Genset Snafus

[Capt. Mike Holmes]

Mikey said I should post this to share with others. Kinda hate to, but here goes. On my last offshore trip, I was running short handed, wore out from busting my ass to get ready, and it was a freebee trip on top of that. Had 6 passengers, three of them large. First thing that happened was they knocked over and spilled stuff all over the cabin, left it for me to clean up, neglected to secure the door to the head, so it came open and wedged against my mahagony cabin door - stuff like that. I went into the cabin and noticed no cold air. AC fan was running, compressor off. I had a short in the control panel that turns on the water pump some time back, so it is now plugged in to an outlet. Somebody unplugged it, didn't say squat to me. I chewed their asses out, told them to tell me if they notice no cool air inside again. Bad fishing day, very slow. Coming in, a large Hispanic fellow climbs into the port helm chair, plugs an ipod jack in his ear, starts rocking back and forth. These are tall pedestal chairs, very heavy, mount on the engine box hatches. I should have made him get his fat ass out, but was feeling bad about not catching fish. Noticed a strange vibration after awhile. Went in the cabin, no air, genset was dead - no power to the ignition panel. Of course, nobody had said shit to me about the AC being off. Back at the dock, turned out the rocking boy had exerted enough force to pull the engine box loose from it's mountings, it was sitting on the genset exhaust elbow, had rubbed the insulation off the main ground wire that got trapped between. Don't know how this conencted to the power problem. but the #10 wire from the start solenoid to the igniton switch had power at the solenoid, none at the switch. One of the pigtail plugs off the wiring harness that was unused had contacted the old shift cable I hadn't had a chance to pull out, and got hot enough to burn the plastic covering off for about 3 feet. Lucky we didn't have a fire. Ran a new wire from the solenoid to the ignition this morning, problem seems solved.

May never let strangers on the boat again. Will certainly not be so polite the next time somebody exceeds the "load limit" on seating.

On the up side, engines ran great, temps and pressures perfect, new Raymarine C120 series multifunction fishfinder was awesome.

Damn, boats are fun!

[Dave Kosh R.I.P.]

Sorry Capt Mike about your unruly passengers. Sure will make a lot of folks glad they did not charter there's out. That's where a mate comes in handy but on our boats it becomes a little impractical at times.
Well I had an interesting day at the dock. My port battery went bad (8D) after only 22 months even with the pink JC Whitey battery juice. Turns out I had a fire start at the dock. A feeder wire (+) from the battery to port rear bilge pump shorted to the engine mount and smoke city prevailed. Engine mount was red hot and started the heavy wood on fire. I got it right away with dry chemical then fresh water from the hose. Whew! Now my starboard alternator is not working (Delco). I guess the 70 amp regulator /diodes bit the dust with a short on the jump position of the battery switches. This is a lesson for me for sure. I replaced almost all wiring but this wire looked good except they did not use gray PVC for anti chafing. Serves me right not replacing it. So lesson here if it does not look right replace it. So I just lost my one alternator and will get it rebuilt. I will say the American La France alternator on the port engine is much heftier than the Delco. I'm just glad this did not happen underway at sea. It could have been awful. I just completed a 280 mile round trip offshore on my last run and it was fine. So total loss one 8D battery, one alternator to rebuild and one # 4 wire to replace and insert into a PVC tube for protection for any possible chafing! Also a large fuse right at the battery for additional protection so this can not happen again. Capt. Dave

[Capt. Mike Holmes]

Dave, sounds like we both got lucky, in the long run. My old boat has had some problems over the years, but nearly all were at the dock, and it has never failed to bring me home from offshore. When it was gas I had to come in on one engine once, but we came in. Do boats have attitudes and pride in their work? I think at least some do.

While this group of passengers were a bit lacking, I've been lucky enough to mostly have very good people on board. Hope this was my "off" group for awhile.

[In Memory Walter K]

My experience has been very few bad ones, but the ones that were, were VERY bad! They destroyed things in multiples and must have had hearing defects because they never seemed to hear anything I said...even with the engines turned off. Strangely, they left thinking they had a great time. Walter

[Capt. Mike Holmes]

Like the ones who love to fish off the corners, right where the props are? Or keep fishing behind the boat after I point out I need to back down to hold on top of the wreck? Or tear up tackle, or drop pieces of bait in places they can't be found - except much later, by smell?

On the other hand, had a couple out a few years ago, didn't have a clue how to fish offshore, didn't take directions very well - so they didn't catch much, no matter how hard we tried for them. At the end of the day, they tipped heavily, said it was the most fun they'd had in years, appologized for being so inexperienced.

[Dave Kosh R.I.P.]

Yea Capt. Mike I can never figure some folks out. I leave that up to my wife. She 's a good reader. I only get myself into trouble when she's not around.
I only had to come home once on one engine. Wasn't fun near shore, autopilot could not even keep it on course. Made it back to the dock though. I have the version 3 rudders but wish I had Patrick's. I will someday soon though. This cancer is holding me back from a lot of things nowadays. Yep it came back about 4 weeks ago and back on chemo again. Another day on that . I like talking about good old boats better.
Tight lines Mike Dave K

[Capt. Mike Holmes]

Dave, my boat had very large bronze rudders on it when I became her steward, steers as well on one engine under most conditions as on two - sometimes I think better. I normally run on one in the canal where I keep it, because of neighbors always yelling at me to slow down. About to solve that by selling out and moving to a shorter canal with almost no neighbors to have to pass.

[Rawleigh]

Sorry to hear that Dave. Keep up the good fight. I'm praying for you.

[Terry Frank]

Dave,

I'm pulling for you too. I got back from the Doc yesterday. Thankfully I'm still doing more than OK. Enough of this talk. Enjoy your boat.

Terry

[AndreF]

Hang in there, Dave.