New item added to our boat checkout list

Hi,

We had a genset fail during the middle of the night last week filling the forward locker and the salon with quite a bit of electrical smoke due to a bearing failure. The couple sleeping in the forward cabin eventually smelled the smoke and woke everyone up.

The smoke detector in the main salon never went off and when we checked it after the crisis calmed down the battery was dead. Another thing to add to our pre-departure check list!

On a more pleasant topic we had a great meal at the restaurant upstairs at Leverick as many on this board have already commented. It was fine dining and I was surprised by the reasonable prices. We unfortunately pay the same or more at better restaurants in the Boston, MA rear. We were there on the 2nd to last day of season.

Dennis

Glad everybody was ok although it must have been a scary few moments. Thanks for sharing.

Glad everyone is ok. Curious what model of boat was it?

If it was a "bearing" I am surprised no noise went with the failure. "Electrical" smoke would not match a mechanical bearing failure. The reality is most of the smaller boats were never engineered fully from the ground up for a proper genset. Marketing requirements/demands force the generators in locations that are undersized, poorly ventilated , and not set up well for the very regular maintenance all the generators require. Then pile on the charter customers with many rapid starts and short cycles coupled with suspect oil change intervals. The fact that it ventilated into the cabin points to poor ventilation and design flaws. Did the thing seize up, what where the symptoms displayed? Any idea what the recommended oil change intervals are for the unit?

To be honest, I don't know that I've ever seen a smoke detector on any of the boats I've chartered. Maybe they are there and I haven't noticed.

My boat at home doesn't have them either unless the carbon monoxide detectors double as smoke detectors. We have heat detectors in the engine room but definitely not smoke because I had the engine room fill with smoke last season one day.

Have others seen smoke detectors on charter boats?

The boat was a Lagoon 500 from CatCo. The tech guy said the bearing going bad caused the armature to rub against the field coils causing the electric short circuit and ensuing smoke. The unit eventually locked up.

I've chartered many boats from Catco and they have all been well maintained, including this one. Gensets get beat to death on charter boats and this one's time was up.

I'm not sure I've noticed smoke detectors on previous boats I've chartered either. I'm in the process of buying a boat and will certainly have smoke and heat detectors on board,

Several years ago we were the 1st charter on a Voyage 440. The gen set failed for the same reason!
Bottom Line: Stuff Happens!

If you can get a properly engineered and installed Northern Lights matching your loads with service intervals you know you(or your operator) can meet for the new boat. You should expect the Northern Lights to meet or even far exceed the published service life. Not all generators are created equal. That said nothing matters more than a proper installation of a unit that matches the actual loads and the religious execution of the required service routines. Today they are many generators that should be serviced before the end of a ten day charter and such.