i've been slack about keeping this blog updated because life has been so chaotic and busy lately. Most recently I decided to repair my hydraulic backstay before the hose burst and we spilled a bunch of oil into the environment.

This is what the hose looked like and it's been that way for a long time. Somebody actually wrapped it with tape to help slow the leaking!
 
The backstay adjuster panel. rather old but it works. parts are NLA of course...




Getting all those screws out was a lot of work! The drum is the hydraulic fluid reservoir.




I've seen better hydraulic hoses...




There was some oily seepage on the cylinder which means the seals need replacing. But I'm going cruising so that will wait a little longer.




Installing the new hose.



The old hose was just sealed with a wad of caulk where it passed through the transom. not good enough. I installed a proper fitting.



The old oil was pretty ugly so we replaced it with new. we pumped the adjuster until the oil came out the new hose, attached it to the cylinder, and pumped it up several times to bleed it. Works great.

Noticed this AM that the cylinder was indeed seeping. Add it to the list.

We left on a 5 day cruise through the gulf islands, and ended up with an overheating engine. If you throttle up the engine it runs at proper temp but during idle it overheated and puked out a lot of coolant.

Fact: temp alarm does not work
Fact: insufficient cooling at low rpms points to raw water pump. Probably a busted impeller vane. Just rebuilt it but you can't trust new parts. I also discovered that the new fuel level sensor I installed a year ago has crapped out.
Fact: "rad cap" leaking coolant. had an old spare that i put on but need a new one.
Fact: it never ends.

Still enjoying the cruising. I would have enjoyed a trip to Barkley Sound much more than (another) Gulf Island cruise, but hosting noobs from out east and want it to be easy and fun for them.