There had to be another reason why we turned back from our voyage to the Maldives and it came to light late last night. But first, let me tell you how it's going here.
We'd been scheduled to be pulled Tuesday afternoon after fighting the winds to get to Krabi. It was not to be(all workers had been sent to Phuket on a different job). We spent the next two days working on Zephyr in her slip. Thursday afternoon, we finally got pulled and put on the hard with four stands on each side. Workers started showing up almost immediately. We got a quote for the bottom paint--$45,000 baht--about $1300US that included sanding down the hull and fixing some spots, putting on a barrier coat and then 5 cans of paint. Not a bad deal. They started in full time on Friday.
We met with Des from Popeye Marine again and went through what we thought was the problem. A leak some where inside the bell housing at the back of the engine where it joins the transmission. His mechanic came by and looked all over the engine to get familiar with what he was going after. He showed up at 0800 on Friday and went at it. There was oil here there and everywhere, but mainly at the back of the engine. Darn near impossible to find. So we all came to the conclusion that the only way he was going to find the problem was to clean everything up again, put new absorber pads down and start the engine and see what happens. Des and Mr. Choo(Marina and Yard Manager) wanted extra stands for Zephyr put in as we have a BIG engine and the fears were that it might shake us so badly that the existing stands might fail. Four more stands were added and in the afternoon, we got a hose with a funnel and ran water up to the through hull so the engine would have plenty of water when she ran. On came the water and on came the engine and a few minutes later we found the leak. Wit, the mechanic leaned over the engine running his hand everywhere. He came away with a handful of oil right under the fuel pump. He'd found out leak. The oil came out through the blown seal, ran down the joint between the top of the engine and sump, jumped the lip at the end and ran down the side to leave a nice puddle at the back of the engine. Off went the engine and plans were made to get a new seal installed the next day(yesterday).
Meanwhile the painter just kept working on the hull making it nice and smooth for the paint that was coming. Tracy and I worked on other jobs. We dragged out all the anchor chain, washed it, and then had the windlass pull it back on board. I stood on deck, regularly pulling the chain to the rear of the anchor locker as it normally piles itself to far forward and that can cause a jam when the pile gets to high. With that done, Tracy took off our lightening wires. These are two large gauge wires we had attached to the shrouds just incase we got smacked my lightening. It would give the electricity a place to go instead on inside the boat. The storm season is pretty much over so off they came. I went after several of the through hulls that needed service. Two of ours had locked open, not what you want should they spring a leak and need to be closed. I used valve grinding paste on them to smooth out the ridges in the cone from being turned back an forth when they did work. With lots of grease on them, they were reinstalled and we are making a plan that every Sunday morning, when we get up, to work all the handles of all the through hulls in the boat.
Wit came back yesterday morning and off came the diesel pump. A new gasket was installed and the job was done. Just to be sure we had the right thing fixed, I had Wit get the funnel again and we started the engine. No oil, no leak. It's fixed. In the afternoon, once he was gone, we pumped out the old oil and put in a new filter and 7 liters of nice new diesel oil. To make sure all was well and we hadn't gotten any other leaks, I headed back to Popeye Marine and got the funnel back and re restarted the engine once the workers were gone. The oil pressure came right up and still no leaks. I disposed of the oil in one of the yards barrels where old oil goes to die.
Now, I'm working on replacing a plug on the end of one of our electric cords at brings power to Zephyr. It keeps causing us to have "reverse polarity" so some thing needs fixing. I've already chopped off the bad plug and just need to hook up the wires and that job should be done.
OK, that's just some of what we have done so far. There is more on the list but with any luck, we hope to be launching sometime on Tuesday morning. They still have to lift us so the bottom of the keel can get painted.
Mean while, we now understand why all this really happened. Last night as I sat in the cockpit watching a show(and swatting lots of mosquitos) after Tracy had gone to bed, I was happily having a nice piece of butterscotch candy we'd brought from Malaysia. Suddenly, I had two pieces in my mouth. OOPS!!! The second chunk in my mouth was really one of my crowns!!! It had fallen out!! We came back, not to get the boat fixed but to be in civilization when my crown fell out. There are more dentist here than out in the middle of the Indian Ocean which is where we would have been if it had happened after we left. It's Sunday but most dentist are open seven days a week out here and since we had already rented a car(need to find some ATM machines to get the money to pay these people) we are about to head into Krabi to get it reglued back on. There is always a reason things happen. Sometimes it just take a bit longer to figure out why.