Black Valkyrie
Active Member
Back from the dead (I hope)...
The sad story of my boat... hopefully a happy ending coming soon...
So - some of you may recall, several years back I was having trouble with power and overheating issue with one motor on my boat. Couldn't get the mechanic to ever show up... finally he did and put a new radiator cap on the engine, which made no difference.
The boat sat barely used. We could never get a hold of the mechanic and were growing desperate. In 2019 we pulled the boat- cleaned and painted it ourselves and changed the anodes.
Couldn't get it to run right still overheating one engine. Mechanic resurfaces - charges us another boat buck claiming now that the engine had problems and that it needed major work. Recommends we open an insurance claim..
Insurance guys get a hold of me and then they play tag team with the mechanic who promptly disappears. Then covid hits. Everything stops. If you think it was hard finding the mechanic pre covid, try in covid..fully vanished.
We are ready to give up. Paying moorage for 3 seasons for no use of the boat. Only person getting $$$ is the mechanic who does nothing.
We take her out for a spin only once - last summer (covid).. she promptly (and for real this time) overheats... previously just read hot on the gauge. Steam comes out.
Shut her down and head straight back to port. The bad engine controls the power steering as well. Ugh. Also discover that the trim cylinders on this engine have leaked their guts into the ocean.
Spend the last 6 months hunting a new mechanic. Finally find a shop and they send down a tech. They tell me to throw in the towel and that I should try to sell her. They don't have the time for smaller boats. They recommend testing the market by listing her for $5k to see if we get any interest.
I list her on Craigslist for $5k with full disclosure and get literally 30 responses in an hour. Uh oh.
Try with a 10k price, then 20k. People wanting to buy her. Am I making a mistake? Giving up?
I skim the ads and realize prices have gone bonkers (covid again??)... kids don't want to give up the boat. Even as a dead hulk she appears to be worth $20. After being online for only 24hrs we pull the ad altogether.
So we decide to keep her and continue the hunt for a new permanent mechanic, and after a few more months finally find who I hope is a great mechanic. Recommended by a few people.
I get her towed (in water) to the haul out.
She is out of the water now, legs off and being properly maintained for the first time since we owned her. Mechanic actually has employees and they actually show up!!
We honestly feel we were taken advantage of by the previous mechanic. We didn't know much about bigger boats having only had a 17 footer before this. We paid a good chunk of change annually for him to maintain it. We made sure we paid him well and he knew we wanted to do PREVENTIVE maintenance!
Now we realize he basically did nothing but take our money. I didn't know the legs had to come off and the impellers changed. I would ask.. hey do those things ever need to come off That? That never happened once in 6 years. We just paid for maintenance, thousands a year. Now we have at least one ruined leg, 4 bad trim cylinders and a big bill.
Hoping to actually spend time on her this summer before the kids grow up and lose interest.
That's our sad story.
The sad story of my boat... hopefully a happy ending coming soon...
So - some of you may recall, several years back I was having trouble with power and overheating issue with one motor on my boat. Couldn't get the mechanic to ever show up... finally he did and put a new radiator cap on the engine, which made no difference.
The boat sat barely used. We could never get a hold of the mechanic and were growing desperate. In 2019 we pulled the boat- cleaned and painted it ourselves and changed the anodes.
Couldn't get it to run right still overheating one engine. Mechanic resurfaces - charges us another boat buck claiming now that the engine had problems and that it needed major work. Recommends we open an insurance claim..
Insurance guys get a hold of me and then they play tag team with the mechanic who promptly disappears. Then covid hits. Everything stops. If you think it was hard finding the mechanic pre covid, try in covid..fully vanished.
We are ready to give up. Paying moorage for 3 seasons for no use of the boat. Only person getting $$$ is the mechanic who does nothing.
We take her out for a spin only once - last summer (covid).. she promptly (and for real this time) overheats... previously just read hot on the gauge. Steam comes out.
Shut her down and head straight back to port. The bad engine controls the power steering as well. Ugh. Also discover that the trim cylinders on this engine have leaked their guts into the ocean.
Spend the last 6 months hunting a new mechanic. Finally find a shop and they send down a tech. They tell me to throw in the towel and that I should try to sell her. They don't have the time for smaller boats. They recommend testing the market by listing her for $5k to see if we get any interest.
I list her on Craigslist for $5k with full disclosure and get literally 30 responses in an hour. Uh oh.
Try with a 10k price, then 20k. People wanting to buy her. Am I making a mistake? Giving up?
I skim the ads and realize prices have gone bonkers (covid again??)... kids don't want to give up the boat. Even as a dead hulk she appears to be worth $20. After being online for only 24hrs we pull the ad altogether.
So we decide to keep her and continue the hunt for a new permanent mechanic, and after a few more months finally find who I hope is a great mechanic. Recommended by a few people.
I get her towed (in water) to the haul out.
She is out of the water now, legs off and being properly maintained for the first time since we owned her. Mechanic actually has employees and they actually show up!!
We honestly feel we were taken advantage of by the previous mechanic. We didn't know much about bigger boats having only had a 17 footer before this. We paid a good chunk of change annually for him to maintain it. We made sure we paid him well and he knew we wanted to do PREVENTIVE maintenance!
Now we realize he basically did nothing but take our money. I didn't know the legs had to come off and the impellers changed. I would ask.. hey do those things ever need to come off That? That never happened once in 6 years. We just paid for maintenance, thousands a year. Now we have at least one ruined leg, 4 bad trim cylinders and a big bill.
Hoping to actually spend time on her this summer before the kids grow up and lose interest.
That's our sad story.
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