My Mac Vacation ...Perfect... Not Really

[Matt19020]

We are relaxing now after our not so perfect Mac vacation from Philladelphia area to C&D Canal to Baltimore and Annapolis. We started out on Saturday on the Delaware river thru Philadelphia to C&D canal. 62 mile leg of trip about 270 miles total...

PROBLEM 1 - One Mile before Delaware. Memorial. Bridge motor started sputtering… we got into shallower water and dropped the hook. Shut down motor and restarted all is fine now. One mile later right before bridge it happened again barely made it out of channel area dropped hook again and would not restart…..seemed to be a fuel issue. I pumped the balls on both tanks and noticed a small red piece of plastic in the sediment bowl on filter (possibly flash from tank construction). Motor started up now…runs fine. Now I can say I am a little nervous going under the bridge we were in about 2-3 mph current and no wind at all and about 20 miles from our destination. Well no problems with fuel after that ....motor ran like a champ…almost..

We made it to C&D had a nice dinner at Summit North Marina and next day went off to Baltimore another 62 mile leg…No Problems at all!! Spent two days in Baltimore site seeing ..well worth the run!

Left Baltimore to Annapolis about 20 mile run planning to sail this day... light wind day according to Accuweather 5-10 all day

PROBLEM 2- Did not check NOAA (and I know better then that) put sails up but not making enough progress to make our destination in a timely matter. Dropped sails and figured we would get into the Chesapeake Bay a little closer to Annapolis and pop up the sails again as soon as we cleared the Francis Scott Key Bridge things started turning fast and with in an hour we were in 3’ swells and gust to 20 knts white caps forming around us and hardly any other boats... closed up all the hatches and the Admiral went below and hung on. We tried to motor as fast as possible to make Annapolis but it still took us over 3 hours. Good news we made it boat and motor held up great! A couple of bumps and bruises but no major issues. When we were at dock checked NOAA and we were in a small craft advisory….We decided to stay two nights in Annapolis until things died down a little bit.

Ok now towards home.. we leave Annapolis back to C&D 60+ miles boat ran perfect 15 mph avg. at 4500rpm made C&D by 2:30. We decided we were going to try and make the last leg home another 60+ miles.

PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS, PROBLEMS…
We went thru a no wake zone in C&D canal.. went to throttle up and buzzers start going off “Low Voltage Alarm” and boat drops into safe mode 3000 Rpm max…but runs fine all gauges show good charge rates and battery voltage.
About a minute goes by all quiet now throttle up again and same thing happens…two more times this happened. Shut motor off and restarted…same thing happened. Even tried switching over to battery two.
We were approaching marina to refuel and figured I will look at it when we get in there.
You do not want to be disabled in the canal no where to run it is all channel…and narrow.
They do not service Suzuki motors I called a mechanic and he did not recommend running 60+ miles with motor in the safe mode about 6- 7 hour run.
We decided to slip the boat at the marina rented a car (A red VW Beatle, adding insult to injury) and come back the next day with the trailer.
OK here we go..left the house at 7:00 AM get to the marina by 8:45 look back and we have a flat on the trailer! How many miles it was like that I do not know but we left with air in them…
I carry a spare…. unfortunately I do not carry a lug wrench … the marina could not help they came out with a 3/8 socket set which I snapped on the first try. We asked for directions to an auto store to go buy a lug wrench…After they gave us wrong directions and the first two stores did not have them we found one.
Back to marina 11:00 AM now.
I was able to loosen 2 before bending the wrench to a unique design. Then I decided to hook trailer back to car and drive to tire store and have them do it (I should have done this first!) $20 and 10 minutes later we are back in business I asked him to look at tire and it was a broken valve stem he repaired…huh… What are the chances of that happening?

Disassemble the boat now we have to wait an hour for haul out at $104. (no ramp).
They pull the boat put on trailer….Now the other tire is going flat!!!! They put air in it and realize the valve stem in this one is leaking also where it goes into rim. We race back over to tire store 3 miles away and they are out on lunch break …one hour later I had him replace the stem and the one in the spare because the way the day was going I knew I would probably need it another$30! Now it is 3:00 and the dealer is 20 miles south of us and they close at 5:00. Well nothing bad happened on this part…
Driving back home in heavy traffic in Delaware hungry and tired and feeling a bit beat up a Captain Morgan Rum Truck pulls in front of us (my drink of choice) I said to the Admiral “Really… this is not fair!” just then a second one passed us on the other side…at this point we had a good laugh about our ordeal…and enjoyed a cold one when we got home…
The boat sits in Smyrna Delaware waiting to be fixed at dealer…

Pics Here Haul out video at end..-http://s151.photobucket.com/albums/s152 ... 0Vacation/

[pokerrick1]

A boat vacation without boat problems is not a boat vacation - - - you, however, exceeded your limit

Be thankful your engine had a safe mode, or you might have experienced a REAL problem

Rick

[Love MACs]

It is said "it's all in the planning". And if something can go wrong it will go wrong. But man u had more than your share One can never prepare for all contingencies or problems and you had more than most. But you're still healthy, no one was hurt and you now have learned to carry a lug wrench. and maybe some Fix a Flat. Nice trip, fraught with problems, but still better than a good day at the office


Allan

[Catigale]

Ive long given up on the cross-type lug nut wrenchs for cracking/tightening lug nuts/bolts. In my trailer tool kit is a 1/2 inch breaker bar and a cheater pipe for all heavy torquing. The cross type are great for spinning them off once loose.

[LOUIS B HOLUB]

Ive long given up on the cross-type lug nut wrenchs for cracking/tightening lug nuts/bolts. In my trailer tool kit is a 1/2 inch breaker bar and a cheater pipe for all heavy torquing.

Me too.
A few years back, I learned the hard way by loosing wheel enroute to the Bay, trailering my Mac-X. All five (5) lug bolts sheared off, and I never heard any rattle, or felt any shaking, before the wheel broke off.

It happened at approx 50 mph...and now, "by-cracky", I use an extendable slide breaker bar with an Impack half inch socket. Them critters aint' going 'no where, 'no more, 'no how.

And, as a side note for fellow Mac'iers...loosing a trailer wheel because of sheared off lug bolts is a real mess. And, its preventable if things are torqued well.

[seahouse]

Hey Louis--

and now, "by-cracky", I use an extendable slide breaker bar with an Impack half inch socket. Them critters aint' going 'no where, 'no more, 'no how.

loosing a trailer wheel because of sheared off lug bolts is a real mess. And, its preventable if things are torqued well.

Sorry, maybe I misunderstand, but I'm not clear about your post, help me out. Sheared-off studs can be as much a result of over-torquing as under-torquing the lug nuts. Right

Regards- Brian.

[Catigale]

If you really overtorque them you stretch them and weaken them - but I think its pretty hard to reach this limit. KMac might disagree with me on this. I think its much more common for people to let them get loose, and then they fail due to the stress of being machined by the loose wheel..

[seahouse]

Hi again Catigale!

I think its much more common for people to let them get loose

When I was a wee lad a tradesman recounted that a "study" had showed that bolts under 3/8" were most often overtorqued by hand by mechanics, and that bolts over 3/8" were more likely to be undertorqued by hand. So lug nuts are over 3/8" and that would confirm your thoughts.

If you really overtorque them you stretch them and weaken them - but I think its pretty hard to reach this limit

My concern precisely. Like Louis, I have a sliding extension bar in my trunk for just such use. If you consider the bar to be 24" long, and assume you want a torque of, say 100 pounds-feet (that's probably high) then you only have to push down 50 lbs onto the end of the bar. I don't know how much you weigh Louis (maybe you can start a thread like Jim's "guess my weight"....or not) but 50 lbs is pretty easy to surpass by even a lightweight person. Which is what I was trying to clarify by my original question.

Even assuming a 12" wrench is used, a person weighing over 100 lbs will be overtorquing by applying their weight to the end of the wrench. Also considering that boat trailers are often in water, or salt water, are often several years old, and anti-seize compound is therefore also possibly in use, over torquing becomes a likelyhood.

Regards - Brian.

[kmclemore]

Given the almost obscenely low price of a fairly accurate torque wrench, why would one not just torque them properly each time?

Seems like "Penny wise, pound foolish" to me.

And yes, I do disagree... particularly when folks use anti-seize lube, it's really easy to exceed the torque figures and damage the elasticity of the stud. A 200+ pound guy pulling on a 1+ foot bar can impart one heck of a lot of torque.. make the bar longer and you're definitely in the danger zone.

[seahouse]

Hi kmclemore!

That's certainly a great wrench to apply torque when putting them ON. It has a max torque of 150 pounds-feet and at 18" long might not be so hot at taking them OFF. Especially on a snowing or rainy night on the shoulder of the road. I think that torque wrench would be a good second tool to carry in your car to supplement, not supplant the sliding bar wrench.

Regards - Brian.

[Catigale]

Kevin has posted (accurately) that the spec torque is given for dry, unlubed nuts/bolts. Torquing to the spec with lube will damage your rig. I do choose to use lube since I dont like not being able to get my wheels off. I confess I tighten them to my " experience" with lube to keep them from seizing. Ive done this for all my cars since I live in the NE, and have neither lost a wheel nor studs - except on trailers which I had bought in bad shape. What I do like about lube is how you feel the stud bottom when the rim makes contact with the wheel hub, and then can apply the tightening torque evenly by turning each nut evenly (usually about 1/4 turn at this point)

Ill even confess I own a torque wrench - maybe someday Ill take Kevins advice...

Whenever I do have my cars serviced for tires, I get the car home, loosen and retorque the lugs - invariably the tire guys put them on too tight imhe.

[kmclemore]

Whenever I do have my cars serviced for tires, I get the car home, loosen and retorque the lugs - invariably the tire guys put them on too tight imhe.

Yeah, that's another real danger... that the 'tire guys' end up stretching the studs and then they are henceforth permanently trashed. I always make sure the tire guys use a torque wrench... and I bring one with me just in case!! Once stretched, the studs are in danger of fracture... and with the way our boats are configured, those single-axle trailer axle assemblies are *very* close to their load limits... so it doesn't take much to break a critical part.

[Catigale]

Just for laughs last night I went out with my torque wrench and found all my 2002 trailer lugs at 90 ftlbs +-5 ftlbs. This is with light lube. Spec in the manual is 90-95 ftlbs, with no mention of lube (so presumably dry)

[kmclemore]

My rough cut engineering memory tells me one needs to reduce torque by 10% when using light machine oil on the threads.

[Catigale]

reduce torque by 10%

Metric, SAE, or Whitworth percent??