Folk Dancer 27
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May 2 , 2005
Ian wrote:
I've had a couple adventures at sea but nothing quite like what South Carolina's Josh Long and Troy Driscoll had surviving 6 days adrift. I can't wait to hear their whole story of real life survival.
I think the rains may have finally lifted. This past weekend Jenny and I, with the help of Eben and Michelle moved the cafe equipment up to the cafe. It went much easier than I thought.
Also, in between the showers, I was able to work on shingling the garage some and working on an old Seagull I bought last fall. I have been working on both projects for the last couple weeks and finally completed one.
If you're into British Seagull outboards, then what comes next will be of interest to you. If you don't, well, you can still follow along if you like. Last fall I found an old British Seagll [phone 1] [photo 2] for sale in Brunswick (since they stopped making them since 1996, technically, they are all old). It was listed for $150 and said to be in really good shape. The one problem was that the current owner couldn't get it started. I offered $75 that cold fall day. I think we might even have had some snow on the ground. When isn't there snow on the ground in Maine? Okay maybe a couple days in August. Anyhow. As I was saying. Since the engine hadn't been started, I was able to haggle the price down. I took it home and put it away in our garage. There it sat for the winter. A couple of weeks ago I decided to take a look at what I had got. It turns out the engine was built between 1960-61 and was a long shaft model. The letter 'L' at the end of the engine number denotes a long shaft engine (See how I determined the year it was built using the engine number: SJP 23888 L and my British Seagull Identification page). I put it in my test bucket and tried giving it a couple pulls. It sounded like the compression was good, but it wouldn't fire. I pulled out the spark plug and spun the flywheel to look for a spark. Nothing. I went online and did a Google search. I found a very helpful FAQ page on John Williams website - Saving Old Segulls. I followed his instruction - spinning the flywheel with a drill, cleaning the points, regapping the spark plug and also did some of my own work - cleaning the entire electrical system with Q-Tips and alcohol. After a couple weeks of trying, I finally got a spark. When the spark jumped across the plug and grounded in my hand, I jumped in the air like a little kid. It wasn't the spark that made me jump, okay maybe just a little, it was the satisfaction of trouble shooting a 45 year old engine with little to no knowledge to speak of. I was so excited I ran inside with my muddy boots on to tell Jenny of my success. She was happy for me and very supportive but I realized that she was probably as interested in my fixing a British Seagull engine as I would be about her fixing a broken sauce using roux. I think that's how you spell it. All the same, it was really, really great.
Jenny wrote:
When Ian says that he tried the engine in his test bucket, most of you probably don't know what his test bucket really is. So I will tell you. Ian dug a hole in the far left corner of the backyard and buried the bottom half of the three foot bucket in the ground. The bucket stays filled with water, and covered strategically with a wooden, hand-cut lid to fit with clasps and stays. I know now that the reason for this bucket is that the Seagull needs to have water run through it to cool down the engine. This man loves his engines! And his test bucket has been a great conversation piece! When he came in that afternoon, jumping and shouting that he had a spark, it was just about the most excited I have ever seen him. The beautiful thing about married life is that when the "sparks" that excite, become real 'sparks' (from the Seagull), I somehow find myself, oddly enough, equally as excited as he is. The Seagulls are like Ian, simple yet complex, somewhat old-fashioned and always in the garage :)
