The little motor that could
07 June 2012 | Musket Cove Marina
Cloud and rain
Yesterday, we started in on our poor Mercury 8hp outboard called Dragon. Ever since we got to Musket Cove, she's been a bit touchy as to wether she wanted to work or not. Monday, she up and died and refused to start requiring me to get a tow into shore and a row back out when she again refused to start. Of course she did start after we got back to Zephyr. Work needed to be done! Out here, your dingy is like your car back home. If it doesn't work, you can get stranded real quick and might have a long row home.
Off came the cover and in we went. I pulled both spark plugs and they seemed fine. I checked the gap and again, all seemed well. I followed the fuel line and again, all appeared fine. All the connections to the carburetor were good. Next step, replace the gasoline. We emptied out what was left of the old into a different tank and once it was almost all out, took a look inside the Mercury's tank. It was a mess with small bits of something on the bottom of the tank along with a good bit of water. You could see what fuel was left as it floated above the water. Now we were getting to the bottom of the problem.
While we were in Vuda Point Marina, I'd used the same tank and fuel when I serviced poor Dragon and she had run fine. The long 6 month stretch of having the fuel tank sit on deck(even though it was under Puff) had taken it's toll on it's purity. The constant temperature and humidity changes during the days and nights had trashed the fuel. So with it gone and sticking a towel attached to a dowel into the tank to get what was left out, we filled the tanks with new fuel. Just to be sure most of the bad fuel was gone, we drained what fuel was in the fuel line to the motor. Back on to Puff she went. I pulled the cord(a few times) and she started up. I disconnected from Zephyr and spent the next 20 minutes or so zooming around the cove. Dragon was doing just fine as I zoomed around. I headed for shore and got rid of the old fuel and git rid of some garbage. Dragon started back up just fine. We were done by 1100.
Since the Sun was shining(and Dragon was working again), we decided to go out scuba diving in the afternoon. After a quick lunch, we loaded all our gear into Puff and headed back to Pinnacle Reef. We'd been there before and loved it. Beautiful clear water and tons of fish. I'd put the coordinates into my old GPS and I let it guide us back to the reef. We'd been assured that there were "markers" on the reef. Well, we were within about 75 feet before we saw the "markers". They consisted of two(yes, that's right, TWO)600ml empty coke bottles! That's it. Two little bottles! We tied Puff up to the "mooring" line and geared up for the dive. Once in the water, we found there to be quite a strong current(against us of course) coming by the reef. The water was quite a bit cooler than last January when we were last here and the water was full of "things". Might have been silt, might have been small sea critters passing us by. We followed the mooring line down to the reef and set about exploring the pinnacle reef. It rises from 80 feet up to 35 feet. Again, tons of fish but with the floating things in the water and the current continually trying to push us off the pinnacle, the visibility was not as good as it was the last time and we cut the dive short at just 25 minutes and headed back to Puff. With a few pulls of the cord(and some prayers), Dragon started up and we headed back for Zephyr.
Once back, we took a short dive on Zephyr. Tracy brushed off a good bit of growth on the hull while I took off for the bottom, following the anchor chain brushing off what rust had been attached to the chain while it had been in storage over the last 6 months. It was so bad, it tore my gloves. Once at the bottom, I followed the chain around till I found the anchor nicely buried in the bottom muck. It's not sand and it sure isn't mud. It's a combo of both and a bear to get off the anchor when it comes up.
Once back aboard, we gathered our shower things and headed for shore taking our two dive tanks with us to get refilled($10.00fijian). Once showered and clean, we each had a Coke($4.40fijian each) at the local cafe and picked up the tanks and headed home after a long day of some work and some fun. That's the way it is out here. Some work and some fun.