2012

PROPELLORS

So it’s ’12 and I’m working in a little boatyard in Langkawi, Malaysia, when a familiar looking hull shape goes by in the Travelift, it’s a S&S ’34, an iconic Aussie design which is still being built there.It also happens to be the same design as Thalia, just 4’ shorter. Keith the owner is a pretty chatty guy and eventually I ask “Why are you here?” “I’m having a Bukh saildrive fitted, I mean there’s a V drive so you can’t get to the engine and just look at the prop angle” he explains “Yeah, that’s a drag, not too effective” I commiserate “Who’s doing the work?” and he named a private contractor that rented space in the yard, I should’ve warned him about the quality of work this outfit turned out but…. But what I’m really looking at is a gorgeous Autostream feathering prop, I’d just fitted a pair of the same props to a cat and the owner was effusive about the deal he’d gotten, he purchased 2 refurbished direct from Autostream for only $2500 ea, instead of $3000 ea, hell that’s my cruising budget for a year. Plus this appeared to be mounted on a 1” shaft same as Thalia’s. So I wandered over to give it a surreptitious feel to see how tight it was. Tight as a tick. “So what are you going to do with this prop, it won’t fit a saildrive spline?” I asked as innocently as possible “No, I’ll have to sell it” was the reply “Any idea how much you’ll need for it, mate?” playing up the Aussie idiom hopefully “I guess 500” was his breezy reply “What currency mate?” I was still trying hard “Well, we’re in Malaysia, it’ll have to be Ringitts” Jesus, at 3.2 Rm to the dollar that’s not even $200. “I’ll have the money in your hand tomorrow, ok?” I can drop the phony Aussie stuff now “Sure, thanks” replied Keith. I went back to work trembling with lust at the thought of what that gorgeous hunk of bronze would do for Thalia’s light air performance.

I paid Keith and offered to remove the prop myself but he said “No worries mate, the contractor is going to do it.” Well, I should’ve worried, the contractor managed to lose the grease nipple fitting tube that mounts the prop anode, ok big deal, I can live with that, plus it was a 25mm shaft not a 1” but I knew 1” = 25.4mm and that a competent machine shop could open up the Autostreams hub to the appropriate taper for my Imperial shaft. The biggest problem was it’s a 17” prop and Thalia’s turning a 13 1/2” prop and I’d had to cut the keel to hull deadwood (or whatever you call the fiberglass mush that the builder had used) and I believed it was thick enough, if it wasn’t it was going to be a laborious patching job. You see Thalia’s Yanmar 3GMD is mounted under the cabin sole as it was designed as an Atomic 4 replacement and the 4 was the original design spec for the boat. Hence the prop shaft comes out the back of the keel under where the knife edge hull bottom joins the keel. The contractor botched Keith’s installation, they mounted the Bukh so low it vibrated against the hull, Keith resolved to sue him and hired our yard to reinstall the engine. Now the only boat I’ll do fiberglass work on is mine, I hate being itchy that much, but our composite guy, Rob, another cruiser, has been doing it so long he’s not happy unless he’s a bit itchy. He’s also damn good at what he does. When I saw how thick the deadwood mush was on the knife edge hull I knew it was going to be an easy, but itchy cut. The prop went under the settee along with a lot of other heavy things that all contribute, negatively, to Thalia’s upwind performance.

It’d been 4 yrs and about 10,000 mi since I bought that prop, in 4 mths prior I had fitted a Yanmar 3GM30F to replace my old rebuilt twice, by me, engine. I now had 35% more hp and the old prop so I had no way to get at it, unless I fitted the pitchable in water Autostream. It’s ’16 and I’m in La Paz, Mexico all of the cruisers are effusive in their praise of Ernesto, the machinist, abilities, they were also horror struck by his prices, but considering what I needed done I wanted the best. So I took the prop hub to him and explained what I needed, he pulled out a digital caliper, measured carefully and said “Sure easy” Cool, I told I also had a coupling problem, the coupling set screws had worked their way lose and the coupling would now rock on the shaft, retightening the screws would only give temporary relief, I needed to fix it. No wonder Thalia has a quest for proper maintenance. “No problem, we’ll dress up the shaft, weld the coupling interior bore and machine it to the new shaft diameter, we do it all the time.” Fantastic,, clearly I’m in good hands. I told him I’d give him a call when I pulled the shaft as soon as I made arrangements for a haulout and he could come and pick up shaft, prop, coupling, etc. He smiled and promised a 2 day turn around. I couldn’t cut the hull until I’d refitted the shaft and new prop. So I went to the yard and explained in my best awful Spanish to the office manager that I had to cut the hull for a new prop, that I intended to do the work myself and wanted no part of a contractor and didn’t require any helpers. “Did she understand my Spanish?” I asked “No problem, you actually speak quite well, you’re welcome to do all of that here by yourself” she replied in slow clear Spanish so I would understand. I should’ve known she was lying, my Spanish sucks. We agreed on a date and out Thalia came. I yanked the parts and Ernesto came to collect them, I’d written out the work I wanted done and gave him the history on the prop and when he heard the price he gave a low whistle. “Ernesto, the only thing I’m asking is please don’t f**k up the prop” he assured me it would go smoothly. He was back 2 days later, presented me with a bill, I paid and thanked him and as he was leaving said “It was easier to cut the shaft” “Ah, wait a minute, you cut the shaft to a metric taper” I asked incredulous “Sure why not” he responded “Because now I have 2 spare props that don’t fit s**t” “Don’t worry we’ll fix those for free” “How are you going to make the bores smaller?” “Ah, I see, we can’t” “Lovely” I said in disgust “Ok, we owe you a new shaft, it’s the only way to fix it properly” he said soothingly “In what material?” I asked quietly expecting 18/8 “316L it’s all we use and yes I have 1” material in stock” he assured me “Jesus Ernesto, you’re a nice guy, I hate to do this to you” “You’re not doing anything to me, all along you said cut the prop hub, you even wrote it. You’ve already paid and you begged me not to f**k up the prop and we f**cked it up anyway.” “You’ll have a new shaft with an imperial taper and everything will fit perfectly, at no further cost to you” He was as good as his word. The problems started the moment I picked up some sandpaper and start spot repairs on my boot stripe, the security guard came and tried to make me stop, I was almost finished and completed the sanding while arguing that Mitzi, the office manager had said I could do it. “Mitzi phoned me and told me to stop you” he said in Spanish. We had the same problem when I painted the boot stripe. I knew the cutting of the keel was going to be a nightmare.

Ernesto returned the parts as promised I reassembled it measured carefully to get 15% clearance over the top of the prop, it was going to require the removal of about 3”, either Thalia was as thick as Keith’s boat or I was going to have major patching job. I started grinding, it took no time for Louis, the guard, to show up and try to stop me, I ignored him and kept cutting, he tried to take it out of my hand. You have to be either very brave or very stupid to mess around with a running 14” grinder “You want it, take it” I told him in Spanish, he probably would’ve if I’d turned it off. I got it done and didn’t break through the hull. Later I epoxied and glassed the cut, like after 5 pm when everyone, except my buddy the security guard, was gone, he looked at what I was doing sadly and just wandered off shaking his head. It all came to a head when I antifouled the patch I’d put over my cut, now I had a group of people from the office including the idiot manager waving the contract I’d signed 5 min before we lifted Thalia saying “It says so right here, no sanding, no grinding, no resins, no painting you signed it” “Fine call the police, I’d like to hear you explain how you told me I could do this work in the 1st place” i was past caring, besides I was essentially finished, but the 3 day sh**tfight I’d had to go through left a bad taste in my mouth. So after I returned to the anchorage I dictated a letter to some Spanish friends who translated it and we emailed the director of the yard. The apology letter I got back was abject and effusive, should’ve laminated it and mounted it. The new prop is amazing Thalia has always been a good light air boat, but you can tell the difference and she now motors with authority, well, as much authority as you’re likely to get out of 24 hp, but reverse, she actually has one now. If you’re ever in La Paz please go to Marina Fonatur and say hi from George to my old friend Mitzi, the office manager, assuming she still has a job. George and Thalia

“If I’m lyin…”