Projects / Maintenance

21 Jan-5 Feb, Colombia days 33-48, Cartagena: After the delights of our 2-week motorbike tour of Colombia we are back to earth again with a busy work week.
Before the tour, the local Volvo service agent (LJ Prop Center) had removed all possible components off the main engine and taken them for rebuild/service. Basically, leaving only the bare engine block in the boat. On one of the parts, the high-pressure fuel pump, they found a worn shaft. $300 for a replacement shaft but 3+ weeks delivery, or $2900 for a complete new pump with only 8 days delivery. Yes, Volvo parts are outrageously expensive! And as we didn’t want to wait any longer than necessary, we had to choose the expensive option, leaving a rather bitter taste. I will keep the original pump, hopefully get a replacement shaft when next in Europe, and keep as a spare, or sell it as refurbished. So for now, it goes into the bilge stowage along with the countless other spare parts that are gradually lowering our waterline!
For the first couple of days we were both rather nervous as our engine got rebuilt. Did they really know what they were doing? I didn’t see any manual giving the torque measurements nor specific Volvo work instructions. But it turned out that they had the workshop manual on the phones and were indeed following it to the letter.

During the day, while they were working on the engine, we had the Sailrite sewing machine out again. Making more shades for the cockpit out of Soltis-86. We had already made drop-down sides for the bimini, and now we made similar for the front and back of the bimini, then shades for the windscreen. For the latter we decided to make them fit on the inside of the screen, not the outside as we normally see it done. This way they won’t get caked in salt and we can still easily clean the windows from the outside.

We were supposed to have the sea trial (of the engine) on the Friday (27-Jan) but they had a problem with the newly serviced starter motor. It would not engage. So it had to be removed again and go back to the workshop. By the time it was refitted and in good working order it was Saturday afternoon, but they insisted to get the engine sea trial done, despite it being outside normal working hours.
As we slipped lines and left our berth, from the moment I first put the engine in gear something didn’t feel right. The lever’s position felt different than before. We did several runs up and down the bay but we could never seem to get it to full throttle.
Then, just as we approached the lee-shore of Boca Grande peninsula, the engine suddenly would not go into gear any more. We stopped the engine in an endeavor to reset all the EMC electronics (the control lever electronically operates the gear box and start sequence). But when we tried to restart, it wouldn’t! We then had a panic as we were being blown onto the lee shore. Do we throw the anchor out or get the sails out? Despite having nothing setup for sailing, we decided the latter, and only just managed to get the boat sailing forwards in the nick-of-time before running aground! It was a very weird feeling having no engine in the middle of this very busy bay!

We crisscrossed the bay for 2-3 hours while the technicians feverishly tried to work out the problem. Finally, we decided to anchor. Our first time anchoring with no engine, but that part at least went well.
It was now getting dark on a Saturday evening. Yet the engineer in charge or our work, plus their chief mechanic came to the boat by launch. The engineer had been at a family wedding and was still dressed as such!
What they discovered was that a tiny plastic cog on the back of the control lever had a crack in it and was no longer gripping the control shaft. So no matter how I moved the control lever, nothing was happening behind it!
Long story short: we managed to improvise locking the cog onto the shaft, recalibrated the control and finally made it successfully back into the marina mid evening.

Of course, getting a replacement plastic cog from Europe was near impossible in any kind of decent time frame. So we waited another week in the marina, twiddling our thumbs (bored, frankly) while a local machine shop made one from scratch.
It was just bad luck that this little cog failed. It was nothing that the technicians had even touched during all their work. But on the other hand, it failed in the best possible place for a repair. So good luck in fact. But it doesn’t help our continued anxiety regarding “what will break next, when we are somewhere remote?”
By the end of the week we had the new part delivered and installed and this time made a successful sea trail, at last. After the trial we filled Cloudy with fuel. Amazingly cheap at US$2 per gallon (about 60cents a liter), half the price of fuel in Panama.

After all the trials and tribulations of the week, we decided not to rush our departure to Panama. Instead choosing to take it easy over the weekend, cleaning the boat of its layer of black dust, food shopping and generally getting ready for our passage. We plan to leave Monday (6-February), along with all fingers and toes crossed that the engine it is now in perfect working order. For the price, it had damned well better be!