21 March 2009

I was reading Gletwyn's blog about servicing or attending to a carburettor at sea and I thought it might be worthwhile to run through some of the problems encounterd with my motors when I owned a boat. By the way, BOAT is an acronym for 'Bring Out Another Thousand'. Anyone interested in buying a boat would do well to bear this in mind before rushing out and splurging.

My boats, 2 in the end, were RIBs (rigid inflatable boats) with a pair of Yamaha 30hp, 2 stroke, 3 cylinder motors (same motors used on the 2 boats). Those motors saw lots of action and came up trumps in spite of some major problems along the way. Let me relate some of those stories as examples:

1. There is a shop in Johannesburg called 'Motor Books'. Either go there or find a similar retailer who can provide you with a service guide for your motors. The book I bought was a teaching manual for outboard mechanics, learning to service a range of Yamamha motors, and was extremely useful. Good simple text, lots of pictures and helpful hints. It was always carried on the boat as part of the normal emergency gear.

2. When the motors were bought, a magnet in one of the starter motors was fractured. It needed to be replaced. I learned a valuable lesson. If you buy the parts via the dealer, they WILL take their pound of flesh. You should look around, consider ebay, pirate parts or chat to local motorboat dealers who may have secondhand spares.

3. Check your sparkplugs. The manual clearly described what a healthy plug would look like. Make sure that the correct plugs are being used and that the gap is correct (usually the case if you buy new ones but it is always worth a check). My motors were serviced by a professional and he put the wrong plugs in (that is what happens when you don't check the manual) .

4. Don't be intimidated by the motors. The more you work on them, the more confident you become about sorting out problems. I was plagued by a motor that suddenly would not start. With 2 motors it was easy to swop items between the motors until I figured out the 'start-in-gear' switch was broken. Since all my launches were through the heavy Natal surf, the switch represented an unnecessary hassle and was bypassed (cut them off!). The motors would start in gear which was really useful with some of the nasty launches we encountered. If you only had 1 motor, use a digital camera to photograph the dismantling process, then you have a record of how to put everything back together without ending up with a handful of 'spare' parts.

5. My boat almost went up in flames when a short caused a small fire. After that the batteriers were always disconnected after use. There was a set of jumper-cables in the usual gear stowed on the boat. Since there were 2 motors, there were 2 separate batteries. This was useful if a battery was flat. Once the one motor was running it was a simple affair to start the other motor (this is not something you want to do in the waves so make sure you keep your batteries charged and properly serviced).

6. Don't sweat it if your motor fails at sea. Be logical. Secure your boat with an anchor if necessary and if possible to prevent you drifting too far or into trouble. Now go through the following sequence:
a. Check that the emergency cut-off clips are secured and in place.
b. Ensure that the battery terminals are clean and correctly attached to the battery.
c. Check the fuel line is connected, bulb pumped and sufficient fuel in tanks.
d. Ensure controls are in neutral if you have a functional 'start-in-gear' switch.

In the majority of cases that sequence would give you a running motor.

7. Carry some spare parts e.g. set of new sparkplugs for each motor, prop-lock nut and spare split pin. It is also worthwhile carrying a reasonable set of tools including spanners, screwdrivers and plug spanner. A couple of multi-tools and some shifting spanners are indispensable. Additional pieces of equipment that were useful: feeler guage (measure the gaps of sparkplugs), piece of emery paper, small wire brushes and silicone spray (WD40/Q20). It is worthwhile carrying a spare impeller for each motor, chances are you will probably need to replace one at 6pm on a Saturday night and that is when a spare is useful.

8. Take time to frequently inspect your engine. Changing plugs, checking wiring harnesses, removing props and cleaning, dropping the lower unit to change impellers and ensuring the crank has adequate oil, are essential and easy tasks. Regularly conducted, they build confidence to work with your motor and troubleshoot if necessary.

9. Always run your motors with the muffs on after taking it out on a trip. Listen for anything loose or different. Ensure that water is flowing freely through the cooling system (this sometimes does need to be flushed: pieces of rusted metal and sand do make their way through the cooling system and usually block the outlet). Part of the preparation before a trip should be to run the motors for some time on several occasions before the trip, to highlight any possible malfunctions. The muffs are intended for motors running at low revs, they are INADEQUATE when running a motor at high revs. NEVER dry start your motor, only 3 seconds of dry running irreversibly damages the impeller!

10. Finally, if you intend launching through surf take a good time to warm up both motors adequately. Low revs are fine and a good 5-10 minutes should provide you with a trouble free launch.