us7070 294 Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 90ft cat on maiden voyage from Bristol, RI..., how many can there be? Problems befall stricken catamaran heading for Island Problems befall stricken catamaran heading for Island By Jonathan Bell A brand new yacht on its maiden voyage to Bermuda struggled to reach the Island after it was stricken with mechanical failures. The 90-foot catamaran Sunshine moored in St. George's early yesterday, assisted by the Bermuda Yacht Services vessel Line One. A Maritime Operations spokesman said the new vessel was on its way for delivery from Bristol, Rhode Island when it developed persistant technical problems. “The hydraulics on board failed for the master rigging, so they couldn't raise the main sail. Towards the last part of the journey both engines failed, so the vessel kept coming with the jib sail.” The crew of eight experienced “a catalogue of failures” on board the yacht, including oil leaks and an unresponsive anchor, while dealing with stormy conditions. Winds kept a steady 35 to 40 knots, with gusts of up to 50 knots, as the Sunshine made its approach to Bermuda late Sunday. “A vessel of that size was probably on the fringe of the capability of our pilot boat in St. George's,” the spokesman said. Bermuda Yacht Services owner Mark Soares agreed it was lucky the yacht hadn't needed to be towed. “They had been sitting a couple of days without hydraulic power for the main sail, and they were running ahead of deteriorating weather late Sunday. By first thing Sunday morning they'd also lost power to both engines. Originally they planned to take the yacht as far as north rock and get towered, but because of the conditions it wasn't good for our boat and crew.” Mr Soares added that no mayday was sent. The Line One left St. George's to assist around 10pm Sunday and waited at the sea buoy area roughly seven miles offshore. He said: “They got to us around 11.30pm and decided winds were favourable to sail into St. George's harbour. Our boat went ahead and piloted them in. With such a large, fast moving vessel we needed to take it under tow and get it safely anchored. “At about 1am on Monday morning they moved up into anchorage, at which time they discovered the yacht's anchoring equipment had also failed. So with limited options we managed to secure her to one of the old US Navy moorings.” The exhausted crew of the Sunshine were unavailable for comment, and so far the cause of its equipment failures remains unknown. Link to post Share on other sites
rattus32 46 Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 Edit...Oh - never mind; the article in its entirety is quoted above. e - somehow your link got contaminated by a link to a torrent hub... Here's a proper link (I hope): http://www.royalgazette.com/article/20101214/NEWS/712149961&source=RSS Mike Link to post Share on other sites
soma 807 Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 Ouch. Sounds like teething problems mainly, though, and not anything catastrophic. I did a delivery on a Wally and every system was broken by the time we arrived. Inconvenient to say the least, but not life-threatening. Link to post Share on other sites
Oxygen Mask 1 Posted December 21, 2010 Share Posted December 21, 2010 Seriously?! Having powered winches and windlass on a cruising yacht are indeed wonderful, but in what world is anyone stupid enough to have no mechanical backup? Seriously? Link to post Share on other sites
Peter Johnstone 0 Posted January 5, 2011 Share Posted January 5, 2011 A high pressure oil line fitting on both Yanmar engines failed. Yanmars are not our first choice to supply, but the local mechanic to the boat is Yanmar. The hydraulic system onboard has plenty of redundancy, and is well built, but evidently one elbow in the hydraulic line failed and emptied much of the fluid in the system before being discovered. This system was done as an owner supplied subcontracted system. Sail handling had mechanical back-up with the winches aboard. The crew manually hoisted and trimmed sails. Not easy at this size, but very do-able. They displayed some nice seamanship sailing a 90' speedster into St George's. That is a narrow entrance. In summary, three small and inexpensive bits failed and made for some embarassing news. Overall, the 90 is an amazing project. I am glad they arrived safely at their final destination after Bermuda without further issues. The captain reports that they can sit on 25 knots forever and they have not even pushed the boat yet. Link to post Share on other sites
eric e 9 Posted January 5, 2011 Share Posted January 5, 2011 thanks for the confirmation/update Peter did the early failure of the hydraulic elbow link somehow to the later failure of the engines? the morelli site says they were yanmar 6YL's http://www.simplicity-marine.com/yan6ly.htm would it be safe to say you'll try to do more to convince owners to stick to the volvo pentas? http://sailboatdata.com/viewrecord_metric.asp?class_id=6103 http://www.volvo.com/NR/exeres/9358A18A-8E8C-41D4-87CC-D37AFECC7E72.htm Link to post Share on other sites
Peter Johnstone 0 Posted January 8, 2011 Share Posted January 8, 2011 Eric, We have found Volvos to be more reliable and they offer better support if anything should go wrong. I think Yanmar's decent reputation in the USA is largely due to the efforts of the NE distributor Mac Boring. Volvos have been standard on our various series for over six years. The newer 50 & 60 are going to a hybrid system with very reliable electric drives. The Yanmar high pressure oil fittings had nothing to do with the hydraulic elbow. Both issues were due to very small parts, and seemingly minor, unless they happen together, as they did. Peter Link to post Share on other sites
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.