Thursday 4^th July, Mackay, Qld Australia!)   21:06.733S  149:13.6E

Today’s Blog by David (Time zone BST +9.00; UTC +10.00)

Well – that is  it! Ted flew home  on Tuesday.  Terry and Lenie spent the day cleaning the boat before catching a plane  on Wednesday – a day which I spent cleaning another part of the boat before heading to Brisbane today  to meet Simone who arrives from the UK tomorrow.

A major service is due on the engine (1000 hours)  and I have elected to have it done now – at 940 hours – because the engine needs a routine 200 hour  service anyway and because the replacement alternator should be here on Friday so it might as well all get “done” together.

Talking of being “done”, I gently enquired as to the likely cost of this endeavour.  Wayne, (for that is the mechanic’s name), looked at me as if I was mad and said: ”No.  I am not going to quote on this, No. I’ve done that before and it’s gone wrong. No”, which seemed pretty equivocal to me, so I enquired about his hourly rate. Without hesitation,  he looked me in the eye and said ”$107 per hour.”   “So,” I said, “ it’s not going to be a grand then is it?”   “A Grand? You have got to be joking, mate”,  replied Wayne with a leering smile, “I’ve ordered the parts from Cummins.  The service pack alone is $800!” 

Now, this is a major service which we cannot do ourselves – it requires the belts to be changed , and that requires special tools which we don’t have. The service is going to have to be done in Australia somewhere, so we are stuck with it.   The only debate is whether to replace the tensioners and idlers at the same time.  These would normally only be changed if there were signs of  wear but Bob went on dealer service certification course before we left the UK at which he was advised to carry these as spares and replace them at this service – as a purely precautionary measure..

Now, at this point, avid readers may remember that these have already been changed  while we were in Gibraltar; indeed there is a picture of the offending items at: http://blog.mailasail.com/serendipity/35 . It was a faulty tensioner/idler that caused the belts to wear then.   If they are not changed now but subsequently they become faulty then they will repeat the damage to the belts .  After wearing for a while,  the belts will break. This would be pretty terminal because the engine would not work.

Imagine now, if you will, that we are perhaps  in Indonesia when the engine stops ..... The local mechanic will want $800 for another service kit, and will be pricing his work in the knowledge that we cannot leave without the engine. On balance then, we have concluded that we need to replace the whole lot now. SO.... Wayne is going to do very nicely indeed out of what is a precautionary service.

I always said that if I were to have my time again I would have been a lawyer or a banker but this mechanicing business seems pretty well remunerated and not particularly stressful!

Anyway, Wayne it is. Meanwhile, I plan to find me a Kangaroo and a Koala......................