Kaimusailing

Imagine my chagrin when the Yamaha outboard manual finally came in - a 2 cycle engine manual instead of 4 cycle. I double checked and the seller did list it as a 4 cycle manual, so he either sent the wrong DVD or incorrectly listed it on eBay. I requested a refund, but maybe he does have the correct manual and can send that one.
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The America’s Cup racing wound up with another Kiwi win, but this time Spithill had a clean start and lead at the first mark. Both boats sailed very well, but it was obvious that the Kiwi’s have a faster boat, maybe a half knot faster.
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The joke was that the engine manual hadn’t come in because I wasn’t done with the engine yet. I decided to make a DIY choke linkage. I used a strand from 1X19 rigging wire and made a small hook at one end and pounded the hook flat so that it would fit the button on the choke linkage. Then I bent the wire and terminated the other end by wrapping it around a screw driver shaft, making a loop. The slug of the choke solenoid has a tiny threaded stud coming out of it and had a coiled spring threaded onto the stud. The other end of the spring had an eye with its own little stud threaded into the spring. The eye would not fit the choke linkage button, so I removed the spring off the stud on the slug and used a 4mm nut and small 4mm fender washer to attach my DIY piece of wire to the solenoid’s slug. When the solenoid was attached to the carburettor assembly I tested it with 12 volts and the solenoid choked the carbs. When I removed the 12 volts the choke remained closed, but by cycling the throttle to wide open, the choke was released. Now I had a choke mechanism halfway between Yamaha and Farmer Brown. It wasn’t a mechanical choke, but an electric choke that could be activated with a remote switch.
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The next day I began wiring the choke solenoid into the engine wiring. +12 volts was taken from the direct battery feed to the starter solenoid and tilt solenoid and connected to the choke solenoid. The other lead was run out of the engine through a rubber seal, cable tied to one of the throttle mechanical controls that ran up to the remote control unit. Here it will be connected to a switch which will get negative ground from the ground buss near the mast. This buss bar provides a ground point for all the mast wiring and electric devices on the centerline of the boat, like the ship’s horn, windlass control, nav lights, etc.
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At this point more work has to be done to rewire the old wiring that used to be switched at the on deck helm station. The panel of switches mounted there did not last very long in the salt air of the ocean. On Chesapeake Bay the water is less salty and corrosion is a lot less. The new switches will be mounted in the pilothouse. The choke switch however will be mounted right next to the engine remote control.
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We are in the summer weather pattern which starts the day in the 70 degree range, then quickly builds up into the 80‘s by midday. Today’s heat index when it was 84 fahrenheit was 104. This is due to lots of moisture from the daily thunderstorms. One thunderstorm of the pop-up variety built up just to the southwest. We could see it forming and expanding over us, bringing lightning and rain. It did not clear out, it stood over us stationary. There was no other storm except this one, our own personal thunderstorm.
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There was so much storm activity that there was little direct sunlight and Kaimu’s new solar installation was starved for power. Eventually I had to shut off the inverter and let the batteries recharge with no load.
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An exceptionally active lightning storm hit us and there were several direct hits in the boatyard, knocking out the power in half the boatyard, and frying the internet gear. This makes everything that much harder, tracking orders, researching parts and supplies. The smart phone was a poor substitute for the computer.
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With the engine complete needing only to be started, oil changed, idle set, and cooling water flow verified, I began working on the nav lights. Surprisingly they still worked but needed cleaning and plastic lenses rebedded with hot melt glue. I had made new brackets out of epoxy and fiberglass, mounted the lights on them, and began mounting them on the hulls. The original Aqua Signal incandescent lights were mounted on the hulls, then later I mounted LED lights on the old solar panel mounts, now they go back to the original locations. The wiring runs were rerun to the new locations from the pilothouse instead of the on deck steering station.
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The Fourth of July weekend started with 103 degrees in the shade. The message from Kristian and Bill, who had set out for Boston about a week ago, was that they were in Georgetown, SC with Kristian heading into hospital with a staph infection and Bill heading to Morocco to help his son deliver a boat to Norway.
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With a heat index of 122 most of those remaining in the boatyard went to the local Longhorn Steakhouse to celebrate Rocky Smith’s 55th birthday along with Rocky’s many friends. The photo is of a compass rose made by a local artist and signed by everyone for Rocky. More photos can be found in an album on flickr at:
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https://www.flickr.com/photos/8728395@N03/albums/72157685777197785