Some random BSing and status

[Chotu]

Well I’m on the east coast of Florida. Feels kind of good. Less red tide. Ha ha

Not very laid-back however. Busy. Loud. Lots of wakes.

Getting ready to head north.

One thing that stinks is I have lost my port engine. It keeps dropping into safe mode. It’s throwing a no oil light. That intermittent leak I had around the oil pump area is still intermittent. These two things together kind of seem to me like I have a problem in that area.

Tomorrow I’m going to do an over temperature test. At full throttle. Make sure that it’s not overheating. Because the light is the same for no oil and overheating. Doesn’t look like it’s overheating. Plenty of cooling water coming out everywhere.

This is why I wanted to get the rig on down here. So I could sail up.

I already have a couple thousand miles on these outboards. Adding another thousand isn’t fantastic. Especially since they sat for so long.

I’m going to have to probably replace some parts on the port engine. I can’t go thousand miles on one engine. Just for safety purposes alone. And it’s only an outboard. These were intended to be auxiliary propulsion for when there was no wind. That’s it. It was not supposed to be primary propulsion for the boat.

Oooh! I did get to “sail” at 3+ knots today for part of the trip. No rig, motors off. Both motors dragging in the water. It was windy here in Florida and I was able to do 3 knots with the autohelm on, relax and travel in peace for a bit.

I have a feeling this thing is going to do pretty well with the 64 foot mast on it. Yikes! Will need to reef.


Of note to anyone, I do not recommend staying at the port St. Lucie lock overnight. I have never seen so many mosquitoes in my whole life. They were somehow getting in the boat. And I could not see where they were getting in from. About 25% of them already had blood in them. And they had not bitten me. I think the blood came from the campground.

Also I figured out why I was struggling in the locks with this boat.

I was leaving too soon to try to be nice to everyone. Trying to hurry up. So the water was still turbulent. And it would push me around. If I took my time and just waited until the turbulence stopped, no problem.

Also, they give you a little souvenir now in the Okeechobee waterway. Ha ha. Take a look.

[Benz]

The second-worst mosquito plague I ever endured was a the St. Lucie lock. And it was hotter than blazes and muggier than a Swedish steam room. Bleh.
Good luck with the engine.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Benz

The second-worst mosquito plague I ever endured was a the St. Lucie lock. And it was hotter than blazes and muggier than a Swedish steam room. Bleh.
Good luck with the engine.

Where was the worst? Because I definitely want to avoid wherever that is. I have never seen anything like that Saint Lucie lock.

Last time I went through there I was lucky enough not to stop.

There were hundreds of them coating my salon doors. I could see them through the windows.

And thanks for the wishes of good luck on the port engine. Probably going to need a little luck there. Ha ha it’s not exactly in the best spot to work on it.

[rslifkin]

If you might spend a good bit of time motoring, might it make sense to sell the current outboards and replace them with fuel injected 4 strokes? That gets you away from the complexity of oil injection and might also give you some commonality with your dinghy outboard depending on what you get.

Your dinghy has a Tohatsu 9.9, right? Up to the 20hp, they're the same base engine. So if 20s might be adequate, the dinghy outboard and mains would become physically interchangeable in a pinch.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by rslifkin

If you might spend a good bit of time motoring, might it make sense to sell the current outboards and replace them with fuel injected 4 strokes? That gets you away from the complexity of oil injection and might also give you some commonality with your dinghy outboard depending on what you get.

Your dinghy has a Tohatsu 9.9, right? Up to the 20hp, they're the same base engine. So if 20s might be adequate, the dinghy outboard and mains would become physically interchangeable in a pinch.

You need 30s to move the big boat. Because it has high windage. You also need high thrust and big prop area.

The Yamaha 25 high thrust would maybe do the trick. I was just looking at those today out of curiosity. They weigh a ton.

But I’ve got to ring out some value out of these engines. I can’t be spending $10,000 for engines and using them just for a few hundred hours and then buying new ones for another $10,000. That’s financial suicide to a sailor. Lol

These were also the lightest engines available and they are auxiliary engines.

I just have to fix the issue with the port engine.

Can’t really be throwing out $5000 or $6000 outboards when they don’t work for the first time.

And the more I fix them, the more I will get used to them. Whenever I get somewhere permanent for a while, I’m going to grab the diagnostic software and see if I can get that running in Boot Camp on my Mac. Hopefully the USB will work and I won’t need to buy a PC for this.

I also have some more testing to do. I have to see if it’s an overheat or a low oil situation. I will do that in the morning. It was too windy today for wide-open throttle testing. Either my anchor would have a dragged, or I would never get it out of the bottom again. Ha ha

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Chotu

You need 30s to move the big boat. Because it has high windage. You also need high thrust and big prop area.

The Yamaha 25 high thrust would maybe do the trick.

But I’ve got to ring out some value out of these engines. I can’t be spending $10,000 for engines and using them just for a few hundred hours and then buying new ones for another $10,000. That’s financial suicide to a sailor. Lol

These were also the lightest engines available and they are auxiliary engines.

I just have to fix the issue with the port engine.

Can’t really be throwing out $5000 or $6000 outboards when they don’t work for the first time.

And the more I fix them, the more I will get used to them. Whenever I get somewhere permanent for a while, I’m going to grab the diagnostic software and see if I can get that running in Boot Camp on my Mac. Hopefully the USB will work and I won’t need to buy a PC for this.

Being able to get the diagnostic software should be a big help.

I'd expect that if you determined something else was more suitable you could sell the current outboards to recoup some of the cost. Of course, if you can get them to work adequately then you might as well keep them. But if they're hard to keep happy in your application and you can't get past the cavitation / ventilation issues, then there's probably a limit to how much fighting is worth it. Hopefully things don't get to that point.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by rslifkin

Being able to get the diagnostic software should be a big help.

I'd expect that if you determined something else was more suitable you could sell the current outboards to recoup some of the cost. Of course, if you can get them to work adequately then you might as well keep them. But if they're hard to keep happy in your application and you can't get past the cavitation / ventilation issues, then there's probably a limit to how much fighting is worth it. Hopefully things don't get to that point.

Oh yeah. If we are talking about Outboards, the reason I haven’t been talking about the cavitation is it seems to be pretty well fixed.

They are a little further down in the water now than they were before. By about 4 inches?

They don’t seem to have the cavitation issue anymore.

They have been working like a champ actually.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Chotu

Oh yeah. If we are talking about Outboards, the reason I haven’t been talking about the cavitation is it seems to be pretty well fixed.

They are a little further down in the water now than they were before. By about 4 inches?

They don’t seem to have the cavitation issue anymore.

They have been working like a champ actually.

That's good news!

[MicHughV]

What kind of outboards do you have ???

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by MicHughV

What kind of outboards do you have ???

2013 Evinrude etec 30’s. Bought brand new at the time.

They’ve done pretty well and weigh 150lbs each.

Looks like I need to double up my o rings on the oil pump.

[Scubaseas]

https://www.powersports-diag.com/en/...it-evdiag.html

Don't know if this will work on your engines but handy to have if it does. I use the Yamaha YDS (same thing but for Yamaha) on my now 6 motors of the dive shop. Fast way to read fault codes and sensor values.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Scubaseas

https://www.powersports-diag.com/en/...it-evdiag.html

Don't know if this will work on your engines but handy to have if it does. I use the Yamaha YDS (same thing but for Yamaha) on my now 6 motors of the dive shop. Fast way to read fault codes and sensor values.

Yeah, that’s some thing I was going to get later. Once I am in somewhere for a while.

Been meaning to get it for about five years just because I should have it.

Needed to feel the pain of something wrong with the outboard before I actually went through with getting that software. Otherwise it did seem a little bit pointless just to have it for fun.

However, I need to get going. I have somebody waiting for me to put the rig on.
I also have nowhere to receive that other than getting it on Amazon. I can use an Amazon locker as I’m traveling. That’s the only way I can mail order anything.

In this case I still think it’s faster to figure it out without the actual code. I only have the light from the EMM.

Because waiting for that thing to come in on Amazon a couple days and then spending a lot of time getting it running on a Mac and maybe it won’t even work because the USB driver might not work. That’s going to take a lot longer. Worst case I’m just going on one engine. I need to get the boat up there to the Rigger.

Still about 700 miles to go

[Benz]

Originally Posted by Chotu

Where was the worst? Because I definitely want to avoid wherever that is. I have never seen anything like that Saint Lucie lock.

Last time I went through there I was lucky enough not to stop.

There were hundreds of them coating my salon doors. I could see them through the windows.

And thanks for the wishes of good luck on the port engine. Probably going to need a little luck there. Ha ha it’s not exactly in the best spot to work on it.

Worst mosquitoes ever was in El Salvador, at Bahia Del Sol after a six-day hurricane deluge that washed away most of a marina and left everything swampy. It didn't take long for them to breed in the billions.

Even if the Pacific coast of central America is your sort of place (surfers love it; cruisers, not so much), Bahia's principal charm is that once you're past the horrible breaking bar, it's one of a handful of non-rolly anchorages in the weary stretch between Mexico and Panama, and has little crime.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Chotu

Yeah, that’s some thing I was going to get later. Once I am in somewhere for a while.

Been meaning to get it for about five years just because I should have it.

Needed to feel the pain of something wrong with the outboard before I actually went through with getting that software. Otherwise it did seem a little bit pointless just to have it for fun.

However, I need to get going. I have somebody waiting for me to put the rig on.
I also have nowhere to receive that other than getting it on Amazon. I can use an Amazon locker as I’m traveling. That’s the only way I can mail order anything.

In this case I still think it’s faster to figure it out without the actual code. I only have the light from the EMM.

Because waiting for that thing to come in on Amazon a couple days and then spending a lot of time getting it running on a Mac and maybe it won’t even work because the USB driver might not work. That’s going to take a lot longer. Worst case I’m just going on one engine. I need to get the boat up there to the Rigger.

Still about 700 miles to go

I agree. In this situation, it makes sense to continue the trip, fix the issue along the way if you can. And I'd plan to get the software when you arrive at the rigger (whether the issue is fixed or not) so you can confirm all is good and have it for any further troubleshooting.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by rslifkin

I agree. In this situation, it makes sense to continue the trip, fix the issue along the way if you can. And I'd plan to get the software when you arrive at the rigger (whether the issue is fixed or not) so you can confirm all is good and have it for any further troubleshooting.

So one of the things I had to do today to do some diagnostics without the software is to take a wide-open throttle temperature reading.

That came out nominal.

not only that, I am currently into about two hours wide-open throttle already today.

well, about half an hour ago I backed it down to maybe 90% throttle. That’s my cruising RPM. The one where I get 3.5 miles per gallon.

estimating that to be about 4800 RPM. And I’m at 6.1 kn.

The engine is running like a champ and not leaking oil today. That’s the difficulty. It’s so intermittent.

I’m also getting pretty decent speed because I got a free bottom cleaning in the fresh water. A lot of the growth of course died in there. And those fish were eating it. But not so much. I only had a few of those fish. They weren’t really attacking it like they did it my old Marina inthe freshwater.