As we ready the boat for families with special needs, we try to mix several “little things” and one “not so little thing” project. Given the current hot, thunderstorm filled summer months (also hurricane season), not really ideal for sailing, we are mostly focusing on indoor projects, and limit our outdoor “little things” to early in the morning or late in the afternoon time – with close daily attention to weather/thunderstorm forecasts!

One of these little things is the sea hood. A sea hood fits over the entrance (companionway) to the living room (cabin house). The sea hood has a horizontal sliding clear door (covers the entryway), that houses the sliding door, preventing water from entering the cabin, a bit like the way old style pocket doors work, except designed to protect from water intrusion. I need to pull the hood off of the deck and clean underneath it, get the dimensions of the clear sliding door and reassemble it so that it is still waterproof but removable so when we install the dodger we can put a new clear slider in. So here I’m doing my boat yoga with a dremel in hand!

In the “not so little things” category, we just finished doing a major rehab of the engine, short of a full overhaul!

We took off all the engine accessories – alternator, water pump, heat exchangers, exhaust elbow/muffler, injectors, starter motor, oil filter adapter, and all water, fuel and oil hoses. And as is usually the case with such things, we found leaks and corrosion in places that are hard to inspect. In one case, a metal part in the raw water cooling circuit had literally crumbled and was on the verge of failure! We were both relieved and happy to discover such items now, instead of at some in-opportune time later. Good folks at Seakamp (http://www.seakamp.com), and Sen-Dure (http://www.sen-dure.com) came to our aid with heat exchangers! Thank You! Thank You!

After several washes and wire-brush scrubs, priming, and painting our old and hopefully even more trusty Perkins 4-236 looks like this (see photo)!

BTW, since we were actively working on this “not so little thing” during July, we decided to adopt the appropriate red, white and blue color theme ☺️

Now, the engine is also sporting a new remote oil filter/oil-primer housing from the good folks at Peterson Fluid Systems (http://www.petersonfluidsys.com/filter_mount.html)! Thanks Mike! With this filter/primer we can pre-lube our engine before starting using a cordless drill, minimizing any wear and tear during engine cold starts! This pre-lube pump built into the oil filter housing was able to get our oil pressure to our normal engine running pressure of 40psi even before we started the engine! We fabricated and welded a custom aluminum hoop to mount this filter/primer housing – our first aluminum weld!

To complete the engine rehab project, we finally got to install and commission the Oil Change System from the wonderful folks at Reverso (http://reversopumps.com/oil-change-systems/oil-change-3010-light-duty). It has been patiently waiting its turn for quite a while. We found just the right nook for the unit, as if the unit was custom designed for that space! With it, we can extract and renew engine/genset/transmission oil without spilling a drop! And even with over 5ft of height, it works like a champ…the trick is to keep the pump gears wet.

Here, I am happily switching oil bottles, while totally ignoring the roll of paper towel in the background – no-mess oil change!

We also cleaned up all the engine electrical wiring and tidied things up. As part of the electrical clean-up, we added four additional engine room warning buzzers, in addition to our low oil-pressure warning buzzer on the engine panel in the cockpit – thanks to folks at Floyd-Bell (https://www.floydbell.com/products/twin-turbo.php)! These warning buzzers have different tones and led-light colors. Now we have a dedicated alarm for coolant temperature, exhaust elbow temperature, engine coolant level, and transmission oil temperature! All compactly mounted in a standard 4in grey electrical junction box from the local Home Depot (see photo, opposite to Reverso Oil Change System). With the unique buzzer sounds and the colors of the flashing lights we can quickly know the exact reason for the alarm – no matter where we are on the boat. Hopefully by keeping up with preventive maintenance, we never get to hear any of them!

And in case you are wondering as to where we started from on this “not so little thing”, here is a before photo ☺️

And here is our stripped down engine during painting!

Have a wonderful day! And a heartfelt thank-you to all of our sponsors!! XO