Sunday August 6, 2017
Most of today was spent hunched over the generator exchanging the
old injectors for a pair of newly overhauled ones. Nothing ever goes as smoothly as I
hope, but the generator has finally started after a lot of hassle. The long pole in the morning was the trouble
with getting the return fuel compression fittings loose from the brass fittings
on the injectors. Even with a tubing
wrench, which you would think in surrounding most sides of the hex-headed
compression fittings would grip the 7/16 inch hex ok, the wrench began to round
off the shoulders. I had to resort to a
small vice grip to get that off, but the effort took over an hour. I had to unbolt the generator’s electrical control
box in order to get access to the left hand injector and in so doing
unknowingly pulled the fuel shutdown control circuit wire out of its crimped
terminal ring which attaches it to the overheat sensor - all this behind the
control box. This resulted in the fuel
shut-off solenoid not getting the 12 volts it need to hold the fuel valve open,
but I did not fall to this conclusion for a while. Soooo, no start. I finally had to take a break, got showered,
and accompanied Mary to Paducah to get some groceries. Several hours later, I was back in the engine
room and finally figured out the fuel solenoid was not moving and the reason
why. Reconnecting the wire required
removal of the sound shroud (second time today) and bending over the generator
to screw in the tiniest little screw and its nut through a ring terminal. So tonight is recovery with ibuprofen! I will run the generator for an hour or so
tomorrow while getting gong on the AIS installation. Hopefully, I have saved the easy part for
last!
First thing in the morning I will go over to the
chandlery and speak with the girl there about ordering a couple of VHF antennas
because my Standing Wave Ratio meter which tests the integrity of the antennas
showed both of them to be shot.
Hopefully, she can get them from her supplier the next day.
