Saving Old Seagulls

"We have no sympathy for these people at all""

I joined these ranks this weekend, although, to give myself credit, I knew it was my fault and not Seagulls fault....I ended up on Cayuga Lake in upstate NY paddling our Island 17 home at 1am in the morning with an unhappy gull...

We left Ithaca NY for an evening sail at 600pm, and made our way up the lake to a restaurant, the Glenwood Pines, docking at the Ithaca Yacht Club as a guest for a few hours.

We got back in the Boat and started the 77 Forty F and about 2 miles downlake with 3 miles to go, our 'Gull started getting rough and then died.

It was pitch black, and I made a command decision not to try and troubleshoot the gull by flashlight in the dark, honestly I thought I had overoiled the gas mix, and the only way to fix that would be pouring a 1/2 gallon fo fuel into the lake, which I will not do.


UP went the mainsail and we beat our way back down the lake for the next 2 hours, and then paddled up the channel to the haulout...hard work, and we collapsed in our beds and fell fast asleep.


IN the morning, the plug checked out fine, and the fuel bowl (Bing) was 1/2 full of water. We have had large temperature swings in the late summer here (28C to 10C in the evening) and my guess is the fuel tank had filled with condensation, which had accumulated i the fuel bowl.


Clean the bowl and dry, Fresh fuel, and the Gull BRRRPPPPPd into life, firing on the first turn of the flywheel of course....
the Admiral heard that and laughed about having to paddle home last night....so there is still hope...


Im still not completely regretting my decision to try and dismantle the engine in the dark, but thats probably more rationalising than anything else.


Be mindful when replacing the fuel filter on that Bing, it only goes in one way - the flange on the filter faces out and fits into the groove into the metal cap which you unscrew of course...look carefully and it is evident.
_________________
Stephen
Awenke Yacht Club
New Baltimore NY
S/V Catigale
Macgregor 26X

Hello Stephen - an interesting problem, even if you had to find out the hard way - but I think you made the right decision in not dismantling anything whilst out on the water and in the dark.
I wouldn't have expected condensation to be a problem - maybe that's a consequence of me living in typical UK temperatures.
I was told many years ago by a chap who used to 'scramble' (off-road motorcycle racing), that petrol (gasoline) could be filtered through a chamois leather previously wetted by petrol, and a suprising amount of water would be held back.
Never tried it, but it makes me curious, and maybe also that was truer of the gasolines of the day.
A bad thought - you don't suppose someone 'spiked' your gas whilst you were imbibing? Rick

Thanks for the chammy filtering tip on petrol Rick, interesting.

Upstate NY is a very nice place and I doubt anyone would have meddled with it..

On the Bing carb fuel filter

Reversing that fuel filter is exactly the sort of thing you would overlook in the dark working by torch, so maybe it was the correct decision. I wonder if it leaks if installed backwards or if it just gets crushed by the metal plate?

I had taken it apart before to familiarise myself, but did not recall noticing this before.

Hello Steven.

It was certainly an unexpected problem and a worthy note for all of us for future reference.

Personally, I would have opened a bottle of vino, climbed into the bunk and re-evaluated the problem this morning in daylight.

On board the 26X that would certainly have been a good strategy...but the Island is a small ope cockpit dinghy and we would have been pretty cold.

Had a wonderful view of the Perseides (sp) meteor shower all evening though...

Still getting water in my tank from the temperature swings (28C peak of the day, down to 10C at night)

Yesteraday on the Hudson, Roscoe the FP started running rough, Im lucky to have a clear fuel line running from the tank to the Villiers Carb so I could actually see the water in the bottom loop of the fuel line.

I successfully tried this trick to prevent me from having to anchor and take the motor apart...I shut the fuel tap and let the engine idle until most of the fuel was consumed in the fuel bowl (I know this is 90 seconds of running time from experience) and then, just before it died, reopened the fuel tap. The surge of fuel mixed up the water in the bowl, and the engine picked back up to a happy BBBRRRPPPP again, making 4.5 mph against a heavy tide.

The fuel line was about 1 cm high with water in the bottom loop, but the fuel was making its way around it so the engine ran well back to dock.

which is Chinese for!

"Don't teach your Grandmother to suck eggs"

but I'll say it anyway - it may be best to keep the Seagull tank full overnight, so that there is no airspace in which condensation may form.

I wonder if about two ounces of methyl-hydrate to a gallon of gas would not alleviate the problem. I've used it in my pickup for years and we have similar weather here in the Vancouver area as in the UK. OR could it damage the piston?

Just a thought.

IM always trying to keep fresh fuel in my Gulls, so I mix it as needed. This absolutely invites getting moisture into tank with the Fall temperature changes. Ive just learned to keep a mindful eye on my fuel supply, and now I can clear my fuel bowl in about 30 seconds!



You have to be careful with Methyl ALcohol - the recommendation for a car is usually one pint per 16 US gallons, which is a ratio of 1 part alcohol to 128 parts petrol if I did that math correctly...this can be easy to mess up if you are trying to mix one gallon of petrol oil mix for your Gull