I have to say that the past few days I’ve been feeling pretty uninspired. I’ve been spending a lot of time on the boat, going out there in the morning before the kids get up and coming back around noon tired and not much fun.
Tomorrow a mechanic is going to give me a hand with lifting the engine a few inches so we can remove the oil pan and have a look underneath the engine. We’ll fill up the coolant and watch from underneath to see if we can isolate which valve is leaking. If the leak doesn’t show up then we’ll just sort of start from scratch and work through the engine piece by piece. But I think odds are pretty good at this point that we’ve got a hole in one of the cylinder sleeves/jackets (I think that’s the correct terminology). With the amount of coolant that is disappearing without even having pressure in the engine I just can’t imagine what else it could be. There have been a few other suggestions, and maybe one of them is right, but my money is on this for now—both literally and figuratively.
Ali has been holding down the fort around here, but our time in Mazatlan is coming to an end. It’s time for us to move on. The tourists are in town now and it just doesn’t have quite the same vibe as in the summer. Our itchy feet have returned.
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At the marina today I went into the office to ask where I could dump my used oil. The guy looked at me like I had a monkey on my head. “En la basura.”
“In the garbage? Just put it in a garbage bag and throw it in the garbage?”
“Si.”
To highlight that there was no confusion he asked the maid to fetch me a garbage bag.
I told him that wasn’t necessary and left. Down on the dock I asked one of the local year-round liveaboards and got the answer I had expected—there is a fifty-gallon drum behind the fuel dock’s tank for waste oil.
Yikes. Look out environment.
Working on getting the solar panels ready. Wiring is all done, now we’re just waiting on the welder who was supposed to come yesterday to add two 1″ bars across the davits. Not to worry, I’m sure he’ll be here Monday. Or Tuesday. Wednesday is probably the latest. Or maybe it’s next Saturday? Gonna be pretty sweet when these things are up and juicing.
10 Comments on “Uninspired”
Hang in there Pat, good days are just around the corner. Love the picture of Ouest feeding the birds, she looks so grown up and confident.
It’s kinda funny. The pictures of the kids are just that; kids being kids having a good time and playing and doing what kids do. But reading the blog, papa needs a break.
This sir, is why god gave us wine – So we can feel like a kid again, once and a while.
Mark and Cindy
Just curious about how Ouest is taking leaving her new school, only because of the stage she was in when she started. I’m sure she will be fine, she knows the life of making friends and moving on. I moved my kids all around the whole time they were growing up, in spite of conventional wisdom saying it was generally a bad thing, and the result was that they can feel comfortable pretty much anywhere.
But to have combined the start of school and staying in one place this long with that particular age of growing awareness seems like it was more of a major change in her life, so I wondered if she was protesting at all. It sounds like you go back to Mazatlan regularly every year, so that should make it easier for her to leave, knowing she will be coming back again.
Anyway, as I said, I’m sure she will be fine. Both her and Lowe’s ages are such interesting stages of development, they learn and change so quickly. I love reading about them and your family adventures. And good luck with the boat,
The photo of the church is outstanding! Contest worthy.
Hey Pat, I unfortunately think your on the right path engine wise..
I have been reading your posts, but don’t remember if you ever said that your engine has cylinder liners with a rubber gasket or the dry liners. I had a similar problem with one of my marine engines, water in the oil, lots…. and not caused by the usual culprit, the exhaust header, and had good compression, and passed the pressure test with no obvious answer. So where was the blankety blank water coming from??
Pulled the engine out, pulled the pan, wala, drip, drip, drip, from the inside of a cylinder wall, incredibly tiny hairline crack in the cylinder, well below the top of the piston even when it was on the bottom of its stroke, no removable liners so a shortblock ordered.
Here is to hoping that it is just a defective headgasket or something similar on the top end.. hang in there mr. soon to be expert mechanic, and electrician, and plumber, and oh yea, sailor. The one good thing about all this is you will be intimately familiar with all your systems now and that will help you immensely in the future… best of luck….aloha Ron
Ditto – what Ron said. Happy Thanksgiving.
It appears Ron has nailed it, my guess also, chain hoist time.
Paul T
As Ron has suggested, it may be a cracked cylinder liner (if your engine has sleeves) or a crack in the block in one of the cylinder walls. If the latter, depending on how much meat there is in the block, the cylinder can be bored out to accept a pressed in sleeve. The sleeve is then bored to the piston diameter. The machinery and expertise where you are may not be available, though…..
I forgot to mention that a leakdown test of each cylinder would likely point out the culprit.
Hy ,
for solar read this
http://handybobsolar.wordpress.com/
also look at a 12v fridge with Danfross compressor like Novakool
good luck with the engine… and the boat