The throttle and fuel cutoff cables go through the cable clamps with those screws that are right by the fridge wall - one full day to get those screws in and get the ends attached. Part of that time was spent cutting the utility cable for the fuel cutoff. In spite of the fact that it was measured against the old one, it was about two feet too long. Not a difficult job, just time consuming. (I loves me some Dremel.) This was the  most difficult day of the job. In fact, it's the most difficult job I've ever tackled on Kintala and I have the cuts and bruises to attest to that.

I finished the cable install on Friday, and wrote this post that evening, fully intending to get to publish it Saturday morning after Tim helped me do the engine run-up to test all the cable functions. Saturday morning came, the engine started, water poured nicely out of the exhaust thru-hull, the oil pressure came up and...the engine died. Somewhere during the contortions of getting my arms into the areas needed to remove and replace clamp screws, I must have pushed too hard on the many fuel lines and worked something loose and the engine got a little air in it. It doesn't take much on a diesel, like I said in a post not too long ago. Rats-n-frackin. The weekend passed with a bit of a gray cloud overhead. I really really wanted to check the project off my list before the weekend but it was not to be.

This morning I dug up all my enthusiasm and all my Westerbeast bleeding tools and set to work. An hour and a half later the engine roared to life and all my newly installed cables functioned as should be. A few lessons were learned here, which I thought I would recap:

1. I should have just taken off the fuel manifold to give me access to the space where the clamp screws were. I thought of this, but since bleeding a Westerbeast is NOT FUN, and I had just done it a few weeks before, I didn't go that route. In the end it probably cost me two days. I confess to being worried about damaging a fuel line trying to take off the manifold which would have cost many, many more days so that's my main reasoning for not removing it
2. Use good color-coded messenger lines.
3. Double check the cable placement in the binnacle clamp before you go to all the trouble of installing the clamp. The cotter key has to be firmly in the groove in the cable. Ask me how I know.
4. Disassemble your compass and binnacle pieces periodically and lube them with Tef-gel. You or some other future owner will greatly appreciate it some day
5. Take the time to do things right. A previous owner had done a real hatchet  job on repairing the block base on the fuel cutoff handle in the cockpit. It took me most of a day to fix.
6. Make use of good techinical service when it's available. The guys on the Edson tech line are top-notch.
7. If you're going to be working way back in the bowels of a 34-year old Westerbeke, be sure to take off your rings. This one I actually did think of before I started.

So before my English major daughter states the obvious that this post is almost one long run-on sentence, it was written that way on purpose because this project was the project from hell that just wouldn't end. And now, I believe, it's time for a project that's easier and a bit more fun. Stay tuned...

Uncle

The filling of the cruising kitty is going well, and the boat project list has more items checked off than not, but summer has been hard on Worker Man. Snead Island is a great place to work: New Boss is fair, considerate, and hard-working himself, the owners and the rest of the employees helpful and easy to work with, and Tim's desire to produce quality workmanship expected. But the Florida sunshine - the emblem of this state - is his biggest enemy. Working down inside small, un-airconditioned boats that are sitting in the brutal rays takes its toll on his 61-year-old body.

On the other hand, the summer has been pretty good to me. Being in charge of The List has afforded me the opportunity to learn a phenomenal amount about Kintala. Most of my projects so far have been inside the air-conditioned boat so, other than the outside portion of the port rebuild project, I have had the benefit of cool working environs. Not having the benefit of a highly experienced mechanic at my beck and call 24/7 has forced me to research, learn, troubleshoot, and push through problems on my own with only the brief conversations after Worker Man returns for the day and before he collapses on the settee directly under the A/C vent. Checking off list items has gone a long way toward improving my confidence as a mechanic.

Until yesterday.

Early in the summer I decided to tackle first those items that would make maintenance on Kintala easier. The easier it is to change the oil or fuel filters, the more frequently it will get done. Installing the remote oil filter system was of the highest priority. Adding en electric fuel boost pump to bleed the engine after changing filters was next. I did my research, spoke to our friend Stephen who also owns a Tartan 42 (which is a very nice one for sale by the way), and spent time looking at various pumps. When Stephen sent a photo to me of the pump in his install, I realized all of a sudden that I remembered seeing one already installed in the boat. It was mounted on top of the fuel tank, hidden under the settee base, all the plumbing there, but the wiring was set up with ends to attach to an external battery when you needed it. Yes, we should have realized a long time ago what it was for but, you know, the out of site out of mind thing.

Not having a separate battery nor any desire to purchase one, I spent the day Monday running new wiring from the house bank to the engine compartment where I mounted a switch, then from there to the pump. As with all things boat project, it took the whole day, although I confess that an hour and a half of that was fashioning a wooden switch box to house the switch I happened on in the used box at the parts dept here on site. If you've been following this blog for a while then you know that Tim and I are both pretty anal when it comes to detail so the box had to be right.

The engine compartment showing the remote oil filter install and the new switch box for the bleed pump on the back wall.

The fuel filter housing with the bleed banjo fitting on top

Tuesday, new filters in hand, I began to learn the ins and outs of changing fuel filters on a Westerbeke 50. I had never done it before and, in fact, had usually found some place else to be when Tim did it because it is a very unpleasant job that involves bleeding of the human sort in addition to bleeding of the fuel sort. We had no spare diesel to fill the filter housings with, but everything I was reading on the topic of the electric fuel pump indicated that the pump would fill those housings given enough time. I changed the filters, turned on the pump, bled the filter fittings, let the pump run, bled them again, pump run..well you get the idea. 15 minutes later I started the engine. It started right up. Big smile on my face for the 10 seconds it ran until it stopped. Rats-n-frackin'.

Off to the maintenance manual and various Westerbeke forums. The general concensus was that I still had not removed all the air and had sucked it into the high pressure side of the system where it air locked the injector pump. It takes shockingly little air to stop a diesel engine, it turns out. Since I had cranked over the engine, I was now blessed with the learning experience of the Westerbeke 8-point bleeding procedure. An hour later and I was still not getting fuel to the injector B-nuts and the starter was getting warm from cycling the engine. "Uncle!"  Wiki says that the term "cry uncle" is from Roman times when children who were being pressed by a bully would have to say "Uncle" to be freed. How truly appropriate, as I can think of no better bullies than the designers of the Westerbeke 50.

When Worker Man returned to Kintala, I retraced my progress, showing him how far I had succeeded in obtaining fuel dribbles along the bleeding path. He loosened one B-nut that I had been unable to reach on the high pressure side of the injector pump. cranked the now cool engine, got fuel there. Then he bled two of the injector line B-nuts and the engine started.

I've learned a ton so far this summer, but perhaps the greatest lesson I learned through this project is that some times you quit just on the verge of success. I stopped because I was worried about damaging the engine and starter from too much cranking (probably smart), but had I taken some time to read some more, to think it through and continued bleeding the next day, I would most likely have gotten the job done without help. Don't get me wrong - getting help when you're unsure is a very good thing, and it's great when it's there to benefit from, but I'm sure there's going to be times when I just have to keep at it and not give up. At least when the Westerbeast is involved.

The oil pressure sender connection is, of
course, right by the dipstick so it can be
bumped into every time you check the oil...

And just so The Beast could show me who's boss...when the engine finally cranked to life there was no oil pressure on the gage. We immediately shut down the engine and closed things up for the night. This morning I started troubleshooting and discovered that the wire from the oil pressure sender to the gage was both loose and damaged. I cut it clean, installed a new connector, lock washer and nut, started the engine and was rewarded with oil pressure in the green. So take that you big bully.

Let Autumn reign ...

The Beast is tamed...

Today is the official first day of autumn. With it comes the official end of the Summer From Hell of our first year of cruising. Even better, the WesterBeast rumbled to life today on the second turn of the crankshaft and settled into an easy idle. Buckets of water pulsed out of the exhaust. It may be just wishful thinking on my part, but the Beast seemed as happy as I have ever seen it. Maybe the new exhaust gasket along with a steady flow of raw water and the fixing of loose this and butched up that, actually did some real good. There are still things to do but, as of this evening, there is no reason to regard Kintala as anything but a ready-to-go cruising boat once again. In addition to a happy Beast she has a solid foredeck and new furling system on the staysail. Better again, we have eight days before the ax falls on the dock fees. There are oil changes to do, stuff to clean, and the normal trial of trying to get a boat that has been sitting still way too long, ready to be under way once again. But those are either routine or just good stuff.

The Summer From Hell was not all bad, of course. We spent months with Daughter Eldest, Son-in-Law, and Grand Sons Two. JJ and I sang “BOOM” at the sky. Christopher sat with me and sanded boat parts. We motored up the ICW from Dinner Key to Cooley's with the boys on board, saw a manatee, and went swimming in the ocean. The Family lore that will be passed down long after I am gone has some new chapters in it that will be hard to beat. Between The Bear and the work on Kintala we have seen some ugly and taken a real beating, that can't be denied. But we have also had the chance to share the kind of love that costs. Which, in the end, may be the only kind of love that matters. As difficult as it was, as long as it may take to recover, it is hard to say that it wasn't worth the price. Tonight I am content to accept it for what it was, hope that we did the best we could, and let it be.

Back in my old life the first day of autumn was always a good day. I like the change of seasons and autumn was my favorite. It also meant that winter was next. Which was okay as well. I looked forward the challenges that came with making a living in the sky during the months of winter. I didn't mind the cold (though once-upon-a-time frostbitten hands and feet hurt when the temperature drops) and actually enjoyed the city under a blanket of snow – so long as I didn't have to drive the Z-car on snow covered streets. This new life brings a different meaning to the first day of autumn.

Right up front is that, here in the sub-tropics, the first day of autumn generally means it just rains a little more. It is still in the upper 80s during the day, the humidity is still a killer, and any bald headed men that go out without a hat are just asking for abuse. Best for me though is that, though it doesn't mean that winter is next, it does means that the Islands are next. It will be a few months yet as a new grand baby is due in December and we plan to be back in St. Louis to welcome the new one into the world. But soon after we will be headed across the Stream once again, to spend the winter as ex-pat Americans living in a country that isn't as crazy as the one on our passports. “Winter” means a whole new thing in this cruising life, but I think I like it.

And for now the summer is over. Let Autumn reign.

An old guy, a Tartan, and a Beast

Sometimes it seems that easing off makes things go faster. Or maybe it just feels that way. It is no secret that this summer's relentless boat work put a pretty big dent in our first year's cruising experience. I have been struggling to keep the faith and rebelled a little. Even with the deadline looming and the Beast still disassembled, I just decided to finish some mods to the aft cabin; a partial rebuild of our storage area / work bench and a new lid for a storage area. It didn't need to be done, just a simple wood, screw, and glue job. It was something different that had nothing to do with deadlines and so I went with it. It took the better part of three days, mostly because I did it twice.

The first time through it was all poor planning and amateur hour, certainly not my best effort. In fact it looked like something someone kind of disgusted with the world would do; and I was embarrassed. So I backed up and did it again. It is still a mod to a home made thing shoehorned into a 30 year old boat, made with hand tools where function is more important than aesthetics. The aesthetics still need some work, but the function part is pretty sweet, so it will keep until we are back under way. Refinishing the reworked part will give me something to do one of these days while we sit easy on the hook somewhere. Even better, somehow doing that project realigned the mechanic / work / attitude relationship in Kintala's deck monkey, and smoothed the path to tangling with the Beast once again - deadline firmly in mind.

The plan when we rolled out this morning was to finish the mod and then assemble the exhaust riser / heat exchanger. Installation was planned for tomorrow. By late morning the mod was done and the riser and heat exchanger parts were laid out on the bench. Among those parts were shiny new stainless steel studs, washers, and nuts. After hours of searching Deb found them as a kit for rebuilding old style carburetors on 1960s Muscle Cars. The kind that people spend tons of money on making everything perfect, with the space under the hood a celebration of pumping out massive amounts of HP the old fashioned, low tech way. A sparking clean, chromed and painted space, including shiny studs holding massive 4 barrels to intakes and blowers.

Studs that work perfectly for hanging the heat exchanger onto the exhaust riser. They do look a bit out of place, hi zoot gleaming bits in the dark and grungy den where the WesterBeast dwells like a troll under a bridge. But that is where they are. (I would love for Kintala's engine compartment to look like that of one of the above mentioned Muscle Cars – maybe in my next life.) The build up went so smoothly, the old studs coming out clean and the new ones fitting just right, that I just kind of rolled with a job that seemed to be going well. By the end of the day the Beast was a whole unit once again. In addition to new studs, nuts, and gaskets to hang the freshly clean exchanger, a new bit of hose went into the cooling system to replace one that looked like it was causing a restriction when the engine was hot and sucking water. There is, of course, a new $80 exhaust gasket pinched in there as well, some new clamps, and a few other hacks that I un-hacked.

Tomorrow, after a very slow and careful look to make sure everything is where it is supposed to be, the coolant tank will get topped. Once we are sure the engine can suck river water – we have been sitting for a long time and the critters grow quick and thick in these parts – the Beast will be woken. IF all goes well, Kintala will be an working cruising boat once again.

We still have a few days to spare and, and at the moment anyway, and for the first time in weeks, I'm feeling pretty good about the tiny piece of the world that includes an old guy, and slightly less old Tartan, and a Beast.

Heat exchanger, round 2 ...

I started wrestling with the WesterBeast again today. That was supposed to happen yesterday but it was just a bridge too far. There was never any thought that cruising was going to be “retirement” (in spite of this blog's name). The work involved is just too demanding, there is too much potential risk, and too many win-it-or-bin-it decisions, for this to be anything like easy living. But once in a while a day comes along where I just can't man-up and get to work. Yesterday was one of those days.

I was still planning on working on the Beast when I ran across Friend James. James is the marina's resident “wooist”. If you want to know about what is going on in the ether, why the Mayan calendar was correct about the end of the age, how to cure almost any disease with the proper herbal tea and a “healing attitude”, what happens now that the solar systems is passing through the galactic plain, who is really in charge of the world, or when the aliens may arrive to lead us all to true enlightenment, James is the man in the know. Though I am way too much of a hard-nosed ex-street fighter to climb into his starship, we enjoy volleying back and forth in spite of our vastly different world views. And even taken by the woo, James is a better person than just about anyone I can think of in either politics or business. James is never going to hurt anyone, making him a pretty upright human being so far as I am concerned.

Then I walked over to Publix and made use of their hi-speed Internet connection to watch hometown hero and multiple-times World Champion Valentino Rossi win the Italian MotoGP, his first win in more than a year. After that Deb and I spent an extraordinary evening with new Friends Frank and Audrey. They are graduate alumni from the Civil Rights Movement and current environmental activists. Hearing their story and listening to their hopes for the future for their grand children and mine ranks as one of the five top conversations I have ever enjoyed. I don't generally give our species much of a chance. But if people like Frank and Audrey win the day there may yet be hope that our grand kid's inheritance will include air they can breathe, water they can drink, and oceans they can swim in. All in all it was a great day, but I didn't get anything done on the WesterBeast.

So today it was back in the ring to take another swing. Several people have mentioned that taking the heat exchanger off without removing the exhaust riser is difficult. (And they were right!) Getting it back on, they suggested, is well nigh impossible. For a while it looked like the naysayers would be proven wrong. Less than an hour after starting work the heat exchanger was hung on the bottom of the exhaust riser. All four nuts were started on their respective studs and awaiting proper torquage to be applied. Alas, said torquage turned into a problem. None of the nuts felt “right” and the aft inboard one, the one most difficult to reach, was clearly not a happy nut. After much internal debate between the cruiser who really needs to get this job done, and the aircraft mechanic who can't let things go, it was decided the exhaust manifold / heat exchanger assembly simply had to be removed. The naysayers were two for two.

Contemplating pulling the exhaust riser caused all kinds of consternation. First and foremost is that the exhaust gasket is an $80 – $100 engine bit. Another fear was that touching anything on the WesterBeast will surely lead to many other things needing “touched” as well. A fear well founded.

Six fasteners hold the exhaust riser to the engine, four studs and two cap screws. Two of the four studs came out of the engine. One of the studs that holds the intake muffler was already pulled out (I just lifted it out of the hole), and the exhaust gasket was indeed thrashed, though it wasn't me who did the thrashing. Apparently this is, minimum, the second time this gasket has been pressed into service. As for the studs for the heat exchanger, the reason for going down this path in the first place, they appear to be too short. Deb is currently sourcing the proper paper gaskets and I am considering the use of low profile nuts and lock washers, but it may will end up that replacing all of the studs with new is the only proper fix. At least the one stud I feared had been put in backwards, and thus trashing the riser, turned out to be the wrong stud; -18 / -18 instead of -18 / -24. Still installed by a Fool, but at least not as bad as it could have been.

By the end of the day both the heat exchanger and the exhaust riser were sitting on the bench waiting to be installed. By any reckoning that is a pretty big step backwards, particularly since the days are rapidly counting down to the killer-rise-in-dock-fees deadline. But this is cruising and, more to the point, this is me cruising on Kintala. Truth to tell I had a nasty hunch this was where today was going to lead all along.

Which may be why I took yesterday off. Once in a while even a tough guy needs a break from taking a daily beating. I am way too far down the road to be a tough guy any more, and this run of daily mechanical boxing matches going back to The Bear, has about done me in.

Maybe I need a glass of herbal tea and a trip through the ether.

A technical rant …

The heat exchanger guy called yesterday and said the bit removed from the WesterBeast was all prettied up and ready to go to the dance. Then he gave me a heart flutter by saying he had found a trace of oil floating around in the coolant. Bad juju. Really bad juju. The only way oil gets into the coolant is through a breach in the engine somewhere. Any such breach is going to be hard to find and expensive to fix. My day went straight in the dumpster.

Both Deb and good Friend / Boat Guru Bill (late of S/V Veranda) suggested there was no need to assume the worst just yet. There has never been water in the oil and what coolant that used to disappear stopped disappearing with the installation of a new cap. So assuming the worst was likely unnecessary. One shop's opinion does not, necessarily, bad juju make.

I assumed the worst anyway. After all this is Kintala and me, the world's most dysfunctional boat / owner relationship. Why wouldn't I assume she was presenting me with a blown head gasket or cracked block?  Kintala's WesterBeast has been the bane of my existence since the V-drive hand-grenaded itself and took the transmission with it.  But when I went to pick up said bit, the shop guy told me he had changed his mind. It wasn't oil after all. Thanks … I think.

Today started out with the newly refurbished heat exchanger sitting on the bench waiting to go back back on the WesterBeast, and thus offering us the chance to get off of this dock soon. So that was my job for the day. Would you like to take a guess as to how it went?

Shop man had been kind enough to make a couple of new gaskets for the install. The ones he handed over were about as thick as waffles. The ones that came off where more like cardboard. Mm … not sure that is going to work but hey, he is the heat exchanger expert.

When the heat exchanger came off the engine, one of the four mounting studs came off as well. Not a big surprise, though it meant a little more work when putting things back together. Included in the box of tricks from my old life are a set of stud drivers as well as a set of taps and dies, thus giving pretty good odds of setting things right, thread cut and stud wise. The studs were 5/16 with a -18 thread cut on the block side and a -24 thread cut on the heat exchanger side. Pretty standard stuff. As it turns out the stud that came out did so because the last fool who put this thing together (let's call him Fool 2) jammed a -18 nut on the -24 end. “Cross thread is better than no thread” is an old mechanic's tongue-in-cheek saying. Not sure why, but in this case a cross thread was barely good enough, it held and there was no leak. (“Barely good enough”, by the way, seems to be the “best practices” standard for much of the Marine industry.)

As the heat exchanger went on the forward port side nut would not tighten up. The waffle thick gasket was just too much, so off came the heat exchanger once again. But, what is this? When I went to check the threads on that stud, the -24 nut wouldn't go. Some fool in the distant past (let's call him Fool 1) had put that one stud in backwards, with the -24 end jammed into the block and the -18 end left exposed. Fool 2, who had put the -18 nut on the stud that had pulled out, was only half a fool. He had been hoodwinked by Fool 1. It likely never occurred to Fool 2 that Fool 1 would install three studs in one way and one stud in the opposite way. That would be incompetence desperately close to outright lunacy. He had four nuts and four studs, and made it work.

In my struggles to install the heat exchanger today, I was had by Fool 1, Fool 2, and the heat exchanger expert who had sold me waffle thick gaskets. So, after a couple of trips to the hardware store (Thank-you Craig for the use of your car!) things stand at the exact same place they did this morning, with the heat exchanger sitting on the bench waiting to be installed.

Tomorrow the WesterBeast and I will tussle once again. At least this time the gaskets will be of a proper thickness. There will also be three new -24 nuts and one new -18 waiting to be torqued onto the appropriate stud. (No, I didn't turn the offending stud around. No telling what is going on with the threads in the block side, but disturbing them now smacks of just asking for more trouble.) Most importantly work will commence with a fresh reminder that nothing (NOTHING!) done on this engine, before it came to me, was done by anyone who had a clue. And, truth be told, I am an old airplane guy and approach this marine stuff with, at best, just half-a-clue myself. Which, if you have followed me this far, puts me a half-a-clue up on most of the gurus.

When it comes to the WesterBeast everything must be checked, double checked, and then checked yet again. That means every nut, every stud, every screw, every gasket … cada sola cosa! Ghosts of fools past are lurking to open the hurt locker on anyone who thinks otherwise.

That “anyone” would be me.

Deadlines

Four nuts. Four hose connections. Four hours.

Working on things used to be enjoyable and rewarding; though it did help that someone was usually writing me a pretty big check to work on their thing. Working on most things is still often enjoyable and rewarding even though, these days, there are only outgoing checks for parts and materials, and no incoming checks. But when the thing being worked on is the WesterBeast shoehorned into our Tartan 42, it isn't likely that enjoyable or rewarding is going to be part of the equation. Today was no exception.

This engine has always run hotter than normal, and never seems to make much water. Two months ago we limped into Ft. Lauderdale nursing the temp gauge once again while dodging ugly weather, just to keep things interesting. Determined to get the thing running right once and for all (yeah, yeah, I know) we decided to pull the heat exchanger and have it checked, serviced or, depending on what the shop finds, replaced.

Four nuts. Four hose connections. Four hours.

And that's just to get it off the engine and out of the boat. Experience suggests that removing anything from anything is way less than half the job. So I am already feeling hard pressed to get Kintala ready to vacate this dock by the end of the month.

Part of going cruising was to get away from schedules and dead lines. So far it has not seemed to work that way. Some kind of deadline always seems poised just above our heads. We had to get the boat ready to go before the truck arrived. We had to get the boat ready to go into the water before the boat show; just barely made that one. We had to get the boat ready to head south before the ugly weather hit; didn't really make that one. Then the engine broke down in Oriental and shoved us way past the weather deadline. We paid the price by shivering our way down the ICW in a seemingly endless parade of long, cold, dark days.

Once south things got easier and, for a few weeks anyway, no schedules drove our decisions. But then we went to the Islands. While still deep in the north part of the Sea of Abaco, the day we needed to be back in the US started to press our decisions. Weeks out and we started thinking of when we needed to be through the Whale and into the southern part of the Abacos; then when we needed to be in Eleuthrea, then Nassau, Bimini, and the States. Once in the US we faced the hurricane deadline, one we missed because of The Thing and The Bear. The penalty was doubling our insurance premiums and spending the summer here, where the dock fees are way more than they would have been in Lady's Island. Now the impending 100% increase in dock fees is driving the need to move regardless of where we are on “the list”. So we are still working pretty close to full time days, seven days a week, driven by a deadline we can't afford to miss. (This deadline is due to cost, but the cost is going up because of the season change. So I am blaming it on the weather in a kind of indirect way. My blog, my rules.)

So far cruising deadlines have proved to be serious things and missing them costly. It is impossible to ignore them and “live without a schedule”. I think our problem with deadlines is the result of two conflicting needs. The first is one everyone faces, living with the weather. North in a hard winter or south in a hurricane is no one's idea of “cruising” or, at least, not my idea. Living on a boat means following the good stuff. Weather deadlines simply can't be ignored. Mother Earth will flat kick your ass.

The second serious thing is, simply, the boat. Nearly four years after buying this thing and there are still struggles with the engine, still adjustments being made to the rig so we feel comfortable as a short handed crew on big, open water. For example the roller went on the inner forestay. But we still have to find a sail that will work on the shortened foil and fit our deck. Another task that has to been done in the face of the impending deadline. The autopilot isn't installed, there are no solar panels, and the Bimini has yet to be touched. Some of this is simply not going to get done before the deadline forces us on our way.

That could be seen as a good thing, I guess. People keep telling me no boat is ever “done”. Waiting until it is would mean never leaving the dock. And I see their point. On the other hand, if there never comes a time when I don't have to balance out the cost and hazards of missing a deadline against the cost and hazards of heading out with the boat not “done” …? Sooner or later “not done” needs to be some bright work or dock lines needing spliced, not the autopilot or electrical system.

I can live with one set of deadlines. Living with two conflicting sets is getting old.

The Beast

The Wester-Beast wasn’t happy. The RPM surge had returned during the long run from Charleston, out in big water and out of sight of land. Some quick mental gymnastics and, given that we knew there was something wonky with the vent, I went out on deck and opened up the filler port. The Beast was better, still not purring, but much better. And thus we limped onto the anchorage. 

Today we planned to go back outside and make the jump to Jacksonville. When we got up the wind was blowing noticeably harder than was forecast, and the new forecast had wave heights of 3 to 5 feet. This was not good news since 5 foot waves could easily have water on the deck where, to keep the Beast happy, we had an open hole into the fuel tank. Going outside was clearly a poor choice.

We worked on the vent system this morning and while doing so I found a couple of valves at the fuel tank that appeared wrong; where it looked to me that one should be open and the other closed, both were open. We put things back together and prodded the Beast awake. It seemed to run okay but there was no way to tell if it would keep running okay – the RPM surge has been an intermittent kind of thing for several days. I wanted a good long run on the engine before heading off shore again.

Stay put and wait for another perfect outside day where we could manage with an unhappy Beast, or back on the ICW and give the Beast a good workout, see where we stood? Back on the ICW it was.

It wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had. Twice today Kintala plowed into the mud. Twice the Beast pulled her free and / or shoved her through; pulling much more RPM than I have ever asked of it before. This on top of running flawlessly all day.

Who would have thought that?


I’m still not sure I can trust the thing, but today it earned nothing but praise. One more day of the ICW should see us safely to St. Augustine where we plan to spend a few days and meet up with some long-time internet friends. After that, please, no more ICW.

Breathe in...breathe out...

The gremlins have, at least for the moment, been swept into the corner. We want to celebrate that the engine is fixed, we really do, but we're only whispering that maybe (just maybe) the fuel leak is stemmed, whispering because we don't want those gremlins to hear.

Early this morning Tim had discovered the source of the leak, a badly scored ferrule in the compression fitting on the end of the line between the pump and the first injector. He spent a good bit of time with some 1500 grit emery paper trying to work the gouge out as I continued to try to find a new one to be shipped to us. It appears that Lucas and Westerbeke have the same business modelss and you can't buy or even look up part numbers for parts unless you are a dealer.

Several on-off-sand-test attempts were futile but he tried once more and had me climb up into the cockpit to start the engine. I held my breath the whole time the engine ran, waiting for the "Shut it off!!!!" to come from the aft cabin port along with a few other colorful phrases the likes of which had been blasting out of that port over the last few days. No expletives...engine running smoothly...I finally allowed myself to exhale and step to the companionway to see Tim eyeballing the engine with a spotlight just daring a drop to splash on the new, white, clean, oilsorb sheets beneath the Westerbeast's belly. No drops, no drips, no spurts. He looked up at me with that hesitantly hopeful "Could it be?".

While we worked all morning to arrive at that point, Casey (sorry if the spelling is wrong) in the Boston Fuel Injection parts department was busy trying to locate the new fitting for the pump to replace the one that was scored. No joy on a new one, but she and the tech were able to locate a used one in excellent shape in an identical pump to ours  on their back shelf. The tech cleaned it up and they are shipping it to us for a spare at a reasonable price. Yeah I know, hard to believe. Casey was the one bright spot in this whole venture. She went out of her way to help us out, not dropping the ball or passing it on to someone else because she didn't feel like messing with a $22 part. This place came highly recommended to us, and I can see why. Kudos, girl and tell your boss to give you a raise. (Have I mentioned that I'm a sucker for customer service?)

We did allow ourselves a celebratory lunch at M&Ms Cafe after which we spent a bit of time on our friend Martin's steel boat from The Netherlands enjoying his warm, comfortable pilot house and a bit of boat talk. The weather is about to fall apart so we'll spend the next few days doing laundry and shopping and cleaning, all things wonderfully uninvolved in engine repair.

A big thanks to all of you who have encouraged us over the last few weeks of frustration. And if you see any gremlins around?  Tell them we hear there are a few derelict boats still left in the harbor.

It's alive ...

After nearly six hours of chasing bubbles out of the fuel manifold Kintala's Wester-beast staggered to life like Dr. Frankenstein's monster, shaking and sputtering and barely coherent. It was pretty ugly. We shut it down, poked around a bit, and a diesel guy from two slips over came by to listen to the engine complaints. (He is suffering through trying to get a new-to-him Gulfstar 44 ready for cruising. His engine runs. It is the generator, batteries, and wiring that are the bane of his existence.) We kicked the Beast into motion once again and this time it ran a bit better. Not good, but better. Enlightened opinion was that it would take a few more minutes of exercise to cough up the rest of the air. That sounded reasonable but, then again, I'm not that enlightened. As the Beast continued to chuff and cough I went searching, and uncovered a new fuel leak; this one at the fuel line to the #1 cylinder, at the pump end.

Rats.

I was very careful and deliberate in wrenching apart the 17 fluid connections needed to remove the pump. It should have been 18 but one was frozen so solid there was no getting it loose. Fortunately, that line could stay attached to the fuel filter cap and come out as a kind of dorked up assembly. I was just as careful mating all of those fluid connections back together. Getting these kinds of compression fittings cross-threaded (and thus terminally dorked up) is way too easy when they are new and shiny. Thirty years old, pitted and grungy, threads already galled ... bring your "A" game and hope for the best. My best this time around was 17 for 17 not cross-threaded, but with one leaking anyway. Un-torque and re-torque didn't help and the day was spent. So tomorrow will be day three of pump assembly and install. (Or day 23, it depends on how and what you count.)

Tomorrow is also Sunday so there is no telling if a successful conclusion to this side-trip to engine disasterville can happen. Monday looks to be the only weather window for scooting on out of here for nearly the next week; but if the Wester-beast is still oozing diesel into the bilge we will miss it and have to make a new plan yet again.

I have no intention of letting this blog become just an endless list of disappointments, break-downs, failures and troubles. I don't want this cruising life to go that way either. There are friends who have made it to the islands, others who have managed their first big water passage (and are justifiably proud), and still others who are way out ahead of us but staying in the States this year. We are going to follow along as best we can and are determined to have as much fun as possible along the way. Tomorrow will be another day living on the boat. It is going to be cold and another day spent getting smacked around by the Wester-beast. And it might be one of those days that I get a bit grumpy. But tomorrow will also be another day of living on the boat and being a part of this community. So I'll try not to be too grumpy.

NLA

Today was a frustrating day of searching for parts. If nothing else, Tim's desire to replace this Wester-"beast" engine, as some people call it (Tim has another name), makes sense if only to replace it with something that has spare parts available. Nearly every single item I've looked for has been NLA (no longer available in parts speak). This seems to stem from the fact that our particular Westerbeke is one of the ones using a British Leyland block, and many of the parts are only available in the UK. Glow plugs for instance. Common part, used on nearly every older diesel engine and available anywhere. But ours? NLA. The only place we could find them was under a cross-referenced number in...you guessed it...the UK. Engine overtemp alarm switch? NLA. Engine coolant temp sensor? NLA.The most frustrating thing is that I know most of these parts have a generic part number and could be bought for a song at the local tractor store if I could just get a cross reference number, but they don't seem to exist anywhere. The only success I've had was with the glow plug relay, found on amazon for $21. Wanna know how I found that one? I searched Google images until I found one similar to ours and then fine-tuned till I got the exact model.


So in the mean time we're getting some smaller projects done. Tim fixed a broken piece of teak in the cockpit today and re-mounted a piece of fiberglass framing around a shelving insert in the cockpit so the mounting screws actually went into the fiberglass instead of into air like it was from the factory. I've been working on some modifications to the dodger to make it better. Now that we've used it awhile there were a couple things we needed to add. We've been doing our daily walkabout and a few bicycle rides to the post office to pick up parts, some bread baking, and cooking and lots of reading. The weather has been fantastic. Except for a few days of thirties in the morning, we've been doing a pretty good job at meeting our goal of chasing 70° and missing the snow that some of you have had already. That's one thing I'm glad is NLA.

Coffee Meter: 10
What's on the menu today

Instinct

Deb tells me that my mechanical instinct is pretty good; that I should trust it more.  Ten days ago, although I couldn't put eyes on the leaking fuel because of a lack of access, instinct suggested that Kintala's injection pump was giving up the ghost and fuel was leaking out a weep hole in the pump flange (designed to protect the engine from just such a failure).  This would have been bad news.  Injection pumps are pricy.  Getting one overhauled was sure to take some time.  And getting this one out of Kintala looked to be anything but easy.

Various Westerbeke support experts insisted my instinct was wrong, that such was impossible because a) the pump couldn't fail that way and, b) there was no such weep hole.  So I shrugged off my instinct.  After all (and this is not instinct but sure knowledge born of 40+ years of fixing stuff) though I know a lot about some things, and some about a lot of things, I don't know everything about anything.  When the folks that design, manufacture, and maintain a thing point blank tell you something can't be, in all likelihood that something can't be.  Who am I to argue with experts?

The intervening ten day struggle, with these same experts, was to actually lay hands on the parts they suggested were the most likely source of the problem.  Parts that, by the by, cost roughly 6 times what they would have cost if we could but lay our hands on the generic version not carrying a Westerbeke part number.  Even being robbed,  it took Deb talking to a Westerbeke dealer in California to get the parts ball rolling.  The Virginia dealer who didn't have what we needed in stock, was insisting he had to get them shipped from the factory to him, and then he could ship them to us   (the reason it took close to a week to get the bit of tubing).

But he was wrong.  According to the CA dealer, the MA dealer (who Deb found had the parts in stock) could sell the parts to us with the VA dealer's permission and could also drop ship them straight to us, a fact that the MA dealer never bothered to mention.  Deb called the MA dealer, educated them as to their own company S.O.P. and got the parts here yesterday afternoon. (Tangle with one of the better parts people on the planet, especially when her boat is broken, and you will get your head handed to you on a platter.)

Randy showed up this morning to help me install said parts and bleed the engine.  A couple of hours later Kintala chuffed a bit of smoke, the engine caught, and immediately starting barfing fuel exactly as before.  This time I shoved face, mirror and light as deep as possible into the engine bay (risking catching my goatee in the water pump belt in the process) in order to see once, and for sure, from whence came the leak.

Yep, you guessed it already.  Fuel was spraying out of the weep hole - that does not exist - in the mount flange of the pump - that cannot fail in such a manner.  I guess I shouldn't feel too bad since I, an amateur diesel mechanic and wanna-be sailor, apparently knows more about diesel engines than the people who design, manufacture, and maintain marine specific Westerbeke diesel engines.  That's pretty good for a person who likes to think of himself as somewhat competent around a toolbox.

On the other hand I, an amateur diesel mechanic and wanna-be sailor, apparently knows more about diesel engines than the people who design, build, and maintain marine specific Westerbeke diesel engines.  How is that even possible?  How does an industry get this monumentally screwed up?  And why does it have to be an industry I have to deal with?  I wouldn't care if the wood burning stove industry was this bad, or the chicken feed industry.  At this point I don't even care if the automobile industry is shooting itself in both feet several times a day.  But I live on a boat and can't escape the marine industry.  This is not a good thing.

Deb found a place not too far away that will repair and / or overhaul the unit.  I tried to settle down enough to get the pump off the engine.  Completely frustrated and spitting mad is not a good frame of mind for starting a completely frustrating task like removing the fuel injection pump from a Westerbeke 50 crammed into a Tartan 42's miniscule engine bay.  Parts installed for 30 years are reluctantly uninstalled, a couple of things simply broke in my hands, (more Westerbeke parts to deal with) wrenches slippery with fuel dance away from cramped fingers, and itty-bitty parts disappear into the bilge mess never to be seen again.  Almost in spite of myself, by 1700 the pump was extracted, tools were stored, and the companionway engine covers / ladders were back in place. 

Oriental is a nice town.  Which is good since there is no telling when we will be moving on.  Instinct tells me we are far from having a running engine.  I have surely kicked over the nest of sleeping gremlins that has been lurking in Kintala's engine compartment since we bought her.  Corralling them all is going to take some time.

Sometimes ...

... it's good to be wrong.  (If, in fact, I am wrong ... the jury is still out.)  Westerbeke gurus answered an email within hours and informed me that the injection pump on the W50 can't really fail in the way I feared.  Not a big surprise since I was envisioning an aviation recip. engine fail mode not a marine diesel engine failure mode.  Shortly after, Randy arrived and we started hunting for the leak.  Access to the area in question is so poor that he couldn't get an eye on the source any more than I could.  After several tries of running the engine without success the call was made to pull the alternator.  That made for better visuals but, with the belt driving the water pump now loose, there was no way to run the engine to look for the leak.  Instead we logic chopped our way to what appeared the only likely culprit; a line between the filter and the pump.  It was not as wet as expected given the size of the leak, but it was the only source in the vicinity, and agreed with Westerbeke's assessment of the probable cause.

With no real option the decision was made to remove the line and check it for damage.  Likely in place since Perseus offed the Kraken; the line was seized solid in the compression nut, which was seized solid in the engine case fitting, which (and this might be the true source of the problem) was barely finger tight in the case itself.  As expected (at least by me) and in spite of Randy's most careful attempts, the line did not survive the extraction process.  He set off to find parts to build a new one with only partial success.  Deb went hunting the internet for the part, found a source, and a whole new line assembly should be here by Monday.  (Have I mentioned that Deb is the best parts person I have ever known?)

So the problem might be fixed and it might be relatively minor, might.  Until the engine actually chuffs to life once again there will be no claims of victory.  While we wait on the part other tasks lie at hand, but we are being careful to enjoy our stay in Oriental and not work 10 or 12 hour days.  The only thing we have found that we don't like is the motion Kintala takes when the wind is out of the north, even when tied in a pier.  We roll constantly with the lines catching us up short and jerking the boat to a stop when she gets too enthusiastic.  If we didn't need the pier for the work being done there is an anchorage just across the face dock from us, but the holding is poor and there is little protection, with a long fetch when the wind is south or east.  (A boat dragged clean out of the harbor last night and ended up in the Neuse.  The harbor doesn't offer a lot of protection from north winds either, but at least a boat at anchor doesn't roll.)  For a place that is the "Sailing Capital of NC" it really isn't much of a harbor for transients.

It does, however have spectacular sunsets. This is the view from our bow.

Rant

After several months of slogging through various dark corners of the marine industry we finally gathered up all of the parts needed to try and reassemble the drive train in the Tartan. The tranny, all new and shiny, bell housing fixed, painted and bolted up, the custom-machined drive coupling gleaming like a big, fat jewel of steel, and the V-drive - after uncounted discussions with Walter Machine trying to convince them that their drive actually was mounted in a Tartan 42 with a Westerbeke engine and a Hurth transmission - dressed in dark blue paint and ready for service. Finally...progress!!!

Ahh...hold on there Ace.

The V-drive we pulled from the boat and sent to Walter Machine had 4 studs sticking out of the heavy end. The drive we got from Walter Machine? No studs. No holes. In fact one of the places where there should be holes sports the data plate. (Yes; I should have noticed it sooner. I plead being up to my belt buckle in alligators for missing this little detail.)

So I spent the weekend bolting it all together anyway and hung it on the back of the engine. My plan is to align the prop shaft / engine assembly so I can lay out exactly where me needs to locate the non-existent studs, then figure on installing them myself. For I know what Walter Machine's story is going to be. There were no studs in the units they manufactured. Studs, big beefy brackets, and two extra engine mounts, are a spooged together service bulletin fix for Tartan's hanging so much "stuff" that far off the back of the engine in the first place. "Stuff" which proved too much weight for the cast aluminum bell housing. How "spooged" is this fix? The extra engine mounts are hung up-side-down, supposedly working in tension and not compression. I'm not thinking that is such a good way to use mounts, so part of my efforts are going to be trying a redo on the brackets so the mounts can sit down-side-down. It is best to think of it as just another part of what has become the project of my life.

A life that has seen a bunch of projects. I have done million dollar repairs on airplanes, rebuilt wrecks back into flying machines, remodeled houses, resurrected dead motorcycles; there was always some understanding of what was going to be involved. None, until now, ever exploded in my face as has this boat. So bad has Kintala become that I have given up looking for an "end date." My life is flying during the week so I can buy the stuff I need to work on the boat on the weekend. When will it be done? When will I do something else with my life besides work and then work on a boat? When will we take to big water or even get this thing back out on the lake? Not a clue.  In fact don't even ask me to think about it. What's next is the studs, the mounts, the cooling system, the shaft seal, oil leaks, the...the...the. If I can get Kintala to the Fourth of July Raft Up under her own power I will take that as a major victory. (I give it about a 50/50 chance.) Then it will be the dodger, the wind vane, the solar panels, the...the...the.

When we started The Retirement Project I never suspected it would grow into a cautionary tale, but it has.  Many people are fascinated by our plan to live on a boat and explore at our whim.  Many wonder if they shouldn't try to do it as well. If they ask, I tell them all the same thing.

If one has been smitten by the idea of living lighter, being less of a burden to our little planet; if one chafes in equal amounts at the demands of corporate overlords and the harassment of bureaucratic busy-bodies; if one has been on the open ocean in the dark watches of the night and the heart desires nothing more than to be there again; if the wind and the sea and the caress of Mother Ocean tug at the very soul; if one finds modern Western culture to be incessantly childish and a crushing bore, and if one thinks of a good day as being equal parts sweat dripping off one's nose and blood flowing from skinned knuckles; then by all means find a boat, a willing partner, and take the shot.

If not, buy some clubs, take up golf, and never go near a sailboat at any time for any reason lest one be lost to the songs of Peisinoe.

You will thank me later.

This just in...

...the re-manufactured drive coupling rests inside the worked-over bell housing, with both mounted firmly (and apparently squarely) on the V-drive! How about them apples?
This isn't to say we are in deep water yet. Fittings must be located to plumb the V-drive into the cooling system, said cooling system which is now mostly disassembled for the water heater mod. In addition all of these various bits and pieces have to be bolted back together. A big sigh of relief will echo out of the boat when the bell housing / V-drive is hanging on the back of the tranny. That end of the bell housing doesn't show any evidence of being damaged, but it is a pretty close fit, so...

...once that is on all that remains is to align the engine / tranny / bell housing / V-drive (all sitting on 6 brand new engine mounts) with the prop shaft, install the starter, hook up wires and tubes and hoses and such, take a deep breath, hit the starter button...

...and fix all the things that pop up.

It could be worse. I was supposed to do a photo flight Tuesday morning, piloting the camera ship to take some areal pictures of the world's only remaining Monosport; a 1920's once upon a time air-race dominator. A friend put more than a year into rebuilding the thing from a box of parts. A fast taxi a few days ago uncovered a serious design fluke with the landing gear. Rework led up to a first flight a day or so later - which was cut short by falling oil pressure and a few other niggles. Come Tuesday morning and we may have discovered why there is only one of these things left in the world. Just minutes after take-off the builder / test pilot experienced a case of aileron reversal that (fortunately) he was able to fly though to get back on the ground. (I have more than a little experience with antique airplanes and have flown though some evil handling characteristics of my own, which is why I now fly the camera ship. We don't build 'em like we used to, and there are lots of good reasons why.)

A year plus of solid work to resurrect an airplane that, as it turns out, is best left in the hangar.

At least Kintala still floats.

(Aileron reversal - for those who are curious - is when a pilot moves the flight controls expecting the airplane to roll one way, and it rolls the other way instead. It is a nasty gremlin that lurks in the dark reaches of aerodynamics. Mention it at a gathering of aviators or aeronautical engineers and a heated debate well surly break out as to the cause, though the cause matters not to the pilot in such straights. All he knows is that the airplane is trying very hard to commit suicide and there are scant seconds available to dissuade it from doing so.)