Recent content by mikegunn

In my experience overgreasing of winches can lead to problems such as sticking pawls and wear of needle rollers. Contamination captured by excessive quantities of grease will also serve as an effective grinding paste. The only surfaces that will benefit from lubrication are those that slide...

If I’m sailing solo I quite enjoy the challenge of making a successful berthing. However, if some well meaning soul decides to proffer assistance with the procedure I’m usually not too proud to accept, because once I have a line ashore I’m not going anywhere anyway. I can then tidy up the lines...

I had a similar problem, intermittently. Radio worked fine on 1W but not always on max power. Returned set to Icom who found it to be free from fault. Discussed the perceived fault with an Icom engineer who suggested I re-examine my boat’s wiring and pay particular attention to the relevant fuse...

I would suggest sourcing and fitting a brass drain plug. Then everyone will be happy. Mike

I’ve just installed a system which would seem to answer your requirements Boat Monitoring System : Hello Sailor. From a users point of view it is very simple to install, there’s no WiFi involved and it just works! Market research led me to device called “Hello-Sailor”. It uses the mobile phone...

Go with Paul R’s suggestion. A more considered response than mine🙂. Mike

Glad you’ve found the culprit without further incident. Out of interest, what’s the voltage across the terminals? If you’ve found the battery to be of adequate size in the past I would recommend going for the same capacity but substituting it with a gel type. Then you can forget about having to...

+1 for battery problem. The alarm is sensing fumes from a battery that is suffering a cell failure. I experienced a similar problem a couple of years ago and thought I had faulty alarms. Further exploration revealed a battery that was too hot to touch!! I presume that the alarms were sensing...

Ciutadella, Menorca? Mike

I have used Le Tonkenois with varying degrees of success and would therefore add the following caveats. Firstly, because it is very slow drying (24 hrs min between coats) the coated surface needs to be in a completely dust/draught free atmosphere during that part of the process. Secondly, it...

It would be very unusual for you to witness a leak from the strainer, for two reasons; Firstly, the strainer is at the highest point of the inlet side of the pump and certainly above the outside sea level. Secondly, the pressure in the strainer’s chamber is always less than atmospheric when the...

I’ve only experienced one hose/hose tail failure and in that event the joint was double clipped! Fortunately it was an outlet connection from a fresh water tank which dumped its contents into the bilge. I never did manage to ascertain the order in which the respective clips had slackened their...

I had been using an expired subscription version of Navionics on an IPad and successfully overlaying a wireless AIS signal. I hadn’t updated the app, for possibly at least a year, but decided to do so recently. From that point on I lost the AIS facility!! I will now need to re-subscribe to...

Have a look at this website. Home Le Tonkinois sell varnish but they also have an interest in Eberspacher heaters. Mike

I would suggest that you examine the heater’s fuse holder very carefully. I found that the Eberspacher fuse holder would relax its grip on the fuse, allowing arcing. Since replacing it with a better quality fuse and fuse holder my heater, which exhibited similar symptoms to those that you’re...