Into Richard's Bay, the hard way.
20 October 2015 | Richard's Bay, South Africa
Bill/Sunny and some breeze
Just to let you know, we did finally make it into Richard's Bay, early yesterday morning. Here's how the last part of the journey went.
As you read in our last post, we were in the final jump for Richard's Bay traveling along with just our "storm jib" up at the bow. There's not much to it but with the current shoving us along, we were still set on getting in in the middle of the night. We started heading farther off the wind so that while we were still moving, we were no longer headed straight of Richard's Bay. We tacked back and forth to slow our southward motion and it worked. By 0300, we had ships passing us or at least close by so we figured we would just drift for a while. The swells were over 3 meters and quite close with the occasional 4+ meter swell surging under us throwing us violently from side to side as it passed under the keel. We both had our life jackets on and who ever was at the wheel was also strapped in with a safely tether. We were close to 30 miles off shore but trying to get back to the shoreline where the swells would be better. Out Hydrovane was helping but even it was having some problems with the swells since there was really no sails involved in our movement. In the end, we fired up the engine so we could better moderate what we were doing and where we were going. Here's where "it" hit the fan. Suddenly, alarms started going off in the cockpit. Something was wrong with the engine!!! Oh, cr_p! Not now!!! The last time it went off, was due to a reduced oil pressure due to the rocking. I checked the oil(not easy in these swells) and added a quart or so as it seemed a bit low. Restarted the engine and again, the alarm went off. Oil pressure was fine, right where it was supposed to be. Engine temp was fine. Electrical was reporting just fine with the volts. Tracy then says that she can't hear water going in the engine. Now it's not that she has super human hearing, it's that on our engine as on most marine diesel engines, there is "raw" water getting sucked into the engine with a water pump that runs off the engine. This then goes through some of the parts of the engine before it gets sent to mix with the exhaust, shoved down the pipes to the muffler and blown out the back of the boat. Along this water line, we(as have most boats) installed an "anti syphon" device so that when the engine is shut off, water can't get sucked back up the engine through the pipes. We've had this "anti syphon" device fail before due to saltwater so instead of it being an anti "syphon device", we stuck a hose to the "anti syphon" nozzle and lead the hose up to the drain for the cockpit. It allows water to blow out the hose and drain through the cockpit drain. When the engine stops, it then sucks air into the hose eliminating any chance that water will back flow into the engine. With the engine running, when you are in the cockpit, you can hear water squirting out of the small ΒΌ inch hose in the drain for the cockpit. It's hard to miss, BUT, if you are getting thrown around the cockpit, have had little to eat since it's not safe to go below to make anything, haven't gotten much sleep, it's easy to miss. And we had missed it. There was no water getting pumped into the engine we had been running for 10 minutes or so. I rushed to the back of the boat and there was exhaust coming out but no water. The water pump wasn't pumping water. CR_P!!! I rushed below and closed the through hull for the water and undid the top on the water filter. It was empty!! Not supposed to be. It should be full. I left the cap off and turned on the through hull and saw lots of nice water coming into the filter. Yeah!!! I screwed the cap back on and we restarted the engine. She started just fine, but again, Tracy calls out that she still can't hear water in the cockpit drain. CR_P!!! We must have ruined the rubber water impeller that pulls water in through the through hull and forces it into the engine. It's now just about 0400 and we are still getting thrown around the boat. I headed for the engine room knowing that I have to get the bad one out and a new one in. For a change, I actually knew where the parts I needed were stowed away(there's a miracle). Now, here I am, leaning over a hot engine, with some padding between me a the hot steel. the boat is rocking violently from side to side working with a meager flashlight and a screwdriver working on a piece that I have never worked on before. Now the old water pump we used to have(now discontinued)got trashed by the alcoholic mechanic we had on Pohnpei so we had to buy a new one. The old one--a mechanics dream. It unscrewed out the side so when you leaned into the engine room, it was right there. Six screws and off comes the cover. With the new one(better design?), well it opens to the back of the engine right were you have lots of hoses. I squeezed my had down the side and managed to get the screws out only slightly burning my hand. Meanwhile, the padding covering my stomach shifted and the hot steel burned my skin. Gee, I'm sure having fun!?! Once I got the cover off(taking each screw carefully out of the engine room and putting them into a bowl(really screwed if I lost one) and took off the cover. Yep, all the fan pieces that make up the impeller were gone. All that was left was the central hub. Now to get that off, you have to either use a fancy tool that cost a lot of money, or put a screw driver on each side and grab the sided of the impeller and slowly pull it out. That's what I did, all the while sweating like a pig. I do that when I get stressed. To say it get disgusting at time is an understatement. But hey, I getting thrown around, the engine is hot and I'm getting burned and I'm doing something I've never done before and it has to get done if there's to be any chance of getting into the harbor. What I didn't know at the time was that the wind had also shifted to be coming out of the northwest so we couldn't go west towards Richard's Bay. Instead, we were still getting shoved southwest along the coast. In the end, I got the cap cleaned of it's old seal as well as the engine block. The new impeller shoved into the pump and the six screws reinstalled. We started up the engine and there was no leakage around the cap I'd screwed on and water could be heard in the cockpit and it was flying out the exhaust pipe on the stern of the boat!!!! It was a miracle! We put the engine in gear(oh, the alarm buzzer had stopped as well), lowered the storm jib and set off for Richard's Bay. We'd only slightly passed it(about 3 miles or so)but were were still miles off shore. We took off for Richard's Bay just as the Sun was starting to come up and as we were about an hour out, I called the Port Control to get permission to come in. Permission was granted and in we went. As we lined up with the channel entrance, a big freighter suddenly shows up on our AIS screen that he is coming out just as we are heading in! Well CR_P! I took the engine out of gear and we just drifted along making sure we didn't get any closer to him. Once he was passed, well another freighter that had been out at anchor decided it was his time to come in so again, we took the engine out of gear till he was passed and then it was our turn. In the end, we got into the harbor and made our way to the Tuzi Gazi Marina for processing and getting checked into South Africa. By 0800, Immigration was there, our passports were stamped and now all we had to do was wait for Customs. They, of course didn't show up till 1700! We cleaned up Zephyr and stowed thing, put away sails and cleaned up the deck and below decks and took naps to catch up on what we had missed the previous night(which was a lot). No one asked us for any documentation from Madagascar, just our passports, and crew list and boat documentation. We were all checked in.