[Passport] Low RPM vibration

[William Ennis]

Hello,

We have a low RPM vibration in our prop shaft. We're going to haul it anyway, but I'd like some things to check. The vibration seems to fade away at higher RPM.

Can this be a cutlass that needs repair? We have a PYI dripless and wondered if, somehow, that could be the culprit. We have a 3-blade MaxProp on her, too.

Anybody got any ideas about that?

Thanks,

Bill Ennis

"The sea can be heavy, my friend." CAP



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[Bill Schmidt]

Bill: Be sure to carefully check the rear motor mounts as well as the
cutlass bearing. Could also be just a lot of barnacles on the prop (hope
so).
Regarding the binnacle wires, we have cable tied them all together in a
way so they can't flop around. Seems to work.
Billy Manana

[William Ennis]

Hi,

Alas, no barnacles up here. Good advice on motor mounts, though, and I'll check them. We pull her for bottom painting in a bit anyway, so we've planned to replace the cutlass. It's old, for sure, and could easily be the culprit. Nigel Calder says just a 1/8 inch of play is cause for replacement.

Good idea on the cable ties. I just don't seem to have many options for the various wires that I'll need for new instruments. I can pull smaller wires through the binnacle support tubes, but for the larger ones there is only the main tube. I'll bet newer binnacles have special cable runs built into them for just this purpose, but ones from 1984 Yacht Specialities binnacles certainly do not.

Thanks,

Bill

[Robert C Young]

I have gotten all wires (except for radar since I did not replace the radar)
up both sides of the Edson stainless steel tube pedestal guard. from there,
drilled the smallest holes possible in the tube to allow the wires to exit
to the chart plotter and instruments.

Regards
Bob

[William Ennis]

The split-tube idea is excellent. I can retrofit that to the wiring fairly easily.

The smaller wires can fit inside the binnacle guard tubes, especially if I make the exit holes a tiny bit larger. The larger cables (radar, sounders-2 of them) can then go up the binnacle tube through your split-tube arrangement.

Great ideas: thanks.

Bill Ennis

Begin forwarded message:

> From: hjka...@ucsd.edu
> Date: May 17, 2010 11:15:34 AM AKDT
> To: "William Ennis" <benn...@gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Passport] Low RPM vibration
>

> I did worry quite a bit about the consequences of running wires through
> the steering binnacle/pedestal. In order to minimize problems, I bought
> "electrical wiring split tubing". It is available at Home Depot, Radio
> Shack, etc. It is flexible and comes in various diameters. I used about 4'
> length and wrapped all the wires inside the split tubing. I then secured
> the tubing with cable ties around the tubing at several points, so there
> was no chance that a stray wire would stick out and snare on the steering
> gear.
> I dropped a messenger line with washers as weights and guided it down the
> pedestal to be sure that it wouldn't snare on the steering chain, cable or
> gears.
> I included the wiring for the chartplotter, wiring for the light for the
> compass, remote controller for the autopilot, power to the steering
> station (for small light, 12 volt outlet, etc) fog horn switch.
>
> This has worked well for almost 10 years without problems (that I know of!).
> Our pedestal is an Edson ripoff by Grand Deer on our T37, 1977 model.
> regards,
> Harvey