Tales from the boatyard. The most common service calls in the office

A quiet morning in the service department is a good morning, nothing broken or requiring fixing, catch up on paperwork, answer emails and so on, phone rings, and we´re off. These don't have to be emergencies or when a client has noticed something serious, has some questions and you can schedule some time for a meeting, we are talking about things that crop up year on year.

I am also aware that a lot of boatowners are not technical or are seasonal boaters, they may not see the boat name on the transom from one summer to the next, but, sure as the sun rises, these are the issues the yard sorts out every season.

A lot of these things are actually resolved with the minimum of fuss, but, from a boatowner point of view, if you are not in your home port, with your friendly yard to hand, some of these interventions can be become costly, both in time and money.

Not in any particular order;

Flat batteries, leaving battery switches on, so when they go back to their boat, it won´t start or the electronics moaning and alarming about low voltage or house bank or service batteries not charging.

Can´t get on boat, There is no need for the ropes to resemble guitar strings.

No keys or using the wrong key to try to start engine (or example the glovebox or door key). This is particularly common when more than one person uses the boat. 

Engine won´t start, battery switch on, in neutral, man overboard switch etc.

The wrong boat, one of my favorites, yes this happens more often that you´d think, even more so with Jet skis, with so many of the same model in the same color and often near each other on the jet docks, owners call and it becomes more a case of making sure they´re on their ski, happens with boats too, you can get the same make and model of boat in the same color with the same name near each other on the dock.

Weather report, we get called a lot to know what the weather is like. This is something I am not fond of, one persons idea of navigable weather to what someone else considers okay are very different, we have to be careful to ask who is going on the boat and where. Naturally we also get it in the neck if the forecast we give should in any way not marry up to the boatowners opinion of good boating weather.

None of these are the end of the world, nor in a lot of cases need to be the end of boating for the day, now let´s move onto calls that require more to resolve.

Rope caught around the propeller, this is most common in the marina and unless you´re very unfortunate it rarely does serious damage, it either involves raising the drive and cutting the line or calling the diver to go under if you have pod drives or shafts, the latter possibly being an end to the days boating, a lot of ports have rules regarding divers in the port. Sometimes the boat needs to be lifted to remove the rope.

Something doesn't switch on, usually the stereo or nav. screen. This one should be handled with care. When the stereo doesn't work, you´d be forgiven for thinking the boat was on fire, the commotion that some people can kick up, they can´t connect, can´t turn it on etc. In my experience it is user error more often than not.

Anchor winch does not work, cue lots of talking about breakers and fuses. Anchor winches. The most common issues and how to resolve them.. I cannot remember the number of times I have given my boat delivery and handover speech, one of the topics covered in detail is how to use the anchor winch, we often go out and anchor, but every season, many calls will come in about anchor winches not working for one reason or another.

I told you so. The off season is spent quoting for various services, upgrades and repairs to make the boating high season as stress and event free as possible. So, when the very thing you quoted for fixing or renovating because it wasn't going to last much longer suddenly fails, it should come as no surprise.

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