[Rhodes22-list] Small temporary replacement motor; Yamaha 9.9 accident

[Keyes, David]

Rik--thanks for your information about the Evinrude 4.5.  Do you link it
with the tiller, or are you doing tight turning with one hand on the tiller
and one on the motor?

Ed--The electric trolling motor sounds interesting, and I will look at them
for temporary use--if the power is enough whils still being light, simple
and reasonably economical.   Not being a fisher, I have never seen one.  

Yamaha 9.9 experiences--I am on a large lake, but the winds can easily be
steady at 25-30 miles per hour, winds howling through the spars and rigging
of the boats tied at dock, with heavier gusts, blowing onshore towards a
rocky coast just about two boat lengths past my slip as I have to return by
making a 90-degree sharp turn to port into a narrow slip (10 feet wide,
probably, no more), when the "alley way" down between the boats before I
make my turn is no more than about two boat lengths.  I have to alternate
between forward (at minimum idle speed) and neutral (mostly neutral) not to
be coming in too fast, and then have to alternate forward, neutral and
reverse just to kick the stern around and turn sharply enough into the slip.
Leaving the dock to go out on the lake can be the reverse of this situation.
In the summers, the wind blows offshore, and everything is easier. 

My experience with the Yamaha 9.9 over the past year and one-half has been
that it can maneuver successfully the above challenges (when the gears and
throttle don't jam as they did in November, first into reverse rocketing
towards the sterns and motors of the boats behind me after I had almost made
it into my slip but had to reverse due to being blown too much to starboard
to enter the slip properly), and in the nick of time forceably hitting
forward and rocketing into the concrete and steel part of the dock between
the inner-most slip and the rocky shore).  However, no outboard motor on a
sailboat, set off as it is to one side of the rudder, seems to give the
steering maneuverabilty for tight turns of a motor boat or a larger sailboat
with an inboard motor.  Of course in no wind or very light winds, I can go
in and out perfectly and think I finally have the technique figured out.
Even in stronger winds, if not blowing directly onshore, docking sometimes
works out just right, as if I were a skilled master at this.  But some
owners tell me that they will not take their boats out at all if there is a
strong onshore wind--and I may listen to them next time.

I don't get the full benefit of the 9.9 heading out of close quarters into
open waters, where I could open to full throttle.  This is because I don't
feel that the steering is stable enough at full speed using the R22 tiller
linkage.  The motor is at that time either connected to the tiller, which
doubles the turning torque (sailboat rudder plus motor steering) or, more
normally, is disconnected by removing the pin to let the tiller do all the
steering but relying on the motor to stay put by itself in a straight
position (requiring proper advance adjustment of a screw to control effort
needed to turn the motor).  To avoid sudden swerving one way or the other, I
slow down to, say, half throttle or less anyway, where everything is fine.
So I am not ever using the full power of the 9.9.  In theory, though, it
could come in handy in a bad storm.

If I were doing everything again, I would buy a motor of half the power but
try to connect it to the tiller and move the controls there--like Stan's 9.9
setup--because, although I have not tried the other way, it just seems safer
and more efficient to have control in one place and be able to look forward
under motor instead of fooling around bent over the stern and trying to
figure out what to do as between the motor steering and the tiller/rudder
steering. Having said that, I would have been a lot better off in November
if I had direct controls on the motor that I could get to, rather than
jammed controls connected by cable on the tiller.  While the fault may have
been with the motor, if I were guessing, I would think that I increased
speed too much in reverse trying to avoid hitting the dock on the starboard
side of my slip, and almost immediately had to (in high wind) avoid a
collision to stern with boats behind.  I probably (but this is just a
guess--it all happened so fast) tried to force the gear shift into forward
while still not having slowed the throttle to neutral.  There is probably a
safety feature preventing switching gears except at idle or low speed.  By
forcing the motor into forward I probably jammed or bent cable connectors
where they enter the gear area on the motor.  Once that happened, I was
stuck in forward and at high speed.  Welcome to the dock ahead.

-----Original Message-----
From: Kroposki [mailto:kroposki@innova.net]
Sent: Thursday, January 09, 2003 11:20 PM
To: 'The Rhodes 22 mail list'
Subject: [Rhodes22-list] Small temporary replacement motor


David,
       Did you catch the line in Rik's email about Stan using an
electric trolling motor?
             Ed K



_________________________________________________
Use Rhodes22-list@rhodes22.org, Help? www.rhodes22.org/list
		++++++CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE+++++ 
The information in this email may be confidential and/or privileged. This
email is intended to be reviewed by only the individual or organization
named above.  If you are not the intended recipient or an authorized
representative of the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any
review, dissemination or copying of this email and its attachments, if any,
or the information contained herein is prohibited.  If you have received
this email in error, please immediately notify the sender by return email
and delete this email from your system. 
Thank You.