Sunset Boat Center – At a dock

37 beers on tap!

We’re here to get our genset repaired. The original reason was to correct an over-voltage condition but just before coming, the genset quit pumping cooling water overboard. So that condition had to be repaired before working on the over-voltage problem. As it turned out, the repairman spent about 6 hours trying to correct the problem. In the process of trying to get cooling water to pump out, he replaced the water pump, re-routed the water supply line, bled the water output – none of which corrected the problem.

Finally I suggested tackling the problems one area at a time instead of the shotgun approach. Step 1 was to see if the pump would output water if it was fed directly from a bucket instead of the water filter and seacock. Answer was no. Step 2, would it pump water if the hose directly aft of the pump was opened. Answer, it did! Therefore, the pump was okay and the problem was downline of the pump, somewhere in the engine cooling system. We back flushed the cooling plumbing in the engine and tried again – it pumped water! There was evidently some obstruction in the cooling system that the back-flush fixed, at least for the moment. However, all this consumed the entire day (and a new water pump!) The genset specialist is due tomorrow to address the over-voltage condition. Hopefully it’s a simple matter of an adjustment? (ha) All this does show the value of separately testing parts of system instead of a shotgun approach.

After all this discouraging work, we retired with Don and Liz Bunch to sample some of the 37 beers on tap at the local restaurant. I found a smooth, light beer that was incredible, very good. The food consisted mostly of sandwiches but they also had fresh seafood if you wanted it.

Properly fortified, I now feel up to facing the genset once again on Thursday – hopefully with better results – and quicker!