Engine breakdown

LadyInBed said:
From the Leaving Lymington thread

In real life, if your engine packed up immediately after setting off, would you:


  1. Continue with your passage
  2. Return to the pontoon under sail
  3. Drop anchor and fix engine / get a tow into pontoon
  4. Do something else
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Only last year, right at the very tip of Portland Bill and close in for the inside passage to Weymouth, all engine alarms went off.

Tide would have pushed me up through the passage but a burgeoning F4 would be against.

I knew immediately I needed sea room, singlehanded as I was.

Luckily,I was motor sailing so turned to starboard and shot out into Lyme Bay and the opportunity to go below and locate the problem - which was me !

Out with the kettle, filled up the closed water cooling system and then putting back the pressure cap CORRECTLY THIS TIME !
 
I lost jojo's engine in the middle of the thames estuary, (ran out of fuel, idiot). Anchoring wasn't an option, luckily the tide was in my favour. Changed course for burnham on crouch, and managed to sail there in an ever dying wind, took me three attempts to sail onto the pontoon in the dark, tide kept taking me away as I turned into it, wasn't getting my angle of approach and speed right.

If it was when I was leaving a marina, it would depend on the passage I was planning. I would prob attempt to sail back in, if I wasn't sure about that would try and anchor and sort it, close enough to get a cheap tow in if I couldn't. If a starightforward passage or already part of a cruise, I would prob just go on and sort it at the other end, after all I will be trying the same two things at my destination as I would try to do where it failed.
 
It all depends on degree of maneoverability possible with sail in the given mooring, and the proximity of places to mend engine or get parts fuel etc.

Setting off from my Bristol Channel mooring in the River Axe I expect to be pushing against 1 to 2 kt of tide in a very narrow channel with moorings on either side of me and no real room to tack. If engine fails I would be lucky not to be swept backwards into the bank or another boat and certainly could never pick up my trot mooring. I would hope to grab hold of another mooring or make more controlled impact with another boat. I always have anchor ready to go and sails also. Having come to rest I would fix engine or if that proved impossible use dinghy and outboard to tow back at slack water - which might mean waiting 12 hours. Have done it solo at other moorings and a bit alarming to be chased by own boat but gets the job done.

If in River Tamar I might get away with picking up swinging mooring so sailing more practical, and anyway could probably sail towards Saltash or one of the Plymouth Marinas. Anchoring to sort it out still a good option though can be done either end of the voyage.

I have notified Coastguard on one occasion that I was approaching Swansea in bad weather without engine and may require assistance on the final part, but we managed without which was just as well as it turned out harbour workboat had failed engine and was anyway inaccessible due to extreme tides.
 
To answer my own question, my prefered option would be
3. Drop anchor and fix engine / get a tow into pontoon
followed by
2. Return to the pontoon under sail
if 3 didn't work.
I think there has only two who opted to continue with the passage (for good reasons).
Which leads me to wonder if on an RYA exam /course, option 3 or 2 had been implemented, what the RYA examiner / Instructor would have made of it.
Hopefully ticks in the GOOD box, as I don't think there is a 'right' answer, but maybe wrong answers if you can't justify your action! :o
 
We practice sailing on and off our mooring regularly to keep up the close quarter maneuvering and stopping skills. If you sail dinghy's regularly it help as they dont usually have any assistance options. I find the skills learnt in dinghy's are very complementary for this type of maneuvering. Indeed I suspect if you ask many of the keel boat and dayboat racers they will tell you how natural it is to manouver in in and out of berths in busy harbors and marina's without an engine
 
Its only happened to me once when I got 'bugged' - engine cut out in the middle of the moorings at the bottom end of Portsmouth Harbour, deployed the genoa quickly and tacked back onto a spare mooring, could'nt fix it so I got a tow.

So for me its 2 or 3 (if you are too far away to make it viable).
 
Happened to me at Bucklers Hard this year, on my first club cruiser event. Own fault, I had left the seacock closed. Realised quickly, but by this time I had shredded the impeller. Quick witted crew hailed a passing boat and we were gently towed to the fuel berth area, where we rafted while I sort it out. No drama, but I won a "duck of the day" for my stupidity. So, to answer your question, find a place to stop and get there by whatever means present themselves.
 
This happened to me this summer en route to Queenborough = no wind so was motoring at the time. Changed the primary filter and engine started but stopped again 10 minutes later. Cause was a blockage at the fuel tap on top of the fuel tank. Cleaned the tap and it's been fine ever since - touch wood!
 
Various options which I have used over the years :

Sail to the pontoon
Sail close to the marina entrance and either pick up a buoy or anchor
Tie the dinghy alongside and use the outboard.

Our 2.5hp Tohatsu brought us ( Feeling 920 3.6 tonnes) alongside the pontoon in Benodet against the current.

Maneuvering in a crowed anchorage under sail I used a triple reefed main and a nearly rolled in genny. That way you don't need to faff around winching.
 
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LONG_KEELER said:
Who needs an engine when you can do this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voAqdCrSnu8
Click to expand...

Poignard said:
That was a joy to watch. :encouragement:
Click to expand...

It was indeed. I wouldn't want to try that in a Snapdragon, though - the film would almost certainly end up in a boaty fail compilation!

Engine failure just after leaving happened a couple of times not long after buying Jissel. The first time (primary filter) was just after upping anchor at East Head. I had enough way on to get the genny out and drawing so we sailed over to Thorney Island, where I changed the filter. The second time, not long after, was leaving my mooring in Portsmouth harbour (secondary filter). No wind and the tide was carrying us towards a moored boat, so I got the anchor out PDQ, which saved us from catastrophe, but it hooked the trot. Bye bye anchor and chain.

Nowadays, the OB for the dinghy lives on a bracket, so I'd drop it into the water and start it up. Failing that, sail to a safe place and drop the anchor while I sort it out. I carry enough spares and tools to fix most non-terminal problems with the main engine and I'd always have the tender OB available to get to a safe place if the problem wasn't fixable. If I'm likely to hit something, I'd drop the anchor wherever I am, and whoever it upsets while I sort things out. (Maybe not under the bows of a container ship...)
 
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