a scary moment

[ashh]

I was on my way for an evening fish at the seaway yesterday on dusk, flying up the nerang river ( well.... as fast as my 25merc would go lol), JUST entered the 6 knot zone behind the council chambers at bundall when all of a sudden 'ping!' my steering cable snapped, motor turned hard right I was tossed into the passenger seat and the boat started doing do-nuts :-X.
If it had happened only 5mins earlier when I was at full throttle, I would have been thrown from the boat and god knows what would have happened. I was not wearing the motor lanyard this time but was lucky I wasnt going so fast, so guess what, I will be wearning it ALL the time now.
Anyways, threw the pick out and assessed the predicament I was in.
I was fortunate enough that there was excess cable looped through the cable clamp to allow me to tie a reef knot, and with the tool kit I carry, made a few adjustments and continued on my merry way.
Ended up coming home with a couple of good bream.

My little project now is to replace the old cable with stainless steel cable so it never rusts and snaps again, and top up the toolkit with a few extra cable clamps.......just in case ;)







snapped cable................................... repair job....................................... reward.

[gawby]

Scarey stuff there ashh and as you say lucky you were only going slow.
I remember years ago coming back in over the currumbin bar in one of my b/i/laws boats, about half in and his is barking orders, do this do that not to quick with the throttle or you will throw me in.
Yep as you the steering cable broke and peter had bracked his legs in the back and wrappped himself around the motor to steer it.
Boy that experience was enough to put some of that stuff in your pants.
Anyhows mate you got a feed and all is good. Fix her up and go again
Graeme

[tully]

G,day ashh, thats an interesting point you raised about the kill switch lanyard.
I guess some people with tiller steer boats use them, but I have a 4.5 centre console and find it impossible to use the damn thing, you just can't move around in the boat. I have nightmares about trolling and having to reach back to grab a rod out of a holder if I get a strike, then going arse up out the back.
With a 50hp 4 stroke and 70 litres of fuel the thing would circumnavigate the country, come back, and run over me.
Maybe somebody should invent something better than the lanyard to kill the engine if you fall out.
Any bright ideas out there?

[FNQCairns]

Ash exactly the same thing happend to me once, I had just finished traveling 10km at cruise and had just slowed to sound around when mine pinged, threw me against the side of the boat. Felt blessed circumstance saved my rear end for a few days after that.

I replaced mine with the next plastic coated size up, it's been a while now but the next size up is rated a lot higher than what I suspect you and I were using (lesson learnt), I had that little tinny for at least 6 years after that without the cable becoming an issue again.

Good to hear you are safe, stuff happens in the blink of an eye!!

cheers fnq

[peterm]

I bumped into a bloke who was designing some sort of electronic proximity kill switch that was wired into the ignition circuit of a jet ski. If the rider fell off the engine would shut down. The need was due to an accident at Sea World I believe. Something like that may help in this sort of situation.

Cheers,


Pete

[FNQCairns]

Tully get hydraulic steering, at least it will not come back and be friendly, you may get a bit lonely though!

It is a scary thought but at least with fear on your side you are in a better positon for it to never happen to you.

cheers fnq