48 hours in the engine room

As an outsider of the project, I can only tell you a brief overview of our last 48 hours. For juicy engine details, part names, company calls, mechanic talk, Jax will have to fill you in once he is done taking our engine out. Yes, my dearest readers we have to take our engine out!

Okay, so a quick update of our last three days… It all started five years ago, when a very irresponsible shipyard in Sturgeon Bay,WI, hired by the last owners of our Ranger 28, forgot to put any transmission fluid (ATF) in the engine. Fast forward to two days ago, when Jax and I noticed that the engine was acting strange. One day later, we find out there is no fluid in. Rob, a really cool guy at the Lighthouse Landing Marina, donated  two quart containers of transmission fluid to us. Jax, missreading the FULL mark in the dipstick, put both containers in, causing an over lubricated transmission. After running the engine in this state for 20min the boat would not shift into forward gear. After burning two hours troubleshooting the gears, clutch, sucking transmission fluid out, Jax searched the marina trying to find some advice and after trying everything that Cody, another very helpful hand at the marina, suggested, we were left with one option to call a mechanic…

After a couple of tries Jax got a hold of Chris, a retired boat delivery guy and now an engine mechanic. Cody recommended him to us after saying, “he’s alright, even though he is a Yankee” followed by “warn her that he has a mouth on him”. So along came Chris this morning, coffee in one hand, a cigarette in the other and a big smile. After Jax and him talked about engine stuff he crawled into our cockpit locker, which can better be described as a 6ft long, 2ft tall space, where one has to be almost be up sidedown to work on the motor, It is dark, wet and Chris hated it. After letting us know how much he hates sailboat’s engine rooms and telling us lots of funny engine related stories of when he used to deliver boats he left Jax with instructions on how to take out the transmission. His diagnosis was that the lack of lubrication in the transmission ate the clutch, which means we need to take it out and analyze what needs to be replaced. Fortunately, Chris is an adventurous guy and has been in similar situations to us before, so he is letting us do much of the work and will only charge us what is indispensable!

That concludes my update for now, Jax is working in the motor and I am sitting next to him as an assistant.