December 12, 2014 from Noumea, New Caledonia
We may have had a little more broken stuff this cruising season than during others, but nothing way out of line…
Probably not as bad as these guys above have it! Here’s a list in no particular order.
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- Radar – we’re now on our 4th raydome. I still love my Simrad 4G radar! (And that they’ve replaced it in Bora Bora, New Zealand and most recently, Fiji.)
- Inverter – from Legacy’s previous owner. It probably provided 20 years of service. Not bad. Good thing I carried a spare – I did that because it was one of the few pieces of electronic equipment we didn’t replace before this cruise.
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- Cabin Fan – another Hella fan bites the dust. I hate these things and I’ll never buy another one. They’re expensive and they don’t hold up. And why do they have to be so hard to clean!!!
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- Double Block – one on the boom vang is about broken. We’ll fix or replace it here in New Caledonia.
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- Solar Panel Fuse – this is a scary one. We used an automotive type fuse with a holder made for marine use. The contact resistance was so high, it melted the fuse. We replaced it with an identical spare we had onboard and a week later, the same thing happened. I won’t use these again.
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- Bilge Blower – since these aren’t rated for continuous duty, and we run the blower at all times while the engine is running, I guess frequent replacement is to be expected.
- Outboard Gas Cap – on our new Suzuki outboard. What a crap design! Its failure caused water in the gas and a real mess in the carburetor (which I’ll have to replace soon).
- Outboard Carburetor – see above.
- Dripless Shaft Seal – isn’t dripless any longer. I think we just got a bad one. The problem was exacerbated by the two starboard side engine mount nuts which worked their way loose, misaligning the engine.
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- Engine Mounts – not really a failure, but the nuts came loose. See item above.
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- Broken Water Pump Belt – I think it was just old. It disintegrated, even with little stress on it. I think all my spare belts are old and will not last. I bought new spares in Fiji.
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- Seagull Water Filter Hose – didn’t survive a filter change. No surprise, they’re 20 years old.
- Macerator Pump – again. We don’t use it often, but it seems like every time we need it, it fails. I’m tired of replacing them. I just messed with this one and now it’s working – at least until the next time we need it.
- Stereo – A wire shorted. Burnt insulation, smoke and no music. I don’t really know why. Maybe bad insulation?
Batteries – our AGM batteries gave up. We replaced these expensive, two and a half year old Lifeline batteries in Fiji. Bummer. Expensive bummer. (More)
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Battery Monitor – as our batteries were going, we realized we didn’t have an amp hour meter that really showed our power situation. We installed a new one. (More)
- Scanner – can’t seem to keep one working onboard.
- Printer – can’t seem to keep one working onboard. This time we tried an inexpensive laser printer and it was as short-lived in the marine environment as the inkjet printers we’ve unsuccessfully tried.
- Phone Charger – I think the RF form our HF radio killed it. It was a Qi wireless charger for our Nexus 5 phone.
- Windlass – a solenoid rusted and failed. I knew they were questionable and I should have replaced both of them before we left on this trip, but I didn’t. I paid the price, though minor, when it quit in Fiji. I didn’t have to lift the anchor by hand. I just hot-wired the solenoid. The auto parts store in Savusavu had suitable replacements.
- Shower Sump Pump – I tried everything to fix it. Even found a rebuild kit in Fiji. After the rebuild, it still wouldn’t pump water. I found that the vented loop on the discharge line was completely clogged. Oh well, now we have a rebuilt shower sump pump (and a cleaned out vented loop).
- Shower Hose – yep, the new one we installed in NZ. It got an aneurysm and exploded! Replaced it with some extra fuel hose. (More)
- ICOM Command Mic – I hate ICOM gear. What happened to their quality control?! This one was less than a year old. The last one didn’t make it much longer. I took it apart and did some soldering on the corroded pc board and it’s working, for now.
- Head Y Valve – frozen in place, as usual. Replaced. I vowed to move it back and forth at least every month. That was about 5 months ago and I haven’t thought about it until now. It’s probably frozen again!
- Shaft Brush – I’ve fixed the squeak at least four times. Next haul-out, I’ll try a different brand and design.
And the season ain’t over yet! I hope this list doesn’t get extended. Wish us luck.
I think this is just a part of the cruising life. If it weren’t a boat, we’d be fixing the porch and patching the roof (let’s not even talk about car troubles). I am glad that I am able to fix all this stuff myself. Otherwise, I’d probably spend a lot of time sitting in port, wait for repair people who are often incompetent, unscrupulous, tardy, or all of the above. -Rich
