ex-Gladys
Well-Known Member
Don't get on here as much as I would like these days, but I thought I would regale you of the experiences of my season so far....
Gladys was launched late may in the end, mainly due to waiting for the weather to improve enough for David Mills at Mersea to finish renewing my wheelhouse. I also had a new morse control fitted as the splines had long been past their best on the old one, so I spent a fair bit of time engaging ahead and astern on the mooring. It was blowing S5 as I pottered out of Salcott, across the quarters towards the Nass. With sufficient sea room, I put her into neutral waited a few seconds and engaged astern. Nothing, engine revs only.. Never mind thinks I, it's easy enough to pick the mooring up without going backwards, so ahead.... Nothing but engine revs again. Now my thoughts at having "sea room" were vastly amended... I unrolled a bit of genny real quick and refreshed my "picking up a mooring under sail skills". Third time lucky, and when the dust had settled time for a look see.
At the control end all seemed well, so I asked crew to stand by morse control whilst I went below to try manual operation of the gearbox. Imagine my surprise then to find the shaft had dropped out of the gearbox coupling! A short millisecond I also thanked my lucky stars for my presence of mind at fitting the shaft anode only a couple of inches in front of the P bracket.....
It turns out that when the shaft was fitted in 2006, the "engineer" had drilled the two indents into the shaft, but used completely square ended allan screws as grub screws.... He also used a brass key as opposed to steel, and the cause for my issue was the key wearing, as it was doing all jobs instead of just transferring rotation from coupling to shaft...
After a bit of bother getting the shaft back up to the coupling (antifouling on the shaft jammed it in the cutless bearing) a large bolt through the lot and a steel key has sorted everything.
A salutary lesson though, but for the anodes close to the P bracket I'd have not only been unrolling jib quickly but looking for an inch and a quarter bung for the stern gland....
Gladys was launched late may in the end, mainly due to waiting for the weather to improve enough for David Mills at Mersea to finish renewing my wheelhouse. I also had a new morse control fitted as the splines had long been past their best on the old one, so I spent a fair bit of time engaging ahead and astern on the mooring. It was blowing S5 as I pottered out of Salcott, across the quarters towards the Nass. With sufficient sea room, I put her into neutral waited a few seconds and engaged astern. Nothing, engine revs only.. Never mind thinks I, it's easy enough to pick the mooring up without going backwards, so ahead.... Nothing but engine revs again. Now my thoughts at having "sea room" were vastly amended... I unrolled a bit of genny real quick and refreshed my "picking up a mooring under sail skills". Third time lucky, and when the dust had settled time for a look see.
At the control end all seemed well, so I asked crew to stand by morse control whilst I went below to try manual operation of the gearbox. Imagine my surprise then to find the shaft had dropped out of the gearbox coupling! A short millisecond I also thanked my lucky stars for my presence of mind at fitting the shaft anode only a couple of inches in front of the P bracket.....
It turns out that when the shaft was fitted in 2006, the "engineer" had drilled the two indents into the shaft, but used completely square ended allan screws as grub screws.... He also used a brass key as opposed to steel, and the cause for my issue was the key wearing, as it was doing all jobs instead of just transferring rotation from coupling to shaft...
After a bit of bother getting the shaft back up to the coupling (antifouling on the shaft jammed it in the cutless bearing) a large bolt through the lot and a steel key has sorted everything.
A salutary lesson though, but for the anodes close to the P bracket I'd have not only been unrolling jib quickly but looking for an inch and a quarter bung for the stern gland....
Boat still in marina, loads of others about, can't get to the engine stop without leaving the helm, what to do? So I turned back into my recently vacated finger berth with the boat accelerating towards the walkway. Boat mounted walkway and rode up over it about a foot or so before the weight out did momentum! In the meantime I had got a stern brest ashore and then cut the engine. Damage - amazingly nothing other than a bit of antifoul scraped off, oh and I needed a cup of tea and to change my shorts!
