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.