Bad Brain-Board
18 March 2017 | Fantasy Island Marina Roatan, Honduras
Susan / sky of clouds & rain, windy, 81 degrees F
We wake early and get underway early. Good thing. All out power is needed to get out of the bight due to strong currents and swell running in thru the narrow break in the reefs that is the entrance / exit. Some exciting! moments. Half an hour or so later we round West Bay and head NE long the coast to Fantasy Island Marina. Along the route the NE wind picks up; a steady 10, 15, 18, 25 kts with scattered rain as we near the marina / CoCo View entrance. We're arriving before the worst of this wx system hits Roatan. A sharp turn to port gets us into the channel and out of the swell. And then as we round the corner to the marina docks we get protection from the worst of the wind. Jerry does a fantastic job of docking between two boats with little space to spare fore & aft.
Robby & his friend arrive at 2pm. They repeat many of the tests of yesterday and agree it's a problem with the electronics. By 3:30pm they've dismantled the genset frame and extracted the brain-board. Encased in some sort of plastic protection layer, Jerry's prediction comes true; there's no way to fix components on it. It must be replaced.
The Cummins / Onan dealer for Central American is in San Pedro Sula. Both men believe they will have this part in stock, and if so, it can be flown in on Monday. They'll plan to come by after work on Monday to install it, re-build the genset, and get her running all fine. Wow... sounds caution-ably optimistically great! Jerry will call the dealer Monday morning. For this to happen Monday or sometime this week, the part needs to be in stock; the (correct) part needs to be flown-in to Roatan; we need to be able to pick it up at the airport and carry it back to Vida Dulce (since in-country, no need for customs); the workers need to be able to use their Monday / whatever evening(s) to do the work; the genset needs to get put back together and then run reliably.
Next installment on this subject Monday.