Short Story....
Thinking I finally had the mystery motor issue fixed after 10 months and multiple mechanics... I was disheartened to find the issue is still there. I managed to limp around super close to home to catch some fresh groceries, but after 2 hours of making the best of the situation, dropped the boat back off to the shop. The mechanic trouble-shooted this recent trip in order to find a possible match in the codes for the motor and we may have found the issue. This disturbs me because another shop charged me and said they replaced this part, but that shop was later determined to use very nefarious means of cheating their customers.... Hoping for the best this time.
Long Version...
I got to the ramp to see dozens of marauding corvina slashing away at the ramp! I casted out a 7" Daiwa SP minnow and hooked two right away, or I snagged them as it was hard to tell. Both cases, they flopped off as I was trying to slide them up the ramp.
The light finally started to come up and I was hoping the motor was fixed and the $1100 tune up was going to make it run awesome.
I only got a few hundred yards, and you can guess what happened ... Same issue. I video taped it and decided to use the speed zone in the bay to try and trouble shoot the issue. Basically below1500rpm's and I can move without alarming and stalling... but only travel at about 3-4 mph. Anything from 1500 to 4500, and I alarm and stall all the time... like every 10 seconds. Over 4500 rpm and it runs just fine with no alarms, but I'll be going over 22-25 mph at this point. The issue is that I can't always slap on waves in my boat at the speed and lost everything between 4-25 mph. Ugh...
Anyway, I'm trying to seriously get my head straight as it's been in a dark place for a while and I need to get it back into the light. I decided to limp out and fish for 2 hours really close in to try and get some groceries before heading back and running the boat down to the shop. It was a painful ride, but thankfully the trolling motor worked like a charm and I got to fish some good structure for a bit.
I actually caught over a dozen bass. Most were right at or around 14 inches, so I just threw them back. I also got 4 of them that were from 2.5 to 3.5 pounds. Two were easy releases, so I let them go. Two inhaled the swimbait and they became table fare.
Some in breeding colors that went back to do their thing...
Got 4 decent Johnny bass...
Released Goat-let.
Big Blue Perch which surprised me as we don't usually see too many down here, or at least I don't.
Three sculpin. I released them all even though they are the tastiest of the bunch as I just didn't want to deal with the spines today.
Assorted Rockfish. Kelp, Gopher, Brown, along with 3 Whitefish.
It was a good few hours. I kept enough for a few meals and limped my way back in an while 4 mph.... ugh....
I ran home, emptied the boat, gave it a quick rinse, and ran to the shop. I was happy he spent some time with me trying to figure out at what motor hour that ran since I last got the boat back did some of the error codes come up. Apparently multiple codes come up for a variety of reason under normal operating so I think we finally might have figured it out. My fingers are crossed.
Thanks for reading!
