Please forgive my sarcasm in this post’s title. It’s been a hectic three weeks of boating “joys” that has unfortunately kept me from my blog updates. It is amazing how fast time can pass sometimes. I left off in my last post discussing some of the tasks I had left to finish up the boat for her Spring launch. Over the past two or so weeks I’ve been able to knock out the tune-ups, filters and anodes on the motors. Gave the entire interior a good detailing clearing up the crud that always seems to find the best hiding places.

Yamaha F250 Maintenance Fun!!

All was going according to plan. At least until firing up the motors! They both started up perfectly and were humming along, however upon further review I noticed the water stream from the cooling system was not what it should be. Intermittent spitting is NOT a good indication of a well running cooling system. Time for the water pumps to be serviced.

Woodruff Key- The Metallic Devil

I had a beautiful day weather-wise on a Saturday and the plan was to replace the pumps and then wrap up with bottom painting. You know what they say about the best laid plans right?? We got the lower units off and pump housing removed with no issue. Next encounter was with a little item called a woodruff key!! Joyful little piece of metal. There is a slot in the shaft this crescent shaped item fits in. It is metal, the shaft is metal and they both spend a LOT of time underwater. You  know what happens here. They rust together to live as ONE!!

We spent the better part of 4 hours WD-40′ing, tapping, banging, chiseling, drilling and cursing trying to get this thing out of the shaft. When we reached our wits end and I’m not sure why I didn’t do it earlier, I hit Google and found that we were not alone in our struggle with this metallic devil! Options suggested included icing the key to contract it, cutting a slot with a dremel and, the solution that we opted for, using a pliers called an End-Nipper. This thing snatched it right out.

Next step was ordering my replacement pumps. I placed the order on a Tuesday and when they did not show up by the following Saturday I called them. Seems the order got mis-placed and had to be re-submitted. Frustrating but I understand that “stuff” happens. I deal with them all the time and the service is very good there.

While waiting for my new pumps to arrive I spent some time below decks checking the through-hulls and their related hoses and clamps. I then did some testing on the bilge pump systems and found a faulty float-switch was stopping the bilge pump from coming on. Seems it did not survive the winter lay-up. I comforted myself with the knowledge that I was happy to have caught this while the boat was on the blocks and not in the water.

The weatherman is definitely not helping any this week with rain forecast for several days this week as well as the weekend so that will push the painting off. It has certainly be a very weird and wild start to the Spring but I am confident the coming season will erase all this from memory.

Tight Lines.........
Capt Paul Mandella
captpaul@maybetonightcharters.com
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