Engine Problems - In Paradise

Jan 10 - Jan 13

Saturday morning, I awoke at 0330!  I had slept through the alarm!  I woke Barb and we were underway in about ten minutes.  The RADAR showed no traffic and once the engine had warmed up, I ran the engine to 6.5 knots.  The 0200 plan would mean that we would need to run at 6 knots, but since I overslept I needed to run faster to make it to the anchorage by dark.  The bottom and the prop was clean and we seemed to have no problem reaching 6.5 knots, until …….. an alarm went off!!

I slowed the engine, took it out of gear and shut it down.  An inspection of the engine compartment, check of fluid levels and wiring yielded no signs of a problem.  Maybe it was a faulty alarm?  I hit the start button and the engine turned about a quarter turn and went arrummppph.  Not good.  A second try with the starter battery and house batteries in parallel gave the same result.  Really not good.

We were about four miles southwest of the La Cruz anchorage.  There was a little wind from the south so we raised sails, turned the boat around and headed back.  We arrived at the anchorage about an hour before sunrise twilight and I suggested that Barb go below to rest while I remained sailing with only the main sail and with almost no wind, back and forth outside the anchorage.  As dawn broke Barb came up and I decided I would lower the dinghy and tie it to our aft quarter and see how our mighty Tohatsu five-horsepower outboard would push our 14 ton vessel through the water and more importantly, how would it stop it?  The experiment was successful in that I found that it took quite a while to get the boat moving, reaching about 2 knots. That gave Barb enough forward speed to steer (sluggishly).  Stopping the boat took longer than I expected, but it did stop.

I climbed back on board, called the marina and said that we were returning without an engine and would stop at the first available dock slip.  We got an okay and I got back in the dinghy.  We proceeded into the channel and Barb gave a “Securite´, Securite´, Securite´” call on the radio warning that Jupiter's Smile was a vessel in tow entering the marina and that any and all concerned vessels should contact Jupiter's Smile on VHF channel 16.  Barb flawlessly put our starboard side to the “T” head dock as I slowed the boat and then stepped on the dock to secure bow and stern lines.  Safe!

There are no utilities on this section of dock so we both got in the dinghy and looked for a likely location to which we might relocate while we assessed the situation.  There was a wide slip with a finger dock on the starboard side (bow in) next to Adesso (Lane and Vickie whom we had met during our first season “in the Sea”.)   We would share the slip with Sailish Sea (Ian and Diane whom we had heard on the radio, but never met) on our port side …. if we could negotiate an “S” maneuver first to starboard into the fairway and then hard to port into the slip.  I alerted Lane and Ian that their first duty was to protect their own vessels and then help us land if they could.

Try to follow this description of our next maneuvers.  We returned to Jupiter's Smile.  I tied the dinghy to the aft starboard quarter, started the outboard, hopped onto the dock, untied Jupiter's Smile’s bow, heaved the line over the starboard side life lines, gave the bow a shove away from the dock, scampered to the stern line untied then and draped it over the starboard side life lines, hopped into the dinghy and noticed that Jupiter's Smile was already moving slowly forward.   With the tide?  The wind?  No matter what, it was good.  I untied the dinghy, scooted it to Jupiter's Smile’s port bow and waited … until the boat cleared the end of the dock and then I pushed perpendicular to the bow with the dinghy like a tugboat would do, turning Jupiter's Smile to starboard and into the fairway.  We were going too slowly for Barb to have any effect with the rudder, but that was okay.  Once headed down the fairway, I scooted to the stern and pushed from behind to get a little  more forward motion up and give Barb a chance to steer.  I scooted again, but this time to the starboard bow and did my tug boat imitation again, turning Jupiter's Smile to port now.  Entering the slip, the people on the dock hooked our bow line with a boat hook, but the stern was too far to port so I raced down the starboard side to the port side aft quarter and gave Jupiter's Smile’s stern a push to starboard, raced to the starboard aft quarter, tied off the dinghy and put its motor in reverse, pulling to starboard and slowing the boat.  The people dockside hooked the stern line and we were in.

We hadn’t seen Adesso last season because they had to have their engine replaced so they didn’t have time to venture far.  As luck would have it their mechanic, Greg Emery, was coming to Adesso to check on something that day and Lane said he would send Greg over to talk to us.  

We checked back into the marina and in with the Port Captain.  He just took our clearing out papers and said he would treat it as if we never left.  Greg did, Lane did and Greg gave us his opinion on what we had done to the engine.  If he was right, we had blown a head gasket or had a cracked head and water had gotten into one cylinder or more.  Since we stopped the engine quickly, we probably didn’t have much damage.  Considering the age of the engine and hours it has run, it would be wise to rebuild it as long as repairs were going to take place anyway.  He said that it would be most convenient for him if we could get Jupiter's Smile to Marina Vallarta and save an hour and a half round trip each day as he worked for us.  We agreed to all this and he said he would find us a slip at Marina Vallarta and call us.  We went out to dinner at Frascati’s Restaurant in the marina to reward ourselves for our bad luck and our good luck in the handling of the situation.

On Sunday, we went to Charley’s Place and witnessed another Denver Bronco playoff embarrassment, this time against the Indianapolis Colts.  But, the Patriots won so at least part of the family is thrilled.  And the Seahawks won again.

Greg called on Monday (the Marina office is closed Sundays) and said there was a slip available.  When could we get there?  We said we didn’t need a tow if there was wind and that we would venture out tomorrow.  I called for help from cruisers with dinghies to effect the exit from the marina and got a good response.  Lane said he would help and Ian, whose dinghy was being repaired, volunteered Jason on Defender.  Dan on Dazzler said he would help as well.  So, we paid the marina and checked out with the Port Captain again.  He asked if we were really leaving this time and I said we would see in the morning.  We would call “Securite´, Securite´, Securite´” on our way out of the marina and the channel as we would be under tow again.

Tuesday morning, at about 9 am the towing team assembled and we got going with only a little direction from me, getting Lane to push, tug boat style, turning our bow to port at the end of the fairway.  Dazzler Dan’s outboard had three times the horsepower of ours so we made good speed and had good helm response out the channel.  As I hoisted sails, Dan cast off from us, we passed out thank you beers to our helpers and we were on our way to sail for the harbor of Puerto Vallarta, about 10 nm away.  There was only a little wind and we were able to make only about 3 knots, but that would get us there before 1 pm if the wind held.  Little by little the wind strengthened, but is was blowing out of the valley off the shore.  I knew this was a geographically influenced meteorologic phenomenon and that the wind would die, then shift as the valley warmed.  None-the-less, we were sailing at six knots for a short while, before the wind died.  I launched the dinghy and went into tug boat mode reaching 2.6 knots with 4 nm to go.  Greg called and asked where we were and after we had gone about two more miles he pulled along side in his thirty-one foot sport fishing boat to take up the tow.  The swells were too big to tie abreast of us so he towed us with a towing bridle into the harbor.  He then tied abreast of us to proceed down the channel to the marina.  With the help of men on the dock, Greg’s patient boat handling and his nimble assistant, Ruffino, we got docked stern in, without mishap.  Greg said sleep well and he would see us in the morning.

Jan 14 - 31

Wednesday morning, Greg and Ruffino arrived and went to work right away dismantling the upper part of the engine.  As Ruffino removed the head, exposing the cylinders, we could see that water had entered all four of them, but after tasting it, Greg said, that at least it was fresh water with coolant and not salt water.  He also said that there was a great amount of carbon present and that we had not been working the engine at high enough RPM to prevent that carbon build up.  He recommended we pull the engine out, check to see if the head was cracked or if only the head gasket had unsealed, rebuild the engine and that I run it hard like it was meant to be run once he reinstalled it.  We agree to all.  Live and learn.  The price of tuition was going to be high, however.

The engine mounts were unbolted, the prop shaft was unbolted from the transmission and the engine was moved forward in its compartment.  The transmission was unbolted and separated from the engine and removed from the compartment.  With a hoist tied to our boom and the boom supported with our spare halyard, the engine was lifted out of the engine compartment and into the companionway to our bridge deck.  The hoist was repositioned so that when we swung the boom, the engine would clear the coach roof and it did.  We lowered the engine to the dock.  Ruffino cleaned things up, hand trucked the engine to Greg’s truck and off they went.  So the engine is in the shop being machined, parts for the rebuild will arrive from the US and then we will have a new, rebuilt engine and we will have learned much.

We have passed the time at the marina cleaning up the engine compartment, dinner plate clean and doing a myriad of other little boat chores.  We have been into the city only twice so far.  Barb is knitting and we are both reading a lot.  We walk the marina’s waterfront and sometimes we walk the two miles to Walmart and if we have much to carry we take the bus back, but usually not.  There are two laundry shops in the marina.  We have run into two boats we have known from the past and two more boats with new friends.  Barb has been preparing meals aboard, but we have gone out to dinner, lunch or cocktails eight times (including Ernesto’s two more times) over the eighteen days we’ve been here … waiting.  One of those times was at a restaurant just outside our dock’s gate to watch the Seahawks and Patriots both win and to pit them against each other in the Superbowl.  Along with Betsy and Leona, we shall support the Patriots.  Unlike Betsy and Leona we will be surrounded by Seahawk fans no doubt.

March 13

Our engine(lessness) saga, which began on January 14th when the engine was removed, continues.  On Friday, March 6th, the machined and partially assembled engine parts were delivered to the boat, hoisted aboard and the engine block, minus the head, water cooling jacket, flywheel and transmission was inserted into the engine compartment.  The engine is too large to simply be put into the compartment in one piece, so the big parts needed to be mated together inside the engine compartment.  Then came the task of attaching all the hoses and electrical parts and connections to the engine.

Over the next few days, the mechanic assembled the parts.  On the 11th, As we added oil there was a small leak which they fixed.  When we added fresh water to the cooling system it was discovered that a plug in the rear of the engine block had not been installed, so fresh water was running out.  To fix this required taking most of the engine apart again to get the plug inserted!  During the disassembly (which required the removal of the engine’s heat exchanger water tank, starter, transmission, flywheel and bell housing) one of the six bolts that attach the flywheel to the crankshaft broke off.  The plug that was missing has been installed.  Various remedies have been employed to try to remove the bolt stub without success.  As I write this, I am waiting for the mechanic to return to drill out what remains of the bolt before the engine can be reassembled.  The engine should be able to be reassembled fairly quickly (lots of practice!) BUT the bolt stub has got to come out FIRST!  

These are the facts of the matter.  I shall not share my feelings about all this.