The new autopilot fix worked great, kind of…. 

The autopilot had a minor failure again last night. Everything was going well and then there was a strange sound so we pulled the ram out.

The Allen key we used had popped loose and the key way we had cut had worn with the constant back and forth movement of the ram.

This all happened at about 7pm so we decided to have some dinner and think things through (the last lasagna was calling).

We decided to go up two Allen key sizes so we would not have to mill the key way again and instead tapered the other end to fit into the roll pin hole.

After a couple of hours of dremel work I was ready to reassemble but it was now 10pm and Ron needed to get off the wheel so we traded up jobs and he worked on the reassembly of the ram from 10-12 as I drove. We found we had some clearance issues so he made some shim stock and decided that I would epoxy the unit together after my shift and let it cure overnight.

When I got to take a closer look we had removed too much material and there wasn’t enough of the Allen key in the key way to hold for very long. I decided I would take another path all together.

One thing I had been thinking about was what if we took a completely different approach to the fix and tossed the idea of the Allen key and key way out the window.

One of the benefits of hand steering is it gives you a lot of time to think. I came up with the idea of using the standard hardware to transfer the load from the motor to the linear drive as that is what it was designed to do.

I had a small piece of Delrin that I was able to machine to fit very well. I have a dremel with a plugs router kit which was perfect for milling the different steps into the Delrin. I was then able to take 4 #8 machine screws and through bolted the whole assembly and re-connect the role pin.

It took me about 3 hours in total and I worked through Jed’s entire shift but in the end we got it back in at around 3:30 and then got the sails set for a nice wing and wing sale straight for Sitka.

By the time I got to bed it was after 4 am and I had been up and working on the autopilot all night except for the two hours I hand steered.

I was pretty determined to get the autopilot back up and working and am glad I did.

We had a slightly better noon to noon run at 124 miles. The wind never really picked up as forecasted but hopefully it will hang around enough so that we can keep the sails up.

Well after the epoxy set and I tested out the motor, cleaned up the fitting and gears and reassembled the autopilot it was time to put it back to the test.

Everything seemed to go well and we were motoring in some very calm seas which was a nice Intro for the autopilot which is working well.

The seas are very calm so we decided we’d have to motor if we wanted to make any kind of mileage.

I figure we have about 36 hours of motoring left after motoring through the high which would leave us with a nice safety margin to run the generator and motor into Sitka.

Since it was so calm we ended up motoring the full 24 hours and had a noon to noon run of 101 miles. This is our shortest noon to noon run of the entire trip.

We should have about 12 hours of motoring left in the tanks but the forecasts look decent for the next couple of days so hopefully we will have a nice sail in.

Well it happened, our autopilot failed last night at 1:30 am.

I was on watch and everything was going well. We were sailing downwind with the Genoa poled out and some main doing 6-8 kts when the autopilot failed. I was not able to move the wheel at all so blew the Genoa sheet and got Jed up to help.

We had a pretty big mess on the foredeck when we were done as the pole had shaken itself loose and was flying around on its topping lift while the topping lift got wrapped up in the furled sail so we couldn’t drop the pole to put it back in the mast.

At this point I got everyone up and Jed and I wrestled the pole on the foredeck while Kevin and Ron unfurled and firmed the head sail thus freeing the topping lift.

Once we had the foredeck sorted I crawled into the Lazarette to remove the autopilot ram. Again after some swearing and cursing it came out.

I’ve decided to try and put off as many repairs until daylight. It takes so much focus to sail the boat at night by hand via the compass any distraction above or below decks can result in something else breaking.

When the day broke (4am ships time as we are still on Hawaii time) I took the autopilot apart one more time.

The main problem was that the Allen key we used to lock the gears had sheared which stopped the ram from going in and out. The secondary and more critical problem was that he motor had stopped operating.

When I got into the motor I found that one if the housings for the brushes had come loose. The brush housing had done a little damage to the windings but Ron and I thought it would be worth attempting a fix.

Since I had been up since midnight I took a nap and Ron got onto the motor repair.

By about lunch Ron had cleaned up all the windings, finished the soldering and we were ready to epoxy brush housing back in place.

We will let that cure for a couple hours and see if the motor is fixed. If it holds we will cut a new Allen key and put our much loved Autopilot back into service.

Fingers crossed.

Noon to noon run as 136 miles so we are keeping the wheels turning.

Not much to report over the past 24 hours. The autopilot had continued to work well and everyone is catching up on sleep.

I’m on the midnight to 3am shift now and it was a very penetrating cold last night. It felt as if the fog was actually inside the cockpit enclosure. Every surface was soaked to touch and there was nowhere to escape to.

The wind held all night but just kept pushing along the fog with us.

We are having to use the radar more often now. Although I didn’t see any ships on my watch, Kevin had two different AIS targets on his watch but none were close enough to see visually.

Our noon to noon run was pretty good at 143 miles. Since we are out of the really consistent pressure I’m not expecting many big mileage days any more. Anything over 130 miles a day is going to be considered a win if we don’t need to run the engine.

Another day and another 125 miles. The autopilot has been working very well with no complaints from the crew having our fifth crew member back on board.

We had an average afternoon but the winds really started to drop off so I rigged up the pole about 6 pm to stop the sail from flapping. We picked up our SOG to about 4.3 kts which everyone was really happy about as it had been a painfully slow afternoon with the wind at just the wrong angle to get the pile out.

I decided to leave the main furled in all night so we wouldn’t have any problems with back winding but I pulled it out to the second reef point at 6am this morning to help push us along, reduce the roll and get a couple more miles under our belt.

At about 7pm we saw a number of whales spouting on the horizon behind us. The sun was out and their spouts were silhouetted against the evening sun which was pretty cool.

A couple hours later Jed yelled out that there was a spout only 30 yards off our port beam. Kevin and I came out to see it but it never came back as close. Hopefully we will see some more whales as we get closer to land.

As of 6:03 this morning we had exactly 1000 miles to go. The wind looks pretty good for the next couple days so hopefully we will be able to knock off some serious miles while the wind is still consistent.

What a change! Yesterday we were filling out fuel tanks in the fun with no shirts while motoring along at 5 kts on flat calm seas and today we are inundated with a thick fog, 20 kts of breeze and a broken autopilot.

That’s right folks, not only have I had to put pants on for the first time since Sept 2015 when we were in San Francisco, but I had to put on my full foul weather gear, two sweaters and a toque as well!

But what you really want to hear about is the autopilot.

As you recall from our adventures from Mexico to Hawaii in April we lost the autopilot 1200 miles out of Oahu and had to hand steer the rest of the way.

What happened to the autopilot last time is that the plastic gears that operate the electro magnetic clutch had sheared and would not engage the drive.

When we were home and Bowen was born I was able to get a rebuild kit and rebuilt the autopilot ram. I thought everything was working well and put it back in the boat.

There was slightly more noise with the rebuilt ram but I chaulked that up to now having metal and brass gears compared to the old plastic ones.

Well it turns out I was wrong on that score as the new brass gears stripped out last night around midnight and we had to take the autopilot out of commission as Ron steered from 1-3, I took over from 3-5:30 and Jed steered from 5:30-7:30 when I got my tools together and pulled the ram out.

While Ron and I assessed the damage and thought about repairs, Jed and Kevin hand steered all morning and we had Kristine on the phone to Raymarine (what a waste of carbon that company is, maybe Kristine will add a note about that later*) and looking for replacement parts.

We think we have an idea for an unobtrusive fix and will try to get that installed this afternoon.

Stay tuned.

Oh btw 140 miles noon to noon under sail so we are officially out of the North Pacific high!

*I was on hold for 57 minutes. The man who answered the phone was extremely rude- repeating he was sitting at a desk and the unit was 24 years old and there could be any number of parts that need replacement and what was he supposed to do from behind desk? I have been talking with support from Maretron and Sparcraft, both who tried to help from afar. So not impressed with Raymarine

Well we made it (I hope). All the forecasts say we should be seeing some wind this afternoon and building for the next two days. I was a little skeptical when I went on shift this morning considering how calm it was again, however the swell had backed more to the west and we were able to motor sail at around 11am.

Jed and I put the fuel from the Jerry cans into the main tanks so we will be ready to go if the wind does pick up. Ron gave me a little scare when half way through the filling he said the starboard side level sender stopped working.

“What now?” I thought to myself – but it was just a miscommunication and we were up and running again.

Noon to noon run was 113 miles. If this is truly the end of the high, we essentially motored through it in three days and had a couple patches where we could sail at 3-4 kts. All in all I am glad with our route choice and hope we have some downwind sailing in the next 24 hours.

Well we are truly in the North Pacific High now.

For our noon to noon run we managed 117 miles which is pretty good considering we motored for 21/24 hours at 1500 RPM to save fuel.

We had a couple hours of sailing and had the main out again which was nice to turn the engine off.

It looks as if most of our fruit has come to an end. We still have some apples and oranges, but the softer mangos and bananas will see the wild blue yonder later on.

We had a nice treat before dinner as a half dozen Dahl porpoises came by and swam in the bow wake as we motored on.

When I came on shift this morning at 0600 the water was so calm you could have dropped the dinghy in the water and gone water skiing! There was not a ripple to be seen.