Andy'sDelight
Petty Officer 1st Class
- Joined
- Apr 5, 2010
- Messages
- 341
I have a large starboard side reserve oil tank that holds at least 4 quarts, maybe more. That feeds the small portside tank on the engine so I don't have to constantly keep filling it. I check it constantly, and there is an alarm if the oil level does get low so I am typically safe from doing any damage. Well, Friday night we were heading out for a night cruise with friends and going to dock up to the restaurant. Things were bad when they showed at my house and immediately locked their keys in the truck accidentally. After taking them back to their house we were finally on our way to the Marina. By the time we got there we were all pretty hungry and still had a half hour water trip to the restaurant. Whe n I boarded I thought to myself I should check the oil, but then thought "nahhhh, there should be plenty" and the alarm will go off if there's any issues. Off in a hurry we went and motored over to the restaurant. Thanks to the delays we didn't get there till after they stopped serving food, so all the way back across the bay we had to go to another restaurant that was still serving dinner.
Well........that's where the trouble came. We undocked and headed back out to sea. I got about a mile or 2 from the restaurant, just west of the Sandy Hook tip and all of the sudden the engine started powering down. I pulled back the throttle and then the motor cut. No alarms, just cut out on me. I tried to restart and 'click'. Nothing. Thinking this might be a drained battery I switched to battery two. Click. Switched to both. Click. Realized all my electronics were working just fine and the spreaders were bright when I turned them on to get a look at the engine. Pulled the cowling and when I did it must have bumped the oil tank a little, just enough to probably jar the level float loose and off goes the low oil alarm. I looked at the portside tank and it was bone dry. Looked in the reserve....bone dry. I added oil to the portside tank and tried to start again, it fired but it was not happy at all. Called TowBoat US and took a nice 1.5 hour tow back to my marina after waiting 45 minutes for them to get to us. We ended up driving 35 minutes each way, 40 minutes to the restaurant on the water, 45 minutes waiting on TowBoat, and hour and a half being towed in, only to then have dinner at 3:30am at the diner about 5 minutes from my house. As for the engine.....two blown cylinders.
Yes the alarm should have gone off and you do count on things to work as a captain. But had I taken the 10 seconds to look at the oil levels before I left and the 2 minutes to replenish it I would have saved myself thousands of dollars. :facepalm:
Well........that's where the trouble came. We undocked and headed back out to sea. I got about a mile or 2 from the restaurant, just west of the Sandy Hook tip and all of the sudden the engine started powering down. I pulled back the throttle and then the motor cut. No alarms, just cut out on me. I tried to restart and 'click'. Nothing. Thinking this might be a drained battery I switched to battery two. Click. Switched to both. Click. Realized all my electronics were working just fine and the spreaders were bright when I turned them on to get a look at the engine. Pulled the cowling and when I did it must have bumped the oil tank a little, just enough to probably jar the level float loose and off goes the low oil alarm. I looked at the portside tank and it was bone dry. Looked in the reserve....bone dry. I added oil to the portside tank and tried to start again, it fired but it was not happy at all. Called TowBoat US and took a nice 1.5 hour tow back to my marina after waiting 45 minutes for them to get to us. We ended up driving 35 minutes each way, 40 minutes to the restaurant on the water, 45 minutes waiting on TowBoat, and hour and a half being towed in, only to then have dinner at 3:30am at the diner about 5 minutes from my house. As for the engine.....two blown cylinders.
Yes the alarm should have gone off and you do count on things to work as a captain. But had I taken the 10 seconds to look at the oil levels before I left and the 2 minutes to replenish it I would have saved myself thousands of dollars. :facepalm:
