Cliffy
AH elite
OK so we're on another fishing trip off shore from Los Angeles. My buddy likes to fish deep for Rock Cod. I mean deeeep! 600 to 900 feet!. So we wind up half way to Catalina Island, in the middle of the shipping lanes (did I mention that)? Fairly calm day, 3 foot swell no wind waves. We pull up our lines and he starts the motor. Now you need to know Gary. Gary only knows 2 throttle positions no matter what boat he's in. On and Off! No in between.
So what does Gary do when it starts? Slams the throttle forward trying to bend the knob off, Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! Can you guess what happens? Full RPM NO forward movement. He shears the props shear pin.
So I says to myself, Self, we're in a world of crap now. I ask him where the spare shear pins are and he says, "What shear pins"? It's his boat but he has no spares and I'm dumb enough to 15 miles to sea with him (he ran out of gas once and floated 2 days and 50 miles off shore until a sailboat found him, but that's another story too). I won't go into what we did as airline mechanics at LAX 40 years ago. Anyway, here we are stuck and now what to do.
I remembered an old article I read in Popular Mechanix magazine when I was about 12 years old (20 years earlier) about what to do if this happened. My mind is filled with lots of junk info. It said that the pin breaks in 3 parts. 2 smaller outside pieces and 1 longer inside piece and if you unscrew the shaft nut and carefully remove 1 out side piece and push it in on the other side that would allow the longer inside piece to drive the prop.
So we're in 1000 ft of water and I'm hanging over the stern working on the prop nut knowing if I drop it we drift till our bones bleach. As luck would have it, I was successful and I drove the boat back home slowly. I would have cut his arm off if he reached for the controls! We're still friends to this day.
So what does Gary do when it starts? Slams the throttle forward trying to bend the knob off, Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! Can you guess what happens? Full RPM NO forward movement. He shears the props shear pin.
So I says to myself, Self, we're in a world of crap now. I ask him where the spare shear pins are and he says, "What shear pins"? It's his boat but he has no spares and I'm dumb enough to 15 miles to sea with him (he ran out of gas once and floated 2 days and 50 miles off shore until a sailboat found him, but that's another story too). I won't go into what we did as airline mechanics at LAX 40 years ago. Anyway, here we are stuck and now what to do.
I remembered an old article I read in Popular Mechanix magazine when I was about 12 years old (20 years earlier) about what to do if this happened. My mind is filled with lots of junk info. It said that the pin breaks in 3 parts. 2 smaller outside pieces and 1 longer inside piece and if you unscrew the shaft nut and carefully remove 1 out side piece and push it in on the other side that would allow the longer inside piece to drive the prop.
So we're in 1000 ft of water and I'm hanging over the stern working on the prop nut knowing if I drop it we drift till our bones bleach. As luck would have it, I was successful and I drove the boat back home slowly. I would have cut his arm off if he reached for the controls! We're still friends to this day.
