Rough First Day On The Boat
 

Well, we rushed to get the boat cleaned up, packed up the truck, and headed south for the 2 hour drive south to Kentucky Lake (Buzzard Rock) on Saturday.

Wifey backed me down the ramp, and with the drives in the water - I was starting to feel the emotional rush that we were actually going to get back on the water!

Turned the key on the starboard motor, and it fired right up! ...then I hear water splashing. Look in the bilge, and water is pouring in. In my haste, I put one of the block drain plugs in the wrong hole. Easy fix, done. (ramp wasn't busy)

I then notice the blue drain plug for the cool fuel unit is dripping water - I tell wifey to pull us back out. Go to the marina and the guys were quick to throw me an o-ring (at no charge - thanks guys). I get that installed - and I see the drain plug for the circulating pump hose/pipe, and I give it a twist to ensure its tight, and the dam fitting broke off in my hand!! Yes, it broke off from the cooling pipe elbow.

PIC OF COOLING PIPE/ELBOW (ON GOOD ENGINE)
http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b1...psfbnjwd6k.jpg

After further examination, someone broke this thing at some point in the past and put it back together with black RTV. Not sure why it didn't break over the last 2 years during winterizing, but it didn't.

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b1...pseljktwpl.jpg

Glad this didn't happen on the water, or I'd guess we'd be sunk! ...literally

So I ordered a new one last night - but why do people do stupid $hit repairs like this for a $50 dollar part??

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b1...psyjzy4k29.jpg

That's what shakedown runs are for! At least you didn't lose a holiday weekend or poker run. You didn't have to limp home or fabricate a MacGyver type fix in the middle of no where. That's not so bad, just frustrating with time lost; and you got to spend a solid 6 hours of time with the wife. :drink:

Sorry to hear that you had so much trouble. I heard that Barkley was pretty trashy. You may have saved yourself some real damage by being sidelined this weekend. Hopefully we will have many nice weekends to come.

You lost me at "wifey backed me down the ramp". That happens?! I started a gofundme page for spousal re-education immediately after reading that sentence.

Yes wifey handles the truck/trailer once we get to the ramp - she's a trooper!

I have found that it is much easier to teach them to load/unload the boat. A lot less broken tail lights in the parking lot that way and you can usually keep the boat off the dock as well.

Well the guy at the marina said, "we can use some epoxy to try and fix it so you don't lose your weekend". I said, "I appreciate that, but you know what - somebody's telling me not to go on the water today, so we're heading back home".

Fortunately, we were planning to stay at Bdon's so we only lost $100 in diesel and most of the day. Not the end of the world.

She wasn't real thrilled to be around me about that time. haha!!

But you're right - that was our intention just to confirm things. Eddie had the boat from Sept ~ Dec to do the top end work, so I hadn't even started the motors since I got it back.

That sux Terry. Glad it happened when it did and didn't happen when I was test running the boat.lol
If it had been repaired with RTV and was winterized, maybe the antifreeze attacked the RTV, especially if it was cheap RTV.
You should have called me. I'm pretty sure that I have one. They are a common item that gets broken. I've actually had to replace one that I broke in the past. They aren't very strong to begin with and with some age, they really get brittle. Let me know if you need anything.
Eddie

I always run huge. Bilge pumps... my dad taught me that... he hit a reef in a sportfish or rather his captain did, he got towed 70 miles with beach towels stuffed into a football sized hole in the hull, his big azz bilge pumps kept up! It was brutal, cleaned the props, struts, blew both trannies,like a 250k repair...

sorry for the bad luck but better that it happened at the ramp....

I have a port on my sea strainer that I installed a 90* AN fitting on and that has a cap on it full time. If I were ever to flood and be in trouble, I could hook up a hose to that fitting, stick the other end in the bilge and let an engine act as an emergency pump...

We also went for our first boat ride last Sunday. Normally I run on the hose first at home, but this year I skipped that step. Both engines fired right up with boat still on the trailer in water. Left running and went to back in just a little more to release boat. I noticed smoke pouring from the exhaust. I never turned the water vavles on from the drives, I turn them off when winterizing. The antifreeze was burning off. Shut them down, opened valves, and fired back up. One impeller lived and the other did not. Roped around the dock, tied up and went to marina to buy new housing and impeler. Got that changed and we were off. Idled out and went to stop, shifted both in nuetral but starboard stayed in drive. Shifted to reverse on that side, still in drive...weird. My thought, lower shift cable broke. So we went on, ripped out to lake, parked, had lunch, and went for a quick 15 mile run. Got the boat apart yesterday. Wasn't the cable! Was one of the 1/4-28 bolts that hold the shift fork to the shift shaft! The bolt was sheared off and just sitting there. Had the head of the bolt fell and made it into the drive it would have destroyed everything I am sure! It was an easy fix, but almost an expensive lesson. If it isn't right, back on the trailer and go home :/

I didn't use antifreeze to winterize - just drained the system and put in a heated building day after I picked it up from you.

I bet you see lots of stupid $hit repairs like this roll through - it just blows me away. If it was a $5000 boat maybe, but WTF! I'm surprised the RTV has held up as long as it has - no telling when it was "repaired" - I've had boat for 2 years, and have had that drain plug out at least half a dozen times when flushing.

That's a good backup plan - unfortunately, I don't have strainers.

That's a good idea. I have a standard garden hose fitting on top of my strainer. So, all I would need is a few feet of hose with a male fitting on the end.

I always fire my motor up at home before going to the water. Particularly if it hasn't been started in more than a week or two.

Last year, I forgot to put the cap on my strainer and smoked my impellor at the ramp. I was offered a spare but I knew I had to go home and back flush everything. Good thing I did, the impellor was in a million pieces.