Back in Vuda Point Marina
01 July 2012 | Vuda Point Marina
Sunny and very warm. Cloudy in the PM
This morning I took in our DuoGen to have the bearings replaced. It has started to bind as the shaft turned around and around. We'd heard good things about an company in Lautoka called P. Kumar Electrical Services on Namoli St. I'd been in there before. Actually the first week we were in Vuda Point. I was looking for a step-down transformer and they carried them, along with just about any electrical component known to man. I brought the required bearings with me since I bought them yesterday. I couldn't find the seal that we needed but figured they could find it with little problem.
I dropped if off this morning about 0930 and was told to check back with them about 1500. Off I went, back to Zephyr after running a few more errands. We had a nice lunch of leftovers and I went back into Lautoka to get our ladder rewelded. It had developed a hole where one of the horizontal steps meets the vertical bars. I stopped in at Kumars(a bit early but what the heck). Well, they had the generator all taken apart and it was a mess. Inside the case was dirt and corrosion! It's not supposed to be in there--it has seals! They told me to come back after 1530 and met with the owner of the shop--the Mr. Kumar. He had been there when they cracked open the case and water has poured out! It was a mess inside. There was dirt all through the unit. The two resistors in the bottom of the case were shot(lots of dirt and corrosion). It was worse than I could have ever imagined. This was going from a simple bearing replacement to a total rebuild! Here's another instance of something that is supposed to be built to withstand what ever Mother Nature can dish out and it has failed miserably. The repair estimate is between $700 and $800! That's going to hurt the cruising kitty big time. Oh well. Having rebuilt is still cheaper than buying a new one.
We decided Friday that since we were going to have to wait till probably Wednesday before the DuoGen as fixed, we'd go down to Vuda Point, see some friends, do some laundry and get a few more projects done. We called ahead as we had heard that it was jammed since the World ARC(a group that goes around the world together) were now starting to arrive in Fiji and many had hit the marina to get jobs done and their bottoms painted. We showed up just about 1600 and got shoved out to the very last slip in the marina. It's right beside the entry. The same slip they wanted to put us in last October. We have no ledge to get off the boat so we have to row ashore! A nice place to tie up but no way to easily get ashore. Oh well. It's only for a few days.