Until a few days ago, I still hadn't put our boat in the water due to cold weather. I also had done some work on it this spring, mainly changing out the engine-cooling water pump and serpentine belt. It was a major pain in the butt to replace because of it's location on the bottom of the engine compartment. But the boat shops are charging $100/hr for service time, so I'm sure I saved some $. I think those places must hire midgets with 6-foot arms to work on these boats though. Anyway, I got it all back together and all shined up. Stuart (my father in law), the kids and I took the boat up to the lake. Stuart dropped us off at the ramp, the boat started up, the kids jumped in and we headed across the lake to the Foster's lake place. We were about half-way across the lake when the over-heat alarm went off....crap! I shut down the boat and opened the engine compartment like I knew what to do, and noted the bottom was full of water...super-crap!! (Yes, I had put the plug in). I turned on the bilge for a while and let the engine cool down some. After a few minutes of lying to the kids about why we weren't going anywhere, I started up the engine again, then I went back a looked in the compartment while it was running and saw the bilge wasn't keeping up with how much water was coming in...super-duper crap!! We were sinking....OK the boat wasn't sinking, but my stomach was. I called Stuart, who must have been talking to someone about something much more important than this
grand kids floating in the middle of a cold lake (For the record, he claims he never heard it ring). Then I called Mon to tell her I loved her and that if she remarries, I'll haunt her underwear drawer with spiders....actually I told her to keep calling her Dad to go back to the ramp and pick us up. I was stuck in a
quandary though: Should I run the engine while too hot to get to shore or should I wait and risk taking on too much water? I did a little of both, shutting down the engine for short periods while keeping a close eye on the water level around the engine. As the engine got hotter and the water level rose, steam from the hot
metal starting billowing out the back. Soon though, the steam turned into dark smoke as I'm guessing the black paint started to burn off the engine. Within about a 1/2 mile of the ramp, another boat started coming toward us. I figured they'd be a good back-up plan as I was about to wave them down (as if the black smoke didn't trigger a cry for help), but as we got closer, I noticed the boat was full of teenage girls...I remember thinking..."I'll take my chances, thanks". The whole time the kids smelled the fear in me, Caleb kept climbing under the bow
cushion and Abby sat perfectly still with her mouth wide open. When I was within a few
hundred feet of the ramp, I yelled at some other boaters on ramp that I needed to beach my boat quickly. A couple guys scurried around and moved there boats to make room for me. And a couple other guys moved their trucks to allow Stuart (who was called by Mon) to back up the trailer. I ran the boat up on the muddy shore and killed the engine. Other than the fishermen Larry and his other brother Larry who were trying to diagnose my boats problems, the next 1/2 hr was spent trailering the boat, draining the water, and letting it cool down. When it was finally safe to stick our heads in the engine compartment, Stuart found a large water hose that had slipped off the water pump...once again I failed as a mechanic. It wasn't too much of a fix the next day, it took me an hour or so. (It probably would have taken the long-armed midget 15 minutes). We put the boat in water and she's run fine since. This concludes the longest post ever.