Underway Day 86:

At 0230, Mary and I had a rude awakening as a bass fishing boat zipped by us doing around 30 knots. He came close and walked us in the narrow cove. He was likely drunk and heading home after a night out with the boys. This is one reason we prefer remote uninhabited coves. After breakfast and breaking camp, I turned on the navionics systems and nothing worked!

At first I thought it was just the keyboard above the display, but further investigation and troubleshooting revealed a complete system failure. We had no GPS, no Autopilot, no Depth, no charts, no weather, no radar, no AIS, no engine information, and with no keyboard, there wasn’t even a way to enter the main computer. Everything was working great the night before. Just like that, we were back in the 19th century. I spent a few hours poking around for an obvious loose cable connection or blown fuse. I tried everything I could think of for the “easy fix.” It was getting hot, so I fired up the engines, called the lock on the radio, and we locked down 94 feet into Wilson Lake. We weren’t going far, and I knew the area from coming through a few days earlier. I used my ears to tune the RPM’s, and my eyes to stay in the channel. A few minutes later, we were back at one of our favorite marinas of the trip, Florence Harbor Marina, at Muscle Shoals. Kyle and Eva, the owners, were very nice, and found us a covered slip in the back, where we could work out of the weather.

There were no marine technicians in this area of Alabama, and I was told by a few guys that I probably knew more about this stuff than the best guy in the region, so I got to work troubleshooting. After getting nowhere, I tried calling Raymarine. They were useless, telling me that I needed a new computer. The nearest guy they had was in New Orleans. Thanks for nothin’. I knew that the computer was the only thing that actually appeared to be working.

Typically in a networked system like this, you would lose one instrument, replace or repair, and you’re back in action. A system wide failure has to be cables, connections, wiring, backbone or network switch. I tore the entire boat apart, with Mary’s patient assistance, and we inspected every network wire, end to end. While I was doing so, I re-spliced any suspect connections with a proper waterproof splice. I used electrical cleaner and dielectric grease on every plug. Since I was in the bowels of the boat, I also did lots of unrelated cleaning and organizing and pulled out hundreds of feet of old wiring from the previous owner that wasn’t connected to anything. It was hot nasty work. I got nowhere. This was not an obvious fix, but the bilge was clean now, everything was organized better, and there were no more mystery wires.

At around 8pm, my friend Rodney called and invited me out for drinks with him and some buddies. I hadn’t eaten all day. I smelled horrible. I was all itchy from fiberglass. My arms were scratched up, and my neck hurt from being in contorted positions all day. Mary, being the awesome wife that she is, basically insisted that I stop working myself ragged, take a shower and go to the bar with the boys.

Days like today are one of the most frustrating parts of boating. Certain problems are harder than others, but they don’t get to be much more of a pain in the ass than to troubleshoot than a system wide electronics failure. An expensive technician would be getting paid to do exactly what I was doing anyways, getting to know, inspect, and label every network wire and connection on the boat.

As I walked up the road to the pub for some much needed food and drink, I saw this quote come across my phone from another sailor and it seemed appropriate:

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do.
So throw off the bowlines.
Sail away from the safe harbor.
Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore – Dream – Discover”
•  Mark Twain

I knew that with time, I would “explore” this wiring and “discover” the problem. As long as I work hard, use my brain, and keep a positive attitude, this too will pass. I’ll figure it out one way or another. This loop isn’t going to do itself. Turns out that a change a scenery, some delicious food at Wildwood Tavern, good company, and a few stiff drinks actually gave me some new ideas. The bar break gave me some perspective, and some new things to check on tomorrow.