A New Noise!

[Mike Smith]

We took Breezer out on Santa Rosa Sound for the fireworks on the evening of the fourth with several friends and "oooh'd" and "aaaah'd" on the foredeck at the wonderful show.  Late that night, we wound our way back amongst the crab pots to her berth on Grand Canal in Villla Venyce.  Saturday we took her out for a sail in the gulf and I noticed a "thumping" sound (not loud, but noticeable) coming from the stern.  It wasn't the exhaust, and occurred only when the engine was in gear in forward, not reverse.  Engine RPMs and temperature, and boat speed were normal under power at 2800 RPM.  Today I crawled back in the aft berth and checked out the transmission, packing gland and shaft with the engine again at idle, in forward, and in reverse.  The sound is definitely coming from outside the stern.  I hope that I may have snagged some fishing gear (it sounds like a fishing float wrapped around the shaft hitting the hull about every half second) on our excursion on the fourth but I fear it might be the cutlass bearing.  I'm having a diver check it out MOnday.  I plan to have Breezer hauled this fall for a new bottom job - if it's the cutlass bearing, can it wait until then, or is this a "must fix, right now" situation?

Thanks as always,
Mike

Mike Smith
S/V Breezer
www.mikejansmith.com

[Stu Jackson]

Ron's right, although most of the parts of his engine are also original, just a few though.

Cutless bearings do not POP and go POOF all of a sudden.  There is a very good article on cutless bearings in the most recent issue of Good Old Boat magazine.

[Mike Smith]

Ron -

You are right on - my diver just called and it was a loose zinc!  Whew! I have just dodged another boatyard bullet!

Thanks again,

Mike Smith
S/V Breezer
www.mikejansmith.com

[Stu Jackson]

Mike

Last year we invested in a wetsuit for me, short sleeves and cutoff length legs.  With our water temperatures at 57 degrees year round, swimming isn't a whole lot of fun here in San Francisco.

Anytime I question potential problems underwater, I don the wetsuit, mask and snorkel, and go find out.  That helped last week in checking my prop.

While I can't say it's "fun" (yet) it sure beats going in with only a pair of swim trunks.

[Mike Smith]

Stu -

I backed over the dinghy painter last spring and did the "hold your breath, feel around, find the rope, cut the rope" thing *without* a mask and snorkle, so one is always on the boat now.  The water temp here is about 90 these days, just below "simmer", so I could have checked things out myself.  I have a service (Bottom Dwellers) do the bottom and check everything out once a month, and as chance would have it, today was the day, so I let him check it out.  He called me at work first thing this morning and said I had a loose zinc.  Earned his money today!

Mike Smith
S/V Breezer
www.mikejansmith.com

[Norris Johnson]

I had a loose zinc. Had to dive on it to check it out. I also keep goggles and fins on board.

Don't know how anyone dives in 57 degree water. I live in Texas on the Gulf coast. Water temp here is about 85 degrees now. Just about the right temp for a Hurricane. Oh Well!

[john daley]

Had the same problem last year. Took a friend out for the day and turned back when we started getting very expensive noises down aft. Lifted the boat out and found the zinc was loose and knocking against the shaft strut very noisily. We stuck another one on and really knocked it very carefully into place, hammering and tightening and couldn't have got it any tighter. The next time we lifted the boat out there was no zinc there!(There wasn't time for it to have worn away) This time we put some "lock-tight" on and hopefully its still there. Someone tells me that these shaft-zincs that have the little ball bearings inside grip tighter, but someone else says they are only there for better conductivity. Any views???

[Mike Smith]

For a view of Breezer and a belated Happy Fourth of July, click here:

http://www.mikejansmith.com/GalleryPage/FourthOfJulyPage/FourthOfJuly.htm ]Breezer[/URL]

Mike Smith
S/V Breezer
www.mikejansmith.com