The Drivetrain

This kind of thing happens every once in a while. I either over tightened the zincs or the stud had a fracture and it snapped. "Bummer!" The hard part is getting the out the broken stud. First, I drilled a hole in the stud, heated it up with a torch and tried an easy-out stripped head screw puller. No luck there. Then, I increased the drill bit size until I could tap the hole out. That worked. "Phew!"

Now I'll tell you how I learned to fix this kind of mistake. Gary Howland was the chief mechanic at Brewer Wickford Cove for decades before new management took over. He was a magician. Everyone asked for him by name and I learned a couple of things from him back in the day. Number One: heat. Heat is a great lubricant. I was often amazed to watch him remove a giant prop. He would put a puller on it an apply a load on it. Pop on the torch, then wait for the heat to get the job done. This works for me 95 percent to the time. Stainless into aluminum is a bit more challenging than a stainless nut fused on a stainless stud. Corrosion is a natural occurrence in the marine environment and that was not letting go of what was left of this stud.

Number Two: use a drill press and a very sharp bit. It is almost impossible to drill a straight hole into a stainless stud by hand. If you try it with a dull bit, you will be using expletives soon thereafter. So, I dissassemble the waterjet so I can get it into the press. I bought a Drill Doctor a few years back because we had a drawer full of dull bits. Now, I have a draw full of sharp bits. This one went into the stainless like butter. I was relieved.

Number Three: take it apart first. Watching Gary, I wondered why he would pull half of something apart to make a repair when it didn't seem necessary. But, over time, I realized he was making sure it got done right. He was actually avoiding a do-over, a knuckle-buster, or a new parts order and a reschedule. I didn't want to take the waterjet back off the boat and remove a dozen nuts to fix this thing, but I suspected that if I didn't, it wasn't going to end well for me. Thanks Gary.

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Safe/Sea captains have a lot of tools at our disposal. We have a single engine boat and several twin engine boats. If we need lots of horsepower or speed, we use the twins. If we need to go into shallow water or don't need the speed and horsepower, we use the single.

Pictured below are towing tools laid out on the dock. All of our boats carry 600 feet of Amsteel Spectra 7/16" hawser. There are a wide variety of boats out there, so to make the connection to the boat that needs to be towed, we have a wide variety of bridles. For towing smaller boats with a trailer eye at the bow, the choice is easy; we use a single double clip line of Spectra or a 20 foot 1/2 inch single clip line made of nylon with a bit more stretch. For boats without a trailer eye, like larger power boats or sailboats, we use one of three double leg bridles. This choice is a little tougher and it depends on the boat size, sea conditions and configuration of attachment points.

All of our boats have an inventory of salvage equipment, tools, and gear to attempt to handle (or at least stabilize) whatever type of job we are faced with. We have a multitude of pumps for dewatering. If we need to dive, we have a scuba tank and a 50 foot regulator. If there is a hole in a boat, we have epoxies, an air-powered drill/driver with plywood patches, wood plugs, and other trade tricky patching stuff. If I told you all of our secrets, I'd have to kill you. ;-) Below is a selection of the bag of tricks carried aboard the Titan.

This stuff isn't just "set it and forget it," though. It needs frequent inspection and maintenance to keep it ready, as it's usefulness will deteriorate over time, especially as it's constantly exposed to salt water and the pounding of the towboat. My work is never done! (That's a good thing, especially these days!)

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Most engine systems have an alarm on the control panel that goes off to warn you of low oil pressure, overheating and similar potentially engine-croaking mishaps. It's the buzzing or ringing noise you hear every time you start the engine, before the oil pressure gets to the sensor sending unit. That pesky buzzing noise can be annoying, so some manufacturers offer a switch on the control panel that allows you to shut off the alarm's audio alert, like the one pictured at right. But that pesky alarm isn't as disruptive to your boating day as a engine room full of smoke.

In this case, either the customer's considerably worn belt broke and flew off, stopping the fresh water coolant pump and the flow of coolant to the heat exchanger, or the fresh water outlet hose came off, allowing the coolant to drain into the bilge. Whether it was the broken belt that caused the hose to blow off, or the lack of coolant that caused the pump to seize and the belt to break is moot... the result is the same, a massive overheat.

Since the "buzzer stop" switch was engaged, the audio alarm never sounded, so the uncooled exhaust and heat build up (about 1000°F) almost set the entire boat ablaze. The boaters abandoned the smoking boat for the Safe/Sea Newport as soon as I arrived.

The owner had engaged the Fire-Boy system, which displaced the oxygen in the engine room, preventing a full-on conflagration. The USCG had us wait for the Newport fire boat to give the all-clear for towing about an hour later, as the smoke had totally dissipated, although the engine was still almost glowing from the heat. You can see the cooked 6LY series Yanmar diesel below. It's the same kind of motor we use here at Safe/Sea, so it's particularly sad for us to see the demise of one!

There are four good lessons illustrated from this case.

1. Always check your engine belts for wear and tightness.
2. Make sure your hose clamps are tightened correctly.
3. Always make sure your engine alarm is audible when you start the boat.
4. Always keep your eye on your engine gauges when underway; don't depend on the audible alarm only.

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It's official, the season is in full swing. By the time Memorial Day weekend was over more then a few boats were trapped by fishing nets, fouled in there own anchor line, and a couple of close calls with fires; but those were just the more interesting cases!

We also helped a number of members back to home port after they experienced simple malfunctions of some sort. But who wants to hear about that boring routine stuff?

Here are a couple of pictures of a boat that struck Mount Tom Rock off Prudence Island on Memorial Day. These folks were very lucky! Another inch or two and the strut comes through the bottom of the boat, sending it for a trip toward the bottom.

In 2007, the blue trawler below was not so lucky. She hit Mount Tom Rock and punched a hole in her keel under the generator and had to run it up on the beach just outside Potter's Cove. I removed the six passengers and transferred them to the Bristol Harbor Patrol who took two of them to be checked for minor injuries. The good news was that they were all ok, and the boat was saved after extensive repairs.

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