From Proti and the high winds we did a short motor to Ormos Navarino that is a large bay (about 4nm long) near Pilos. There were a few Greek/Italian flags near monuments (I assume to people killing each other heroically) and there was a Turkish castle near the opening of the bay, so safe to say this place has seen a lot of interesting times.
Around this time the wonderful reliable Onan Generator started acting up. It would start, run a bit and then stop. I can still charge my batteries with the main engine (redundancy is always good), but the generator is much more efficient. A week or so ago I had noticed a water-leak from the water-pump and I had ordered a replacement (500 euros) and a few replacement impellers (90 euros each for rubber!!!). I thought I had a spare impeller but it was for the main engine. The water leak seemed to stop (weird) but I was going to replace the pump anyway…..it is only 2 bolts and I was confident I could do it myself. ANYWAY the Generator was now stopping and gave a code 36 (engine stopped by itself), then when I tried it again a code 41 (can’t see output from stator) then a 36 then a 41 again and finally always showing a 41.
I noticed the oil was very cloudy looking so I changed the oil and the oil filter. I had an oil extraction pump that was made of crappy plastic and barely worked and leaked and it was horrible pumping out all the oil and I got oil everywhere……so when it was done the pump went into the garbage with all the oil rags (I’ve ordered a good german one ;-).
To get help we decided to go to Kalamata which is a fairly large port and has marine services available. When we were just over half-way up the bay to Kalamata we heard our first PAN PAN over the radio. (If you don’t know PAN PAN is an urgent situation but not life threatening….MAYDAY is a life-threatening emergency.)
In Greece you need to monitor channel 12 (apparently used by Greece for emergencies) and channel 16 (general emergency channel). The message was first in Greek and then in English. There were 2 people on a sailboat with a failed engine and they were taking on water and needed a tow. They gave the GPS coordinates which I quickly looked up and they were south of us but outside the bay so too far away for us to help. (There are lots of boats around so I’m sure they were OK).
Finally we got to Kalamata. We had to hover with our boat in a small spot waiting to find out where to park which is always fun…..but there was no wind or current and not such a big deal. Kalamata is great, but first a bit more about the problem.
The generator is scary looking, but after going through the parts manual I generally understand how it works. It is a diesel engine connected to a rotor/stator to generate electricity (magnet through coils of wire) connected to a computer/circuit board that monitors everything and controls everything. Not so bad when you break it apart into logical pieces.
My Amel expert thought the problem was the governor (about 800 euros)….which is an electrically controlled rod that is moved to control the flow of diesel to control the speed of the engine to generate the required amount of electricity. The Greek Onan rep thought it was the computer/control board (about 1900 euros). Around this time I noticed that one of the grounding straps had corroded and was not connected to anything so I connected it but that didn’t help.
By this time the generator would turn over but no longer start, so I called a local Kalamata guy who came with a diesel mechanic. The diesel guy pops down into the engine room and starts messing around. He is immediately suspicious of water in the engine and asks me when I had changed the oil (a few days ago). I watch as he pulls apart the fuel system.
Diesel engines are sort of simple, but one of the complex parts is the fuel injection system. The engine compresses air in a cylinder (makes it hot enough to ignite fuel) and when it is under this high pressure it injects the fuel which must be at an even higher pressure which then immediately ignites. I can’t remember exactly the pressure but if you mess with these pumps and run them when they are pointing at you they will inject diesel into your body and you can die. So they are to be respected.
The diesel guy unscrews all the steel fuel lines from the cylinders and the fuel injectors (I would have been scared to mess with these) and takes the pump off and shows me how it works. There are 3 rounded pistons at the bottom that are mechanically pushed up by a camshaft as the engine turns and this pressurizes the diesel…..and one of them is stuck. Needs to be serviced and he suspects water as the cause.
Moral of the story is that I should have changed the fuel filter when I changed the oil. I looked at the external fuel filters for water but never thought that water could have got into the engine past that…..which was kind of stupid given that I had a water leak. Live and learn.
So we are going to be spending some days in Kalamata. Good news is that we have gone out for dinner twice, once to a fish place where we had fish from that day (Victoria loved it), the next night to an Italian place with a great view that had excellent Italian food. The food here is great!
Bad news is the temperature was 41 today!!!. There are 3 smaller Amel boats beside us and I don’t think they have air conditioning. We have air conditioning in each cabin and it is barely keeping up.
Stay tuned for what happens to the generator.
Adventures on Spruzzo 