Thursday, January 29, 2015

Oh no not again

This morning before I had returned from the clubhouse I saw the lift moving Inspiration towards the water.  I jumped in the car and drove down to the launch site.  There she was sitting pretty in the water.  I was watching for a few minutes and saw the bilge pump spew out a large quantity of water so all was OK on that front. After a while I saw the bilge come on again: Not Good.  A quick check showed that a large quantity of water was coming in via the depth transducer thru hull. Out come the boat for the the third time - DUH.

SAM & I decided to light the stove to check propane levels while waiting for the bilge pump to come on again. No gas was coming out of the stove.  With a muttered curse, I opened the propane locker to check if the valve was turned on.  It was so I removed the tank, the only one I could, and then started to pull the connected tank forward so I could turn on the gas:  It was already on.  Back at the stove, I turned on the LP Gas switch and it clicked just like it should.  A few more on-off-on cycles and everything appeared normal but still no gas at the stove. I took the two cylinders to Ace Hardware that has a refill station right in GCS.  The Tech was real nice and very informative with some appropriate knowledge.  The grill tank had 2# of gas - about half of a tank.  The one stove tank was totally empty and the one that was connected had 7# of a total of 12#.  The tech guy explained to me that for the past 20 years or so that there is a pressure switch that closes when the brass probiscus is removed and you can open the tank main valve but no gas will flow until the probe is inserted and tightened.  BINGO: some lights turned on in my head.

Back at the boat I carefully inserted the probe and tightened while turning on the main tank valve.  I could hear gas escaping all was good to the electric valve. I went below and still no gas but the solenoid  was turning on and off.  As I back tracked I found another in-line manual valve that was off.  After turning it on all was AOK. One success for the day.  I went back to the Hardware and had the empty tank filled to the 13# level. I also painted the bottom of the tan k because it was getting rusty and tank would not expire until 2018 so it was worth trying to save it.  I will do the same with the other two tanks if the expiration is 2018 as well.                                                                                                                                                     

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