Part II: "Narrow Escape" Returns to Long Beach

Ensenada harbor with brush fire smoke visible in center distance.

It was hot in Ensenada on Sunday, April 27. Winds blowing southwest off the desert mountains made the air dirty, fed a huge brush fire southeast of the city, and earlier allowed racers to make it to the finish line of the Newport to Ensenada Race along the shorter shoreline route.

After a lazy brunch on the patio of the Hotel Coral, my three remaining crew and I motored "Narrow Escape" to the hotel marina fuel dock. Geoffrey Vanden Heuvel, our fifth crew member, had arranged a ride back home Sunday morning with a friend who raced down in a trailerable trimaran.

We had arrived with about one-fourth of my 20 gallons of gasoline left, after motoring from Long Beach to Newport Beach, motoring about 10.5 hours during the night, and then another five hours into Ensenada after we decided to abandon the race.

I wanted to calculate my fuel consumption, but it was not to be. The gas pump at the Hotel Coral Marina was broken. (The diesel pump was working). The fuel dock crew gave me a couple of jerry cans and told me to take a taxi to a service station in town. The cover for the vent hole on one can was missing, so I had to stop at four gallons instead of five. As a result I added about nine gallons, which gave me plenty to cover the 66 nm back to U.S. Customs and then to the Shelter Island fuel dock in San Diego.

Everyone has to stop at the Shelter Island police dock and clear customs. It was beautifully organized this year and maybe the new passport rule was part of the reason. Although you can still return to the U.S. from Mexico without a passport, you must show a driver's license and a birth certificate to do so. I gave my crew plenty of warning to get their passports renewed if needed, and did so myself.

The U.S. Customs Master's Oath was supplied in the Skipper's Packet by the Newport Ocean Sailing Association (www.nosa.org) which does an impeccable job of running the Newport to Ensenada Race every year with its all-volunteer committee. The form provided a space to enter each crew member's passport number as well as other identifying information.

With all of us on deck, all that was necessary was to approach the dock, bow first, and hand the customs officer the yellow form. He quickly scanned it and gave the bow a shove to send us on our way. I suspect that we would have had to stop and he'd have come aboard, however, if there had not been a passport number on the form for each of us. Prior to the race I had submitted a crew list, with nationality, to NOSA, and that information had been conveyed to both Mexican and U.S. authorities.

After that mandatory stop, virtually everyone heads for the fuel dock and the short-order eatery upstairs. I then was able to calculate fuel consumption, which had been .67 gal/hr since leaving for the race start.

My tactician, Nate Tucker, left the boat at the fuel dock to meet his wife who drove down to pick him up so he would be home to meet relatives on their way to visit.

After refueling, its either a non-stop bash home or a leisurely cruise. I've opted for the leisurely cruise ever since doing the non-stop bash the first year I entered the race.

For me, that means rounding Point Loma after refueling and spending the night in Mission Bay. Tuesday is a motorsail to Dana Point for the night. Then back to Long Beach on Wednesday. This year I had a slip reservation at Marina Village in Mission Bay and a guest side tie at Dana West Yacht Club the following night. DWYC is dark on Tuesday nights. But nearby Dana Point Yacht Club is open for its Taco Tuesday night, and boy was that delicious.

A highlight of the Mission Bay stay was seeing my long-time friends, Bob Dickson and his wife, Elsa. I've known Bob since junior high school and we've shared many adventures, and a couple of boats. They drove me and my two remaining crew, Hobby Hobson and Pax Starksen, to a great dining spot in San Diego's Old Town district. The Dickson's had been at their Ensenada condo on Saturday watching the boats stream in all day, wondering which one was mine. It was fun to be able to show it off to them up close.

The Sunday night motorsail up from Ensenada had been pretty easy. It was even warm at times when the offshore wind reached us. We stood watches of two hours on and two hours off, with a new person coming on watch every hour to break up the monotony.

The only excitement of the return trip came just as I was coming on watch at 2 am. Hobby was in the cockpit and making a 20-degree course change to starboard to follow our planned route up the Baja California coast. He punched the 10-degree button twice on the Raymarine ST2000+ tiller autopilot and it "exploded". The piston shot to port and kept going, falling out of the unit body to the cockpit sole. The boat did a wild turn before it was brought under control.

No problem. I have an older version of the same auto pilot as a backup. It was quickly put in place and cockpit life returned to normal.

I later discovered that all that happened was that the control shaft somehow had unscrewed itself inside the autopilot housing. I screwed it back in place tightly. It tested perfectly and I expect many more years of trouble-free service.

Autopilot disassembled. "Exploding" shaft is beside the uncovered unit.

Stainless shaft had unscrewed from bronze driver

Autopilot fixed

Pax left the boat in Mission Bay on Tuesday and Hobby and I made the rest of the trip, all in daylight hours, alone.

There were a couple of exciting episodes, however.

Late Tuesday afternoon, the outboard suddenly lost rpm and began running rough. I looked back and saw the oil pressure warning light glowing bright red.

Immediately shutting off the engine, I found it fairly easy to stretch out well beyond the stern pulpit, remove the engine cowling and pull the dip stick out for inspection. No sign of oil on it. I carried extra oil. The oil filler plug is at the rear of the engine. It is about an inch in diameter and it was possible to pour oil into the filler hole without spilling. I stopped a couple of times to check the level with the dip stick. I was surprised to find that the oil sump took the full 800 milliliters of oil that is the engine's specified capacity. The outboard restarted immediately, idled normally, and ran fine after that.

I have chosen to call this event an environmentally-friendly oil change. It is done by running the engine dry so that a full change of oil can be poured in.

Joking aside, I'm more than a little impressed that the Tohatsu was able to make use of every last drop of oil before it signaled its distress. Signal is what it did, too. Reading the owner's manual later I found that in case of low oil pressure, even intermittently, it slows and runs rough to get the operator's attention. Sure worked for me.

What I don't know, is where the oil went. I had checked it in Ensenada, but may not have wiped the dipstick and replaced it for an accurate check. The oil level was fine again in Dana Point the morning after this incident, and again the next afternoon when we reached Long Beach, a total of about five more hours of operation.

During the race we had been bothered with difficulty unfurling the jib. Each time I found that the furling line had jumped out of its drum guard and wrapped around the top of the drum. It was easy to clear at the bow of the boat, however, and I didn't try to fix it until we got to Mission Bay.

I decided that the furling line fairlead attached to a leg of the bow pulpit had loosened and worked itself too high. So I moved it down and put a hose clamp around the stanchion leg above it to prevent recurrence.

We didn't use the jib until Wednesday, however. That was when Hobby and I attempted to unfurl it and it jammed tightly on the drum and couldn't be budged. The jib was only part way unfurled.

This time I read the furler manual before "fixing" it. I had put the fairlead far to low on the stanchion.

Equipped with a set of metric allen head wrenches and screwdrivers for the hose clamp and the fairlead I made my way to the bow, which was bouncing in boisterous wind-driven seas. Opposing machine screws secured the two-piece line guard to the base of the drum, not far off the deck of the bow. The manual had cautioned that the screws were "not captive", meaning that they would fall out when loosened and probably be lost.

I carefully unscrewed one and put it securely in my jeans pocket. As soon as I started loosening the other, the guard fell from the drum. The second screw still held the two parts together, but I discovered that I could manipulate them enough to remove the guard from drum and unwind the furling line that had taken three very tight wraps around the bottom of the shaft that held the drum in place.

The allen screws are visible at bottom of the furler drum guard. The guard had been mounted too low on the drum, allowing the line to squeeze above or below it and jump out of drum.

Improperly positioned fairlead initially forced line to wrap at top of drum and then pop out of guard. After I first repositioned it by guessing the proper position, it directed the line to wrap at the bottom of the drum and then jump out and wrap tightly underneath drum. Photo shows proper position, with hose clamps added top and bottom to keep it secured.

Soon enough, the furler was in perfect working order, and I was back in the cockpit with all my tools still aboard the boat. Maybe next time I'll remember to look at the instructions while the boat is tied motionless in a slip before I "fix" something.

Part 1: "Narrow Escape" Goes to Ensenada

A photo album of the race and return trip can be viewed at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Ericson.NarrowEscape/NewportToEnsenada2008.

I entered my first Newport to Ensenada Race in 2003. It was a windy race and I finished in about 22:47 in the cruising gennaker class. The following two years were slower, but great compared to the last three years. My slowest time was about 26:49.

The significance of those earlier races was that they all were Saturday afternoon finishes. It was easy to have dinner in town while the sun was still shining. That was in my previous boat, a 1986 Cal 33, which was a faster boat than "Narrow Escape", but not hugely faster.

I entered my Ericson 30 in 2005 and dropped out after four hours and about four miles sailed. About 20% of the entrants gave up that year. Last year I was refinishing the boat and missed an even slower race in which about half the entrants failed to finish.

This year, about 19% again failed to make it, and I was among them.

We drifted across the start line at 0.2 kts. under a nylon windseeker jib and mainsail. We were the first or second boat across, but we weren't moving. The eventual winner, Fair Havens, a Newport 28, headed offshore farther than nearly everyone else and disappeared. Meanwhile we got the Ericson moving and stayed ahead of the rest of the 10 boats that started in our cruising non-spinnaker class. I was particularly pleased at our growing lead against the only other original model Ericson 30 in the race.

By late afternoon we had passed the latitude of Dana Point and the San Onofre nuclear power plant and were doing 5-6 kts. We also were trending west of the rhumb line course, and even west of a course to take us a couple miles outside the North Coronado Island.

But by 8:32 pm the wind had mostly died and we were down to 1-2 kts. The cruising class allows engine use between the hours of 8 pm and 8 am, not to exceed 12 hours total for the race. The penalty works out to about two minutes for every minute under power, which is added to the corrected time calculated on the boat's PHRF rating. It seems a worthwhile tradeoff when motoring is more than twice as fast as sailing.

But a quick review of past race results will reveal that the winners of cruising classes sail the whole race.

I had another consideration. My crew of five was larger than the number of berths available. In fact, I thought that two people would have to sleep in the cockpit because the v-berth up front seemed more suited to two people who wanted to maintain contact all night than for a couple of guys who value having their own space.

Thus in early February I was able to reserve a suite at the Hotel Coral, which conveniently also had a marina in which I intended to tie up rather than anchor inside Ensenada harbor. There is a two-night minimum on weekend room reservations. With tax, that woujld total a little over $400 US. So I had a strong economic incentive to get to Ensenada in time to enjoy my expensive hotel room.

We were able to stop the engine and raise it out of the water in the wee hours of Saturday morning for 1:05 hours of sailing at 4-5 kts. Then the wind disappeared and we restarted the engine.

Things didn't improve much after the mandatory 8 am sail-only cut-off. It wasn't until mid-morning that we were able to get above 2 kts., but it didn't last long. The wind died. Wind ruffles teased us on the water nearby, but seldom developed into anything useful.

Eventually, with me at the tiller, we did an uncontrolled (and uncommanded, I insist) 360-degree turn while the knotmeter indicated 0.0 kts.

Finally at about 1 pm Saturday and about 26 miles from Ensenada, I exercised my authority and decided we were dropping out and motoring the rest of the way. I did have support among the crew, but not enthusiastic support and maybe not universal support. There was no move to mutiny, however. Thankfully. I had allowed them to keep their riggers knives and it could have been ugly.

As we motored toward Ensenada, of course, the wind grew boisterous. It was windy where it isn't supposed to be windy according to race lore. That was along the shore, which has a reputation for being a graveyard. Some boats were sailing hard through that graveyard heeled strongly to starboard from the offshore, Santa Ana-like wind blowing down off the mountains north of Ensenada.

Meanwhile, we noticed that boats that did manage to struggle out to Todos Santos Island, from whence experienced skippers typically make their approach to the finish line, seemed not to be moving.

We arrived at the Hotel Coral Marina before sunset and had a good dinner in town at the Mahi Mahi restaurant.

Afterward, we sat on the fifth-floor balcony of my room and watched an endless stream of sailboats make their ways to the finish. Some were moving smartly. Some barely moved. We felt confident that it would have been sometime Sunday morning before we had arrived had we stayed in the race.

Just a Great Day

The ocean surface was alive with fish, birds and dolphins last Friday as a couple of crewmembers for the upcoming Newport to Ensenada race and I made an outboard engine endurance run to Avalon. Getting back from Ensenada later this month is going to require upwards of 25 hours of motorsailing. I wanted to assure myself--and my crew--that the engine was properly fixed after being trolled through the waves for a half-hour last month.

Our motorsail to Avalon was flawless. It was even better than that because we were treated to special sights that seem to happen mostly in the spring.

The run began under low clouds and a temperature barely into the 50s, but with dry decks as we left the slip at 8:00 a.m. We weren't far beyond the Long Beach outer harbor breakwater when large boils of bait-sized fish began erupting on the glassy sea all around us. Some were dozens of feet across and one or two may have been a half-acre in size. Larger predators below were probably driving these small fish to the surface in frantic efforts to survive. As we watched, squadrons of sea birds homed in to get their share from above.

As that spectacle ended, another began. A pod of dolphins leaped into view through the waves and soon groups were surfing our bow wave on either side of the boat, stacked one above another as well as side by side. They looked a little larger than us, perhaps six to eight feet long. Many had long scars on their backs from other encounters with something hard. Occasionally one would hit the side of the hull with a bang and veer away.

My experience has been that such encounters are rare and that they don't last very long. So I watched from amidships while my mates, Hobby and Nate, went to the bow for a better view.

After awhile I remembered that I had a camcorder in the cabin and I went to get it, hoping that I would still be able to get a little video. I need not have worried. The first group probably stayed with us for seven or eight minutes before getting bored.

Then, which has never happened to me before, we soon came across another large pod and they altered course to come take up escort positions at the bow. They stayed about as long as the first group and were replaced later by yet another group of dolphins. By this time I had taken up station at the bow and was so fascinated watching them that sometimes I forgot to press the record button. Still, I ended up with a lot of video.


After perhaps a half hour, all the dolphins were behind us and we retreated to the cockpit, seeking the protection of the new dodger and letting the autopilot handle the tiller duties. We talked about how cold it was and how much colder it will be on the overnight Ensenada Race, and the overnight motorsail back to San Diego afterwards.

The gray sky and gray sea merged into a seamless dome of gray that surrounded us. About 15 miles out from Avalon, Nate said he could see the east end of Catalina Island. But I couldn't, and he wasn't quite as sure that he had seen it. In another mile or so, however, it was clearly visible. At 10 miles out we were proclaiming that we could see the landmark round Casino building. Or maybe it was the condos spilling down the hillside above Hamilton Cove.

Originally we talked about trying to get a mooring in Avalon for a couple hours and take the shoreboat to town for lunch. But Nate had another idea: if I'd get him back home by 7:00 p.m., I could join him and Barbara for dinner out that evening.

Thus it was that at about 12:30 p.m. we were within a mile or two of Avalon, the wind was calm and the seas were smooth. So we stopped the engine and retreated to the warmth of the cabin for lunch while letting the boat drift as it wished. Amid sandwiches, chips, onion dip and chocolate chip cookies, we made periodic checks for traffic, and noted that the boat made at least two lazy 360-degree turns under the lifeless main sail. It was once again pointed at Avalon when we returned to the cockpit.

With no discernible wind, it was a perfect setting for doing an inaugural test of my new light-wind sail, a "windseeker".

Hobby and Nate were part of my Ensenada Race crew two years ago when we sailed only four miles in the first four hours after the start and I decided to drop out and motored us back to Long Beach.

With that embarrassing performance in mind, I talked to sailmaker Harry Pattison this January about how to improve my performance "if I could buy just one new sail".

He recommended the windseeker, which is made of 3/4 ounce spinnaker nylon, but is shaped like a jib, not a spinnaker. It is red, orange, yellow and blue in a pattern that I chose, so it certainly dresses up my boat, which does not have a spinnaker or the gear to fly one.


The windseeker comes stuffed in a bag with a snap shackle fastened on the bottom, which is actually the tack point for the sail. It clips onto a shackle attached on the bow just behind my jib furling drum. The luff of the sail contains a cord that serves as the sail's own forestay when it is hoisted on a spare halyard.

The colorful sail instantly proved its worth. With no apparent breeze it quickly got the boat moving at three knots and we head back for Long Beach.

Our timing was perfect. Within five minutes there was enough wind to roll out the working jib on the furler and retrieve the windseeker. We were up to five knots right away as the afternoon seabreeze began building from the southwest. By the time we were half way back across the San Pedro Channel, we were consistently in the 6-6.5 knot range and the sun was shining. It was still hazy and cold, but it was a wonderful sail home. We made it in about four hours, which gave us a lot of anticipation of a great performance in this year's Ensenada Race.

It's been a windy winter and spring this year. I'm telling myself that it's time for another windy Ensenada Race, since the last two were light wind drifters.

Big Weekend

It was a big weekend for Narrow Escape. On Saturday, it was the committee boat for the first race of the season to be hosted by my club, Little Ships Fleet Yacht Club, and I was the Principal Race Officer.

Then on Sunday, the club hosted its Opening Day ceremonies, and Narrow Escape, proudly decorated, was tied at the center of the Long Dock to takes its place in our planned afternoon boat parade.

Our Saturday race was named the Murray Gordon Memorial, after a long-time member of our 71-year-old club who passed away. It was the second race of the season in the nine-race Long Beach Harbor Invitational series that is sponsored by three clubs, each club responsible for separate races.

The wind was 5-6 knots out of the southeast as we gave separate starts to three classes, sending them on courses of 10.6 nm and 11.6 nm. By the time they finished three to three and a half hours later it was in the upper teens and building, having clocked around toward the southwest.

It took three men on the bow to wrestle the Bruce anchor out of the sticky clay bottom of the harbor. That put the boat bow down, and the outboard bounced in and out of the 1-2 foot chop as I asked the remaining two crew members to stand at the stern to try to get the engine to spend more time in the water. Once the foredeck crew secured the anchor and rode at the bow and moved aft, the boat motored well through the building conditions as we returned to Alamitos Bay.

I spent the night aboard at my slip and awakened to drizzle, threatening skies and cool temperatures. After dressing the boat with strings of signal flags and colored pennants, I motored over to the Long Dock and assisted with preparations for our midday ceremonies.

Decorated and ready to go to Opening Day

We are a club without a club house, a so-called paper club, existing mainly as a venue for official entry into sanctioned yacht races, and bi-monthly dinner meetings of our members as guests at facilities of larger clubs. We do claim as part of our long history, however, a substantial contribution to the origins of the PHRF racing handicap system for sailboats.

Our only facility is a storage shed, leased from the city-owned marina, where we store our racing equipment, our barbeque for after-race festivities, and the paraphernalia we use once a year to convert the adjacent marina parking lot into an outdoor yacht club for our opening day ceremony.

The setting is far more glorious than it sounds. This small section of parking lot is set near a point on Alamitos Bay. The point itself is bordered with the grass lawn and white picket fence of the Navy Yacht Club of Long Beach, where we set up our luncheon tables. Beyond is the small bay itself, bordered by docks full of large yachts on the east, and fine homes of the Long Beach Peninsula and Naples Island on the south and west. In the distance between the two rises San Pedro Hill. And, of course, boats of all sizes are plying the water in between.

It is, however, subject to the weather of the day. On Sunday, that weather was cool, mostly cloudy, and blustery. Speakers had to take care their notes did not blow away. But it was dry. Forecast rain failed to appear.

The opening was well attended by flag officers from other clubs, large and small, and our own members. Our officers were introduced to canon salutes simulated by 12-gauge shotgun blanks, and a pair of pipers played a couple of stirring numbers, finishing with Amazing Grace. Afterwards, perfectly-grilled hamburgers were served on paper plates. As the burgers were consumed it became more and more difficult to keep the plates on the tables.

In the end, the boat parade was cancelled as whitecaps driven across Alamitos Bay by winds upwards of 20 knots pinned the eight-boat fleet hard against each other and the Long Dock.

Extricating the boats from that lee shore was skillfully handled by a combination of crews manning boat hooks from adjacent boats, pushing bows off while others kept stern lines tight, and skippers gunned their engines. The light Santa Cruz 27, a class-winner Saturday, powered by a small 2.5 hp outboard managed to avoid scraping the newly-painted Cal 40, a 2005 Transpac veteran. The Ranger 26 got cleanly away from its sidetie to the J-30, and the J-30 escaped unharmed from alongside the Mirage K-30. The Catalina 310 stepped smartly away from the side of the Ericson 38.

Finally it was Narrow Escape's turn. Three helpers walked her forward along the dock to the end. With a shove at the bow, a tug on the stern line and a healthy dose of forward throttle, she left the dock unscathed and soon was tied quietly in her slip once again.

A yachting season which never ends in Southern California had symbolically begun once more.

A Dodger

I watch while Dan Loggans, right, owner of Harbor Custom Canvas, measures for a new dodger.

Narrow Escape has survived 39 years and who knows how many owners without a dodger. But these last few weeks, while I was wrestling with problems of keeping my outboard firmly attached to the transom, Narrow Escape was being fitted with a dodger.

The engine problem is now solved. A new carburetor restored the Tohatsu outboard to its normal smooth, quiet, powerful self, after its recent ocean dunking. And then a new oil pressure sensor switch turned off the red low oil pressure warning light that came on and stayed on while I was out testing the new carburetor.

That episode was only slightly traumatic. I knew the engine was full of new oil and it didn't sound like an engine consuming its innards for lack of lubrication. Never-the-less, I did make for the nearby fuel dock where I tied up and called the repair shop for reassurance before motoring back to my slip.

I've owned several boats in the past that came with dodgers when I bought them. I always appreciated their protection, while also noting that dodgers can make it more cumbersome to see forward and to move forward.

But it was time for Narrow Escape to have a dodger. She's entered in the Newport Beach-to-Ensenada race later this month and a dodger would make the bash back north after the race so much more endurable, especially since the longest leg, from Ensenada to San Diego, will be motorsailed at night.

Since I had never bought a dodger before, I didn't really know what was involved, nor how expensive they are. I solicited three bids and found that the fastest response and lowest price came from the company whose label is on most of the dodgers in my marina, Harbor Custom Canvas of Long Beach.

It took about a month from start to finish, and it involved a surprising amount of hands-on, at the boat effort.

The first step was a two-man team who came to measure the boat and talk about exactly what I wanted. That resulted about 10 days later with another visit by the same team (which included the company's owner) to install the dodger frame.

Far from being a mere spectator to the installation of a pre-manufactured item, I was a participant in the custom installation of a made-to-fit frame. I wanted it installed farther forward on the cabin than initially proposed. That minimized obstruction of the cockpit by the side curtains, and also allowed the canopy to cover the entire companionway hatch slide. Thus the front of the dodger could fasten to a molded fiberglass lip on the cabin ahead of the hatch area. I also was able to keep the canopy lower so that it would never interfere with the low boom on the Ericson 30. I can see easily over the top while standing and steering with the tiller and through it with plenty of protection while seated.

Teak strips had to be installed on either side of the cabin top to attach the outboard fastners for the isinglass front. And teak wedges were fabricated to match the curve of the cabin at the outer edges, supporting the teak strips.

The frame was left in place, secured with straps, for me to live with for a few days to ensure that it was properly placed before the fabric was fitted.

When I say fitted, that's what I mean. The team next showed up with a wide swath of Pacific Blue Sunbrella cloth and tailor's chalk. They laid the cloth on the frame and marked it up much the way a tailor would fit me for a suit.

About a week later the cloth top of the canopy and the isinglass front section were installed, along with the two vertical posts near each rear corner of the cabin that make the frame rigid and able to serve as a secure handhold for moving in and out of the cockpit. Wide cutouts on either side of the rear frame provide the aft handholds. Curved stainless bars were later mounted fore and aft along each side of the dodger as handholds for walking forward along the deck.

The last portions of the dodger to be installed, a few days later, were the removable side isinglass panels and the covers for all the isinglass segments.

New dodger offers excellent visibility forward, and easy deck access.

In our original discussions at the boat I was adamant about wanting maximum visibility out of the dodger and they did a beautiful job of meeting my demand. The sunbrella borders that are necessary to secure the isinglass panels are barely larger than the teak and fiberglass strips to which they are secured. I find there is no reduction in forward visibility compared to having no dodger.

Looking sharp all buttoned up.

Similar care was taken when they made the remaining pieces of my order. I bought weather cloths for each side of the boat, which fasten over the lifelines running from the rear cockpit gate hooks to the mid-cabin stanchions. They'll work well while motorsailing home from Ensenada by reducing the amount of spray that reaches the cockpit over the sides. I didn't intend them for sailing, however, because they fit too close to the sheet winches to allow the winch handles to be used.

Other tidbits include a new sail cover and a companionway cover. The latter will put an end to an occasional rain leak at the junction of the hatch slide and the folding companionway door. The sail cover replaces the ancient battered cover that worked okay when it protected the thin, ultra-pliable original main on the boat when I bought it. After I bought a new main I had to sew a canvas extension along the bottom of that cover to make it big enough to go around the new sail.

Perhaps it was that experience that convinced me I should never ever try to make my own dodger. Or a new mainsail cover, for that matter.

A Little Overkill Never Hurts (updated)

Engine on its new mount

My goal was to never have my outboard mount break again, so I came up with the most indestructible unit I could think of, that I could make and afford to make. It began with a block of teak 1-7/8-inch thick by 11-11/16 by 11-1/2 inches. It was what I could buy at H&L Marine, Inc., which is a manufacturer of teak joinery for boats.

Unlike the Honduras mahogany block that split apart, the new teak block is large enough that I could mount it with the grain running vertically. Probably that was all I would need to do, but I studied the grain pattern and kept imagining how it might break vertically.

At first I thought I could prevent that by adding horizontal aluminum straps under the bolts on the back side of the teak. I had some aluminum stock 2-1/2 inches wide and 1/4 inch thick, which I cut to the proper width.

But then I saw that I also had some 1/8-inch aluminum sheet that was 11 inches wide. There was enough to cut into two 11-inch by 11-11/16-inch plates with which I could completely sandwich the teak block. I couldn't imagine any way such a unit could break. It also had the added benefit that the engine clamps could not dig into the wood and eventually loosen. I oiled the teak liberally and repeatedly for a day before installing it.

Teak block, on its side, and aluminum plates

The news on the engine was initially very good. The dealer reported that it was fine, having required only a two-hour labor charge to clean the starter assembly, the oil sensor and the carburetor. I was told it then started easily and ran fine in their test tank.

However, when I installed it on my new engine mount assembly, it was hard to start and then it wouldn't idle. Eventually I did get it to run pretty well, although there was some uneveness, and ran it in gear for about an hour, with the boat tied up in the slip.

But the next day, it balked at starting again, and wouldn't run at idle.

I took the engine back to the dealer today. The mechanic verified in the test tank that it would start and then die, and refused to idle. I then watched him remove and dismantle the carburetor. The bowl was coated with gray crud and the idle jet was plugged. I suspect one or more of the tiny drilled passages were also plugged. It is impossible to see through them even when they are clean.

I suggested that the carb cleaning I had paid for last week was never done, which drew a threat from another worker to throw me and my engine out of the building. As it was, I was ordered out of the work area. But not before the mechanic was able to demonstrate to me that the carburetor metal was still being dissolved by salt that had impregnated the metal during the dousing. I could literally see the light gray patina reforming after being washed with solvent, dried and scraped clean.

In a determined but losing effort, the mechanic persisted in trying to clean the carburetor and eventually reinstalled it and had the engine running. I was then invited to the back of the shop to witness the successful repair. But, then the engine died and was very difficult to restart. When it did, it wouldn't idle.

I returned to the front of the shop and ordered a new carburetor. I wish that I had been told from the outset to buy a new carb. It costs about the same as the two hours labor spent today trying to fix it. But I guess every case is different, and they were trying to save me some money to start with. As it is, we all end up a little unhappy with each other and I don't yet know who is paying the cost of today's failed effort.

The simple lesson I'm happy to pass along is that if you ever find salt water in your carburetor, throw it away and buy a new one.

At 100 pounds, with a 25-inch shaft and all the complexity of remote controls, it is not a simple matter to remove the engine and take to the dealer. I have it worked out so that I can do it all by myself, however, thanks to my engine hoist accessory for my radar mast, and a hand truck that I modified into an engine carrier with plywood for the mounting clamps and iron pipes that extend forward at the bottom to hold the hand truck upright when the engine is attached.

I was very glad for the assistance offered by a slip neighbor this morning, however, so that I did not have to wrestle it from the hoist to the hand truck. Nor did I have to pull it by myself up the steep gangway to shore at low tide.

And, once again, I was able to remove the push-pull cable fittings, the electrical connections and the battery cable without dropping anything into the water, nor falling in myself. When I raved in an earlier post about how convenient an outboard was compared to the old inboard, that was when I assumed that all I had to do was install it once and likely never have to take it off again.

Unwelcome Opportunity

Those pesky laws of unintended consequences aligned last Saturday to add some drama to my blog. As a matter of fact, they ruined my weekend. It remains to be seen what else is ruined.

It was a little after 2 p.m., with a light wind out of the southwest. I was motoring out of the Alamitos Bay channel in Long Beach, which is created by two parallel rock jettys. I followed my usual drill, hoisting the mainsail as I slowly motored into the wind while inside the small bay, adjacent the ritzy peninsula and Naples Island real estate. The tiller autopilot steered while I tugged at the main halyard at the mast, since I was alone onboard.

In fact, I had just exited the channel and turned ESE toward the Huntington Beach coastline, when I heard the engine suddenly cavitate and continue to run at high rpm. I looked back and could no longer see the top of the outboard behind the transom. I pulled the remote control throttle/shifter to idle neutral and went to the back of the boat to see what happened.

The thick mahogany plank I had used to make a shorter engine mounting block on my outboard bracket had split in two horizontally. The top half was firmly gripped by the screw clamps of the motor, which was now lying on its side in the water. It was being held to the boat by a Master Lock cable lock that was stretched straight, as well as the battery cable that exited near the top of the transom.


I was about 100 feet off the eastern jetty of the channel, which was now my lee shore. The main was close-hauled and filled, but the boat wasn't really moving. I remember looking at the knotmeter and seeing 0.0 on the display.

Just a few minutes earlier the red Vessel Assist towboat had passed me inbound to the bay, and it wasn't towing anybody. I reached for the cockpit-mounted VHF radio microphone/speaker unit and tried to hail them. "Vessel Assist, Vessel Assist, this is Narrow Escape. Over." What I heard back was loud static. I remembered hearing this earlier before leaving the slip. Someone on Channel 16 seemed to have a stuck mike and no communications were getting through.

I changed the trim of the main to try to get moving and wondered if the cockpit mike was interfering with the main set mounted inside the companionway. I unscrewed its cord from the receptacle and went forward to the main radio to continue trying to reach Vessel Assist.

I've listened to both sides of these conversations hundreds of times over the years. There's a lot of back and forth. Usually the dispatcher answers and asks if you are in any immediate danger and other defining questions, such as whether you are a Vessel Assist member, how many people are aboard, description of vessel, etc. I looked at the jetty. It seemed to still be about 100 feet away and I still didn't seem to be moving.

Only later, as I write this, would I realize what an effective sea anchor I was dragging along behind me.

It is the skipper of the Vessel Assist boat Alamitos who answers me; the boat that had passed me earlier. "I'm in no immediate danger", I tell him, looking again at the ever-present jetty. But I'm gonna be pretty quick if I don't get outta here, I'm telling myself.

We switch to Channel 78. The skipper of the Alamitos says he'll reach me in about five minutes. The dispatcher comes on and I read him my member number, which I had long ago written with a Sharpie on the fiberglass headliner behind the VHF radio.

I reach back and punch in a 10-degree turn to port on the autopilot and try to get the boat moving. The jetty is a little farther away. I walk back and look at the new engine. It is still horizontal in the water and about half submerged. The cable lock seems to be holding. The broken, wet mahogany is a beautiful red-brown contrast to the black engine and blue-green ocean.

Usually I wear a self-inflating life vest when I go sailing alone. I started that several years ago when I began thinking that I would be very sad to fall overboard and watch my boat sail away under autopilot. At least with a life jacket on, there would be a chance of watching another boat approach and pick me up. But I didn't put on my life vest this day. And now, in the fog of this little bit of an emergency, I felt I couldn't take the time to go below and forward to the v-berth where I kept the life vest.

It never occured to me to open the cockpit locker a foot away and take out one of the eight Coast Guard-approved flotation vests or orange three-segment life preservers sitting right there.

Thus I wasn't wearing any life-saving equipment when the Alamitos pulled up on my lee and I went forward to the bouncing bow to try to catch and attach the towline. The seas are always more confused near the channel mouth and were in the 1-3-foot range. When a boat is moving, that's not much motion to deal with. But when two boats are nearly motionless, its something like two people making uncoordinated jumps on a big trampoline.

I missed catching the first towline heave. The skipper had to manuever his boat before he could try again. As his stern backed toward my bow, I feared we would collide. He assured me that we wouldn't. But he had to stay at the helm a bit longer to make good on that promise, by which time we were drifting apart again. I did catch the one-inch yellow polypropolene line this time and clamped the large caribiner through the center hole of my bow cleat.

But the line was behind the forward bow pulpit leg and would have to be moved before the tow could begin. The jetty was slightly further away. The line was taut now, and I couldn't move it. I waited for the boats to bounce through the waves closer together. Then I repositioned the line and made it secure.

The Alamitos skipper towed me into the wind and I wrestled the main sail down, trying to flake it as best I could. The lazy jacks helped. I went below for a single sail tie and returned to make it fast around the forward part of the sail. I did that two more times until the sail was secure and I told the skipper I was ready.

"Dead slow", I hollered.

I went aft and for the first time tried to pull the engine head up by the cable lock. I managed about six inches. And where were the third and fourth hands I'd need if I could raise it high enough. I let it drop back into the sea. In the time between radioing for help and waiting for the tow boat, I had retrieved the four-part Garhauer hoist from the other cockpit locker and attached it to the fittings on my radar mast at the stern. Now its hook swung dangerously back and forth at the stern. The engine was not going to be picked up out here in the ocean.

Nor was I going to be towed "dead slow". The twin-diesel towboat of about 25 feet in length, couldn't idle that slowly, nor did it have any steerage. The pace turned out to be in the 3.5 to 4-knot range as we made our way down the channel. And it wasn't a particularly pretty sight. Even though the autopilot was now on "standby" and held the tiller firmly amidships, Narrow Escape did not obediently follow the tow boat.

My bow yawed one way and the Alamitos' stern yawed the other. We seemed to be lurching toward the shoal spot in the channel and it was almost low tide. I hollered that my draft was five feet. He shouted back that we had 13 feet under us. I pointed at the shoal ahead and he said he'd take care of me. Later, I was ashamed of myself. He does this everyday for a living, and I'm trying to tell him what to do. Obviously, he'd heard it all before and graciously didn't tell me to shut up.

By now we were in calm water. Finally I decided to detach the autopilot and steer my boat to try to counteract the yawing, some of which must have been from the outboard strapped sideways to my transom. It worked great and we made the last several hundred yards into the bay in proper nose to tail fashion.

Once inside, a smaller Vessel Assist boat came out to meet us, and the Alamitos told me to remove the tow line. I drifted while the two Vessel Assist skippers transferred between the boats. My rescuer, Darcy, then came alongside in the smaller boat, about 18 or 20 feet, and lashed my boat to his.

Next we motored to a city dock, where he put me gently against the dock and another co-worker joined us. He stepped onto my extended, empty outboard bracket at the stern and reached down and attached the hook of my hoist to the outboard. I hauled it up and ran the clamps in as far as they would go, under the stern pulpit rail. Then I secured the engine some more with a length of line and we began the final part of the journey to my slip.

Darcy guided Narrow Escape down its marina fairway, spun it part way around and backed its stern against one finger of my slip where I could climb off and pull the boat in by hand, stern first so that I could work on the engine from the dock.

With the boat secure in its slip and a semblance of calm beginning to settle over me, I looked down at the engine controls and noticed that the ignition key was turned off. I have no memory of doing that when I throttled the engine back after if fell off.

I already knew why it broke off. I had mounted the mahogany plank with the grain running horizontal instead of vertical. It broke along a horizontal line between the two upper bolt holes that attached it to the outboard bracket. I did use large diameter washers. The force of the break bent the tops of those washers. What if instead I had fashioned a couple of U-shaped reinforcements from hardware store aluminum strap to clamp the wood front and back against the bracket.

What if I had used plywood instead of a single thick piece of mahogany.

As to why I mounted the grain horizontal. Simple. The plank from which the piece was cut was only 10 1/2 inches wide. The outboard bracket needed a piece 11 3/4 inches wide to straddle the two mounting flanges. The wood I bought wouldn't fit with the grain vertical.


The Tohatsu owner's manual says take a submerged engine immediately to the dealer. If that can't be done, remove the sparkplugs and pull the engine through with the starter cord to expel water in the cylinders. None was apparent when I removed the plugs, but some spray was visible when I pulled the cord repeatedly. Pour engine oil into the sparkplug holes. I didn't have any way to do that, so I sprayed lots of WD-40 into them. Change the engine oil. There was some emulsified water-oil mix, but not much.

The manual made no mention of draining the carburetor. Sunday I finally realized that the brass screw on the flat plate on the outside of the carb was the drain plug. Water came out. I also bought an oil pump can and pumped oil into the upper cylinders. Then I had to figure out how to secure cloths around a couple of places along the engine shaft assembly to keep oil drops from falling into the water.

Next stop. The Tohatsu dealer.