Champlain Rendezvous

Little Bitt, Nellie D., Callisto and Fram

The tugs have arrived in Burlington, Vermont!

Tug Spotting: Carla B. 37VT05 and Nellie D. 37VT63

A mini rendezvous on the Erie Canal at the Schenectady Yacht Club, NY with Carla B 37VT05 and Nellie D. 37VT63

Tug spotting: Fun 37VT75

Peter Reich forwarded these pictures of Fun which was spotted today in Coecles Harbor, Shelter Island, NY.  She's looking good!

Engine Room Ventilation

I have so much enjoyed the blog and seeing what other folks do to improve their tugs, so I thought I would take a little time to tell you what I have been messing with on Thistle 37VT47.

A couple years ago I decided that the engine room lacked enough ventilation for proper cooling and air for the engine.  I installed an inline 3" blower.  It was kind of noisy with a high pitch whine.  But, it seemed to help, maybe 10 degrees or so, but this is hard to measure.

I also didn't like the fumes from my Cummins 4BT3.9-M 150HP crankcase just floating around in the engine room making everything a little oily. The cure for that was a 3 or 4 hundred dollar breather cap device.

My inverter/charger was starting to complain about the temperature.  Its manufacturer wants it in an area with lots of ventilation and a maximum temperature of 104 degrees.  That must be a misprint or else they are not made to be used in Virginia.

Seems we are getting a little older or maybe just spoiled but I ran the 8KW generator a lot this summer so we could have air conditioning. Wow, does it get toasty in the engine room with everything running. There was really no other place to install the inverter/charger and so here is my solution to the problem.

They were promoting a blower for engine rooms at the boat show (Sea Flow SFBB1-130-01) that was super quiet, with a 4 yr. warranty and made for continuous operation. I installed one on the port side blowing out and one on the starboard side blowing in. Based on engine room size and the blowers rated output, theoretically they change the air once per minute.  I aimed the discharge from the blowing in air blower straight at the inverter/charger to help with the high temperature issue.

A close look at the blower sending the warm air out will show a ¾ inch plastic tube that is an extension of the crankcase breather tube. This is placed near the intake of the air out blower. I find a little oily residue on the outside of the boat at the 3" round vent, so we know it's working. The in and out vents are new and none of the original vents are changed in anyway.

Ed McChain, Thistle 37VT

mcchain@verizon.net

Tug Spotting: Callisto 37VT19

Callisto, with Keefer and Bill Irwin aboard, is spotted on Lake Champlain heading towards Burlington, VT

Teddy Bear Gets an Update

From: Peter S. Reich, MAC <peter@reichboat.com>

Date: June 27, 2018 14:29:35

Subject: Before and After

Only took 33 years to do this!

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Peter S. Reich, MAC

⚓️ 631-749-0138 ⚓️

peter@reichboat.com