Another hydraulic leak on our pods!!

[sandydlc]

This must be a cruel joke. We've now had coolant tubes on both pods replaced due to transmission fluid leaks and now this morning, as we were headed out for a 10 day cruise, we had an error message flashing that said, "TVM: Hydraulic oil pressure low". It appears that this time it's the fluid for the trim tabs and obviously, until we get that repaired, we're not going anywhere. We're safely back in our slip and I have a call into Lake Union Sea Ray. Additionally I have our mechanic on the way down to see if there is anything that he can do to help us.

I'm beyond frustrated to have 3 oil leaks in a boat that we've owned for less than 6 months. On the positive side, when the boat is running, it runs wonderfully and we love the pods and their maneuverability. I'm just really anxious to get past this initial "shake-down" of our Sea Ray.

I'm really trying to stay positive but I'm going to be devastated if our 10 day trip will have to be cancelled.

Sandy

 

[Strecker25]

sorry to hear about another leak, I'm ignorant to pods but know the feeling of trips being cut short for mechanical failure (we had one this year with a blown drive) so I feel your pain there.

Not knowing much about the plumbing of the lines to the pods, are the trim tab reservoir and lines completely separate from the other lines you've had fixed?

 

[sandydlc]

Yes it is. Different fluid - 90 weight. Our mechanic just arrived and is trying to isolate the leak.

 

[Sous]

Good luck.

 

[FootballFan]

Sandy,

Have been following your posts about the issues you have experienced.

Your boat is a 2010 model - only 5-6 years from the factory. I would be wanting more than a mechanics visit at this point. This boat should have already been through "shake down" at this point, unless you bought it with less than 10 hours. Sounds like a systemic issue with the boat.


Have you reached out directly to Sea Ray?

What about requesting all warranty and maintenance records? Did your local Sea Ray dealer sell the boat new? Do they have history on the boat. I don't know for sure, but if an issue came up during warranty I would think SR had a record. I would guess this issue was there previously, that it didn't just start when you got the boat.

Mark

 

[sandydlc]

Sandy,

Have been following your posts about the issues you have experienced.

Your boat is a 2010 model - only 5-6 years from the factory. I would be wanting more than a mechanics visit at this point. This boat should have already been through "shake down" at this point, unless you bought it with less than 10 hours. Sounds like a systemic issue with the boat.


Have you reached out directly to Sea Ray?

What about requesting all warranty and maintenance records? Did your local Sea Ray dealer sell the boat new? Do they have history on the boat. I don't know for sure, but if an issue came up during warranty I would think SR had a record. I would guess this issue was there previously, that it didn't just start when you got the boat.

Mark

Thanks Mark,

The boat has an interesting history - only two owners prior to us. First owner was in Ontario Canada, bought the boat new and only kept it for one season. He sold it to the guy in Seattle who owned it the longest and then we purchased from a yacht broker (not Sea Ray dealer) at the end of February of this year. It took me quite a while but I was finally able to get the previous service records released from the previous owner and our mechanic is actually the one who took care of anything with the boat that wasn't handled by the local Sea Ray dealer/technicians. The only incident we can find was in September of 2015 where the transmission fluid housing was changed out on a service bulletin. The previous owner did not have to pay for this repair.

I was able to drive over to Lake Union Sea Ray just now and found their pod technician, explained what was going on and he agreed with our mechanic's recommendation to thoroughly clean everything, tighten all hoses, clamps, etc and then run/test the pod. If there is no glaring leak then we'll use the boat. If we have a cracked tube or something else, we stay. The boat had about 350 hours on the engines when we got her so really not much for a 2010 boat. We now have 410 hours.

I did reach out to Sea Ray and most likely we'll be attempting to work with them to resolve this issue however with a 6 year old boat with no remaining warranty, I'm not sure what our options are??

If you have any advice for us, I'm all ears!

About to test the pod soon - stay tuned.

Sandy

 

[Fly'n Family]

I watch for your threads as the newer 450 layout is amazing and we're considering one for our next upgrade. Don't like seeing the issues you've, as well as some others have had. Seems to be real hit and miss on them.

Fingers are crossed it was something minor and your shoving off for your 10 day romp.

 

[sandydlc]

I watch for your threads as the newer 450 layout is amazing and we're considering one for our next upgrade. Don't like seeing the issues you've, as well as some others have had. Seems to be real hit and miss on them.

Fingers are crossed it was something minor and your shoving off for your 10 day romp.

Well I wouldn't take the 450 off your list just yet. I'm not sure if we're just really unlucky or if certain pod drives just are prone to hydraulic leaks/issues.

In our case it turned out to be a hydraulic pressure transducer that is leaking. The parts are coming in tomorrow and we have our mechanic scheduled to install it as soon as it comes in. With any luck that the part isn't delayed in shipping, we should be on the water by mid-afternoon.

Sandy

 

[sandydlc]

Can our luck get any worse? The shipment did not go out from Mercury so now we are stuck until the parts come in on Tuesday.

There is an outside chance that some o-rings that I picked up today on the advice of our mechanic might do the trick. If so, we'll be on our way tomorrow. If not, we're back to waiting until Tuesday for the full transducer to come in.

I'm trying to be positive but again - 3 leaks in the hydraulics in 5 months. It just seems unfair if nothing else. They say that bad things come in threes so if that's the case, we're all done. I'm hopeful that the new o-ring might just do the trick, even if it's only a temporary measure.

Sandy

PS - about to go out on the dinghy so we can feel what it's like to be boating again. It's probably silly to continue staying on the boat when we live 20 minutes away but it's so comfortable and we're getting some good family time so maybe it's not so bad?


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[Fly'n Family]

So are you on your journey?

Hopin' you are and it was something small and painless...

 

[sandydlc]

So are you on your journey?

Hopin' you are and it was something small and painless...

I wish! We're still waiting for our mechanic to stop by this afternoon to try out the o-ring fix. Since it's Sunday I'm not being too insistent with him. Apparently he's out on his own boat with his daughter. I can't blame him.

I'll be sure and update here when I have more information or hopefully when we're on our way!

Thanks for checking in!

Sandy

 

[Billfletcher]

Generally speaking, and it's only anecdotal, but it seems that the older, first gen pod systems have more issues than the newer ones. IE, like any system it takes some time to refine the engineering.

 

[sandydlc]

Generally speaking, and it's only anecdotal, but it seems that the older, first gen pod systems have more issues than the newer ones. IE, like any system it takes some time to refine the engineering.

Makes sense. I wish we had known to look into this further before we purchased but how could we have known? We have a friend (met on CSR) who has an identical boat - same year and everything and he's had no pod issues. Luck of the draw I suppose but that doesn't help our current situation.

I just hope/wish that we could get past these leaks and be able to enjoy the rest of our summer on our new boat. Not too much to ask is it?

 

[JC3]

Sandy, You have a great boat and I know its frustrating to iron out the bugs BUT once you do the memories that are made with that
beautiful boat will last a life time. Its going to turn out ok just wait and see, JC

 

[sandydlc]

Update on our hydraulic leak...the transducers that our mechanic suspected were faulty were in fact not. The leak appears to be coming from the housing that is directly below the transducers and without taking more things apart, there was no way for him to identify where the leak was coming from. Also, since he's not a certified pod technician he was concerned about causing more problems.

We're left with contacting Sea Ray in the morning and hope that they can pull some leverage with our local Sea Ray dealer to move us to "emergency" status and help us tomorrow or Tuesday at the latest. If we can't get the boat fixed by Tuesday, we're going to have to scrap our boating vacation plans and find a plan B. I know that sounds like a trivial thing to a non-boater but I know that you all can feel my pain. This is the first boating vacation in a long time where our 16 year old son was actually excited about coming along with us. I bought us shellfish licenses for the US and Canada and we had everything in place to be gone from the office for the duration of our trip. Now - we're still in uncertain waters waiting to see if the problem with our pod is minor or not. I am terrified that we inherited some kind of major issue though I would hope that if this is a known or systemic issue to Mercury pods that either Sea Ray or Mercury would step in and assist with the costs. My husband is already starting to talk about not considering Sea Ray for our next boat. He's very disappointed and frustrated and I can't blame him as I feel the same way.

I'll continue updating here in case anyone is following our saga. I hope beyond hope to have better news to report tomorrow.

I would appreciate any good vibes that anyone would care to send our way.

Thanks,
Sandy

 

[ziekman@cox.net]

I feel your pain, completely. Hang in, and try to laugh it off, these things happen and all I can say from experience is its like the weather. Do all you can do preventively, then it's all up to the weather/boating g@ds.

 

[Paparaazi]

Without hijacking your thread or risk sounding like a troll. I feel for you. My experiences has lead me to not go sea Ray again. Warranty or not, they're not very forth coming with help and will only support bandaid fixes for big problems than to help you fix the root issue.. Wish you best of luck getting your boat fixed though!


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[La Maddalena]

Good luck Sandy! I'm following along as usual. I know what it feels like to have the same problem over and over again. We've had much better luck with our 420, although who knows when the next weird problem will arise.

 

[sandydlc]

Good luck Sandy! I'm following along as usual. I know what it feels like to have the same problem over and over again. We've had much better luck with our 420, although who knows when the next weird problem will arise.

Thank you Larry!

The latest update is that Lake Union Sea Ray can't get out to look at our boat until Wednesday afternoon at the earliest. Considering that there will almost certainly be parts that need to be ordered which wouldn't arrive until Friday so our boating vacation is officially cancelled. We're trying to make the best of it and we're heading North anyway early tomorrow morning and vacationing in Tofino which is somewhere we've wanted to go but I was not comfortable visiting on our boat.

I spoke to Mercury and Sea Ray this morning and while Sea Ray was apologetic, they were not very helpful. Mercury on the other hand said that they will most likely be able to at least help us out with parts depending on what part has failed. Our mechanic advised that anything that is replaced on the starboard pod should also be swapped on the port pod so I'll do that if possible.

We have isolated the leak to somewhere in the trim tabs/steering system but still don't know specifically which part is leaking. As soon as I have more information I'll post here. I appreciate all of the good wishes! Only another boater can truly feel for you when you're having mechanical issues!

Sandy

 

[sandydlc]

Update!! Lake Union Sea Ray was able to determine the cause of our leak is an o-ring that is located inside the manifold for the trim tabs on the starboard pod. Since this o-ring failed, they are recommending we replace the o-ring on the port pod as well. The cost of the o-ring? $1.60 plus shipping (and labor). I'm so irritated that such a small part could have caused this issue but of course I'm grateful that it's not the manifold itself which could have cost over $2000 to replace.

We're in Tofino BC (lovely place, btw!) and although the cell service is awful here I managed to get a call through to their service scheduler to authorize the purchase of the parts. I asked her to go ahead and replace the o-rings on each of the four transducers while they're at it since I don't want to have yet another leak anytime soon. I explained that she should go ahead and place the order regardless of the cost and without checking back with me (since I knew it would be minimal), and I also reminded her that it was unlikely that she'd be able to reach me today since we're taking an excursion and we'll be completely away from cell coverage during that time. I was really annoyed because she rushed me off the phone and all but hung up on me as I was trying to get the details covered. Keep in mind that while we're dealing with this whole issue last week I was rarely able to get anyone on the phone and ultimately had to drive down to speak to someone at Sea Ray which is really ridiculous. So pardon me for trying to be thorough on one of the few times that I was able to get through to the service scheduler who hadn't been returning my calls!! Pretty rude if you ask me.

At any rate, bad customer service aside, it appears that the parts will be in early next week and I'm hopeful that they will be able to get them installed fairly quickly so that we can at least look forward to Labor Day in the San Juans.

They say that bad things come in threes so now we've had our 3 hydraulic leaks. Can we be done please??

Sandy