Oh the Engine Room!!!

Well now that we are back at the dock and back on shore power we need to go into the engine room and try to figure out the oil leak and the generator problems.  The engine has had a small leak for a long time, but after our last trip up to Los Cosinas Jerry is concerned that it is larger and more of a safety issue.  Well I, being the great crew I am, went down into the engine room and cleaned out the bilge of all the water and oil that has been accumulating over the last couple of trips.

 It took me two buckets and three rolls of paper towels, but I got it spic and span clean.  John on Magus came over and helped Jerry down with the engine and generator.

Generator Water Pump

First they removed the water pump from the generator, believing that there is a bad seal,  they will have to take it apart to be sure. 

The pump was in the very back on the side next to the batteries, so due to heat and sweat John got shocked a few times...sorry John. 

generator starter motor

Then the generator starter needed to be removed, which was located in the same area as the pump.  The solenoid on the starter motor needs to be replaced, hopefully we will be able to have that worked on down here.  Finally to the big project, trying to find the oil leak in the engine.  Jerry has looked many times before but can not seem to pin point the problem, I looked a little for it when I was down cleaning the oil off the bottom of the engine, but still nothing that looked like there was a problem.  The most frustrating thing about this is that with all the oil the engine is loosing while under power, one would think that it would be easy to spot the leak, well I guess what one thinks is not always right.  Jerry ran the engine for an hour, went down to see if they could see any oil spots, but due to the engine being hot they were unable to tighten any bolts or work on it anymore that day.