PRE-FLIGHT ENGINE ROOM CHECKS

When preparing to depart for the day, one of the biggest jobs is to ensure that the engines are all set for our next leg of the journey. Every morning before departure, Pete the proverbial Pilot opens up the hatch to the engine room and climbs down into the compartment to methodically make his multiple checks on our two Volvo Penta Engines. Similar to Pre-flight Checks, he wants to ensure that there are no leaks and that everything is Ship Shape before we leave the marina. First he checks the Engine Oil for each engine, affectionately named Frick for the Port Engine and Frack for the Starboard Engine. He checks the Transmission Fluid, the Coolant Levels, and the Battery Chargers. He checks the Fuel Filters to ensure that they aren’t clogged. And he checks the Bilge in the Engine Room as well as the bilges in the Bow and the Stern of the boat. He then carefully records the Generator Hours.

We have owned the boat for almost 2 1/2 years and Pete has done each of these checks meticulously every single time we have departed the dock! Since starting this second segment of our Great Loop Trip, we have traveled from Prizer Point on Lake Barkley to Green Turtle Bay and crossed over the canal that connects the Cumberland and the Tennessee Rivers. We then headed upstream on the Tennessee River against the current stopping at marinas along the way. At this point of our segment, we had traveled approximately 250 miles when we went through the Pickwick Lock and came out on Pickwick Lake in Mississippi. We stopped at Aqua Yacht Safe Harbor with a few of our new found buddy boat Looper friends for a few days of recuperating and exploring.

We were set to leave Sunday morning with the other Looper boats so Pete did his usual Engine Room Pre-flight Checks. When departing the dock, Cheri usually drives the boat and Pete usually brings it into the dock. So Cheri punched in the code to start the engines. She pressed the button to start Frick, the Port Engine and that’s when Frick started yelling and flashing Communications Failure – Shut down the engine! Cheri shut down the engine right away and then tried to start Frack, the Starboard Engine – no problem. So we tried Frick again to the same results as before. It was a no go day for sure!

Since it was Sunday, there were no mechanics around to diagnose the problem with Frick. We waited until Monday morning and the mechanic came over with his laptop computer to check it out. The computer said there was an error in the Power Plant Control Unit and we would need a new one. The mechanic said that we should be able to get it the next day but it was Monday – Columbus Day and the Part Shop wasn’t open. Tuesday the part was ordered and it arrived on Wednesday. The mechanic installed it and tested Frick. Uh oh – same issue! Now what? He checked things out again and was quite perplexed. He conferred with his Mentor and went back to his shop to try and research other issues such as a Fire Suppression Issue, etc. He asked us to not be on the boat on Thursday so he could work with another mechanic to solve the issue. Unfortunately, he was called to help out the other mechanic with his issue on a boat that had been there for 2 weeks. It’s now Friday and our Looper friends have been long gone and we were still waiting patiently and really getting quite concerned. We had gone up to the pool area to let the mechanic focus on trying to fix Frick.

He came by a few hours later with good news! Frick was finally fixed! The bad news – Pete was the problem! What?? Pete sits backwards in between Frick and Frack to record the Generator Hours. Remember he has been doing this for the last 2 1/2 years. Well, evidently this particular time, his big Butt caused the locking lever for the computer control wiring to disengage just enough to cause the engine to not communicate with the rest of the engine electronics! Even though he had mentioned to the mechanic that he has to crawl all over in the Engine Room to do his checks, the mechanic missed the mark on this one too. We ended up paying for the mechanic’s time and the marina was kind enough to not charge us $2500 for a new PCU we didn’t need and took it back for a small restocking fee. We lost a week of boat travel, but we made up for it by renting a car and exploring the area. That will be a post for another day!

WHERE DID PETE GO??

PETE POINTING TO THE LEVER THAT HIS BUTT ACCIDENTALLY DISENGAGED

SOO – SHOULD THIS POST BE CALLED PRE-FLIGHT ENGINE ROOM CHECKS??

OR

BIG BUTT CAUSES BIG BUCKS??