Search Party!

From the beginning, I have wanted to have a particular diagram of CAYUGA. When I had the sailboat, it was much clearer and of course relatively new (1 previous owner for only a year) regarding any diagram or layout of what is what and where. The first year of owning CAYUGA, we simply used her and didn't fuss much about anything. We knew we would be taking her for service in the winter season and would have things checked out. I would get the diagram I was interested in having. That brings us full circle to the week before Christmas. We haven't shared much about the boat since back in late September. Much has transpired and we needn't talk about it with the world. We did mention we'd filed an insurance claim and to that we did get a check to get a new port gear. CAYUGA is on the Eastern Shore again with an outfit that is known for its work with Bertrams, among others - this is an example of the 31' Bertram (not their work but so you can see the very classic kind of boat it is). They do all kinds of boats, and very big boats too. Positively, we've gotten a lot of thumbs up on going there, from all kinds of folks. A working yard with marina, I was impressed. Brad too. Time will tell. So I went over for a meeting with a few of the guys and this was specifically about the electrical system. I've wanted to get a diagram of it from the beginning because I know over the years things have been installed, taken out, changed, bigger batteries, etc. The wiring is a disaster, at least to me. Apparently, they think so too. Hence the call for a meeting. We went over the main issues and possible solutions, and of course, I asked about the pie in the sky overhaul of the whole system. I'll be getting an estimate for the main issues and a small venture into an overhaul without some of the insanity. Oh boy, another $$$! I love yachting. The boat had smaller engines when first launched and whatever electrical system at that point in 1984. Much of that wiring still exists as well as a few of the instruments - which are no longer connected on one end but are the another. Madness, I tell you. Brad and I are in full agreement that the electrical system has to be taken care of. We are getting new gears (paying for the starboard ourselves) and with all the effort on that, the last thing anyone wants is the boat having an electrical short (see! I got that title in here) that leads to a sad ending because we didn't take care to fix it. This is what the wiring looked like in 2021 - both engines shown - the starboard has the bus bar just lying there with a zip tie somewhere, the port is even worse. Seriously? The battery has wires that connect with a fuse (the red squarish piece), but a wire got loose at some point and Brad fixed that. Under the deck sink there's a mess of wires that come in for the solar panels and the instruments on the mast like the radar dome, etc. That black rectangle has been a mystery (something about the batteries but maybe not). However, a couple of small improvements while over in Denton were mounted bus bars - it's a start. It was an interesting conversation with the guys, and one of them was young - he was taking copious notes - he's apprenticing. Cool. The black rectangle was solved. Separate note: Brad and I were invited aboard a boat of one of the guys when CAYUGA arrived at the marina - he has redone his entire boat under the floorboards. Yes, as they say, you could eat off the bilge floor. And wiring, OMG, seemed like everything was just where it should be. I, again, have hopes, high hopes even for getting a real electrical diagram. I've built a binder for the boat which includes as much of the information we have gathered about anything in the boat, and it has a lot of specifications on all kinds of items. Like, the serial number of an engine, model number of a carburetor, the year something was replaced or serviced, etc. And eventually, I'll have a battery consumption chart. CAYUGA doesn't need to plug in, she likes getting sunshine. A trickle charge from the solar panels does the trick. Of course, with the antiquated way the wiring is done through various connections, we lose a lot of efficiency and charge power. Goal? Fix all we can, avoid electrical mayhem, make sure the bow thruster has juice, the bilge pumps work properly, and most importantly (!), understand how long we can play the stereo at full blast.

This year has been just that. Ups. Downs. Twists. Turns. And we are still riding along, white-knuckled, screaming, wondering when we can get off and get back on solid footing. Since the port gear exploded, we have endeavored to get it fixed. Of course you say, and our adventure has taken us all across the country, back in time, and for a brief moment, other countries. As such, Brad has been on fire! He's cataloged a long list of numbers for transmission shops and making sure if it's a dead end, he doesn't accidentally call twice. Thankfully Brad enjoys research, and listening to the old marine guys, but primary to the task, he's channeling his inner detective, hoping to crack the case of the elusive parts. June 26 was the fateful day for our port gear. Going into July, we were hopeful to find the parts we needed. Our gear guy was searching and contacting all the folks he knew (all the same people Brad called too and then some). Basically, the whole month was a u-joint yoke hunt and what might be alternatives, until July 30th. That's the day we reluctantly filed an insurance claim after getting nowhere with finding the parts and not getting much help from the folks who had been working on the boat, plus hearing really bad news about ostensibly never finding the parts. But we keep looking. August brought in the insurance sleuthing and trying to figure out exactly what happened. As of now, I am not convinced of any one thing, but I have my suspicions and hope they will be or have been investigated fully. I have voiced that rather firmly. But we do not have a report yet... One of the things very important for us to provide the adjuster is an estimate to get the repair done. We are between the rock and hard place. What a disaster. One other August development of note was when Brad reached GL Power and spoke to the owner, Harry Allen. We were on to something. After what we were told was a reasonably exhaustive search, including Europe, it was discovered, right at their own headquarters in Ohio, that GLP had an old Paragon, our model, on display. It was dismantled, but to no avail, there's a reason it was on display - it didn't have all the parts inside. But that's not the end. A little reminder on the history; Paragon Power was not always that, it started as Paragon Gear which was bought by Twin Disc, got its name changed somewhere along the way and then finally Great Lakes Power (now GL Power) bought Twin Disc. Parts were around, but at some point GLP discontinued Paragon and tossed parts. Our gear guy tells us he tried to get some of those parts but had no luck. And by the way, all the transmission guys know each other no matter what state they are in, and most are twice as old as our gears. So you can imagine the stories we've heard about the days of old and the transmissions of yore... Meanwhile, in pure frustration, I went so far as to say we're going to do new gears and even engines, and some boat deck reconfiguration, etc., because f-it, we're not planning to sell the boat for a long time, she is a beautiful, capable boat that has the luck of 2024, like me. Brad shuddered at the idea of the cost of that. Me too. We'll keep our engines, but new gears may be the only choice if we can't find parts. I must digress to say that each month has brought some kind of hurdle. Besides the boat having its own, I too have been enjoying a monthly escapade of setbacks. August was the death of my laptop. Luckily, I had the extended warranty and Dell came to the house and replaced the hard drive. What that it were the case for CAYUGA! But besides that favorable outcome, August hadn't gotten by without an issue. Don't believe me? July had handed me a sick dog - a bad ear infection. Only 4 more days in September, I wonder what's in store? Yesterday we had a very near collision. A car driving too fast lost control around the dead man's curve in our community as we were heading home. Had it not recovered, Brad and I would probably have been at the emergency room. Let's continue. Sometime around the beginning of September, GLP was considering machining the parts we needed. I was thrilled and shared that with friends who have of course been following along and asking about the status. And then... Yesterday, we got the disappointing news that GLP will not be able to help us. Reason? Attorneys. I leave it at that. Brad sent him the September PropTalk and the Ray Hunt Design summer 2024 quarterly articles about me (Brad very lovingly combined them) and while not helpful, Mr. Allen had very kind words and was supportive besides his attorneys, so at least he knows of our CAYUGA and wishes us well in our endeavors. Unfortunately, that does not fix the problem. But my fame is not limited to these two publications, no! The Antique & Classic Boat Society's quarterly magazine, ACBS Rudder, will have an upcoming article written by me. As of now, we are still hunting down proper estimates to do whatever repair we will need to do. You see the difficulty. Without finding the parts, how can anyone give a real estimate? Chickens. Eggs. Horses. Carts. Getting an estimate to put in new gears should be easier but that too have proved unusually difficult. If I worked in the industry, you can be sure I'd take this challenge on. It's a bit complicated but the outcome would be serious glory. But yesterday. And I need to go back to the one entity, Marty Brown Racing, who refurbished the engine - of which has worked flawlessly. Brad called Marty yesterday to ask about engine rotation. Shall we dive in? CAYUGA is equipped with two engines, one rotating as it would "normally" and one counter-rotating. This is to work with the way the props rotate. They spin outward - the starboard prop is a right-hand and pushes clockwise. The port, the opposite. Our engines function by the way the camshaft is set up. Our Paragons have zero to do with how the props spin, however, they are right and left working because of the engines and props. If I've got this wrong, please contact me - don't just laugh at the girl and her boat. What we are finding is that most gears today do not work that way. There is only one manufacturer, that we know of so far, Velvet-drive, where the v-drive itself can be reversed. That would be our solution if we go with new gears. Back to Brad's call with Marty. The question was what it would take to change the cams on an engine. Marty answered but then asked what were we trying to do? Brad explained the issue with the u-joints and to Brad's surprise Marty said he had a guy who might be able to machine what we need. While this seems to be exciting news, there is so much left to sort out for that to happen, but we may actually for the first time in 3 months, see a faint, very faint, glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. Hope , again? Here's what needs to happen: insurance still needs estimates to wrap up we still need estimates for a refit - this scenario is outfitting new gears both port and starboard if this is the path, then the rest is moot, and the boat goes to that shop we still need estimates to fix the broken gear which involves the gear guy Marty Brown a mechanic who takes things out and puts them back in we have a space lined up at a yard where she could be hauled and stored for the fix we need would need an estimate from a shrink-wrap person to build an enclosure so the mechanic can work on the boat over the winter we will have the boat towed by BoatUS to wherever the boat needs to go While this may sound not all that hard, our insurance person said he'd never seen such a complicated ordeal for what is otherwise a simple claim. Cue the Rube Goldberg machine: I love yachting!

These pictures are shortly after the complete destruction of the port U-joint Wednesday afternoon and the morning after cleanup of the transmission oil and small debris. Bottom line, Brad, me, and our mechanic are all safe as is the boat. She may be trailered back to Denton. Or, we stay in the water, and figure what's next. Someone remarked that we could remove the port prop and limp around on one engine nearby not far from the marina until a solution presents itself. I don't think that sounds like fun, but moreover, we need to get to the bottom of this first. So, I ask you dear readers and fellow yachters, do you use your old boat or old car such that you expect it to perform as it should? Or do you baby the heck out of it and fear a failure at any moment if you should use in a normal way? We had the belief based on the restoration and rebuild and all the marine industry folks we'd worked with that we would be able to have the boat perform. However, only 3/4 of it performed as it should, 2 engines and 1 transmission/v-drive, while 1/4 decided to fall to pieces. I'd pushed her up to 3600 RPMs on our return from St. Michaels, which is only about 800 or so less RPMs than when disaster struck. Was failure imminent at some point in the future and we just hurried it along? Who knows, at least not at this time, but having our mechanic (note - he is not a transmission person) aboard was, if anything, comforting. Remember this picture from this previous post ? Basically, the "neck" between broke. The Paragon died. Right now, all the experts are conjecturing and tasked to figure out how to fix this. What exactly happened is now a figure pointing exercise. Frankly, if someone would just step up and say, you know, I think I fucked up, I'd respect that and think a turning point had been reached where my shaken confidence would be renewed in the folks involved. It's a possibility that we will fully ditch the remaining Paragon and go with new (or new to us) gears. If that is the direction - there'll be stories a-plenty. If I loved yachting before, now I'm married to it. I can't sell a broken boat, so I've got to see this through. I don't want to sell the boat, but you can't blame me for thinking about it. 2024 keeps landing punches when I was getting hopeful that things were turning around. Silly me. So, all I can say is bring it on - and as someone suggested yesterday, "get a second mortgage, redo it all new and then refi when rates go down - you only go around once".

Vlog All Videos All Categories Play Video Play Video 00:26 Starboard Starting the starboard engine after a fine tuning of the carburetor. June 2024 Play Video Play Video 00:22 Moving Returning to Annapolis after two years of engine/transmission work. May 2024 Play Video Play Video 00:32 Roar Port engine running and it's a beautiful sound. Fall 2023 Play Video Play Video 00:17 Boring AKA honing the cylinders at Marty Brown Racing. June 2022 Play Video Play Video 00:37 Choptank Motoring up the Choptank River to Denton for storage and the start of restoration work. November 2021 Play Video Play Video 00:06 Listen It never gets old just listening. Summer 2021

If there's a boat... there's a story. TM The adventures of intrepid boaters. Despite their boat... What is "I love yachting"? Maybe you remember ABC's Wide World of Sports ? The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. Or, like golf, (hate it or not), finding the sand and taking three swings to get out only to be followed by a spectacular drive straight down the fairway. Maybe even the old adage of falling off your bike and getting back on. All of these have one thing in common, we keep on going back for more, we don't give up, and that taste of glory, while maybe elusive, is compelling, perhaps addictive. I came up with this notion a few years back when I had my sailboat... that no one points a (hypothetical) gun at your head and says, "Go buy a boat". Nope, never heard of that. We do it willingly, we do it because we enjoy boating, and we want to be on the water aboard some floating craft. Worldwide. We even get on odd boats, and wonderously, I've sailed on three of them; a felucca on the Nile, a fitted-dinghy in Bermuda, and the background picture here, log canoes on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay. The fitted-dinghy and log canoes are nearly identical in their being, overly canvassed and highly unstable. Guess what? People love doing it because when things go right or you are victorious, it is a thrill. But like this picture, when boats go over it's pure agony. I love yachting is the way to express all of it. You love it one day, you swear at it the next. Whether you are going out for a sail, to fish, motoring around, paddle, etc., boats have a way of being awesome and frustrating as heck. Read about the origins of this fine exclamation. Via our boat, CAYUGA, we are sharing our boating adventure, but we really want you, our readers and followers, to share your stories too - good or bad. You can write your story yourself or text/email it to us , whatever your preference, we just want to hear from you. In 1972, Hurricane Agnes made quite the impression on upstate NY. This is a picture of the destruction of the boats and lifts on the east shore of Seneca Lake. My dad or grandfather took the picture. Granpa had a cottage there, well up the steep hill and across the street, but his boat shed along the shore was damaged (left). However, the neighbor's boat clearly did not fare well. But a few "I love yachting" mutterances later and it was all rebuilt. Thankfully, because I have wonderful memories of boating and going fishing with Granpa. Whether it's a mechanical failure, or Mother Nature doing her worst... we still love yachting. Blog The Ships' Log and other Stories. A Short Story 13 0 comments 0 3 likes. Post not marked as liked 3 Rollercoaster 137 2 comments 2 2 likes. Post not marked as liked 2 Transmission... dead. 98 0 comments 0 Post not marked as liked Dali Departs 11 1 comment 1 1 like. Post not marked as liked 1 Props to Cobe Marine 21 0 comments 0 Post not marked as liked 1 2 3 4 5 Your Story Please share your "I love yachting" story. Our mission is to curate the good, the bad, and the ugly. With a little dash of history. And a huge dose of humor. Every boat has a story her skipper can tell. Vent, laugh, cry, sing? Whatever floats your boat, or... even that too. Click here to type and submit your story. Vlog Ready... Set... Action! Check out the Action for video clips and live stories. Starboard Play Video Facebook Twitter Pinterest Tumblr Copy Link Link Copied Search video... All Categories All Categories Go Machines Motoring Rebuild Now Playing Starboard 00:26 Play Video Now Playing Moving 00:22 Play Video Now Playing Roar 00:32 Play Video Now Playing Boring 00:17 Play Video About Discover our story and our boat. Race committee 9/26/2021 Annapolis to Bermuda 10/20/2013 12/13/2020 Race committee 9/26/2021 1/7

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