Monday, 29 June 2009

Back to sea at last

Salar's engine has been misbehaving, or so we thought. It would rev to cruising speed then drop back, then speed up by itself. Even the engineer I usually have great faith in did not come up with a solution, despite trying everything. As a last resort I posted a question on a web forum and a process of fault-finding was suggested - starting right back at the tank. Bingo, there was the problem - not in the engine at all.

Salar was once petrol-driven, and the tank still had the gauze petrol filter fitted. Diesel tanks don't have them, any dirt ends up in the pre-filter. Salar had hidden her dirt problem from us, with a nice blob of muck embedded in the feeder pipe. Lesson of the day - start fault-finding at the beginning of the process, not in the middle! That cost me about three months fishing time.

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