Boats being boats – You always need to keep on top of maintenance.
So lets face it boats have problems and they have them regularly and this is one fo the great things about the RYA courses we are looking to offer, RYA not one gives youth knowledge to sail the yacht your in charge of BUT also how to work with problems that arise and how to fix them, what can go wrong and what does often go wrong on yachts. Luckily from running charter yachts and having upward of 10 yachts on the water a week in summer seasons – We have seen our fair share of problems on yachts.
Experience is king with sailing and the more you sail the more knowledge you learn about sailing and how to look after your boat when your out on the water BUT also to maintain your boat before you go out on the water.
So instead of pretending nothing ever happens on yachts we want to bring to light some of the problems we have experienced over the last few seasons which actually makes us more and more careful as the seasons go on.
So below; in no specific order across all the boats we have had are some of the problems that we have come across in the last few years.
And this is in now way to scare anyone from sailing – as with good maintenance and keeping a watchful eye on yachts all problems are dealt with quickly if not by ourselves but by the network of maintenance specialists we have on hand to keep out boats sailing throughout the season.
- Rudder detaching form steering column in rocky port over night
- Windvane – making autopilots malfunction irregularly
- Air in fuel pipes from tanks not being changed over.
- Numerous fuses needing rest
- Mystery fan faults – and in summer you definitely need these babies.
- Excess big water around the engine
- Bow thrusters strangely breaking on two new boats int he fleet at the same time.
- Uncontrolled gibes causing problems by some skippers
- Transomes not always raising
- Sail tears and sail jams in roller reef systems
- Dock lines caught in propellors
- Gel coat repairs to scratches
- Leaking windows
- Battery draining too quickly and needing replacements.
- Trip switches dripping regularly.
- Melting smells from boats
And we all know with so many skippers on the water each week eventually one of them is going to sail into a dock and will need repairs or hull polishing to get these yachts looking pristine yet again.
These boats do get used BUT that means maintenance MUST be kept up which means what is going to break has often already broken and is now repaired.
Excess bilge water around the engine, results from further research worked out it was excess water overflow from the hot water system onboard.
With all of these problems – there always comes a solution and what better way to end the day than with a cool beer and to reminisce with the crew on the solutions that were found and the knowledge that has been learnt.
